“…He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. He is ready to separate the chaff from the wheat with his winnowing fork. Then he will clean up the threshing area, gathering the wheat into his barn and burning the chaff with never-ending fire.”
Matthew 3:11-12 NLT
Teaching… what a great way to learn…
In preparing… I see a new facet of who Jesus is… and what He does… with His winnowing fork…
Winnowing the Chaff | Bamiyan (Photo credit: Hadi Zaher)
winnow… verb… 1: to remove (as chaff) by a current of air… to get rid of (something undesirable or unwanted): remove… separate, sift… select 2: to treat (as grain) by exposure to a current of air so that waste matter is eliminated… to free of unwanted or inferior elements: pare… 3: …to separate desirable and undesirable elements…
–Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th Ed.)
Before… the only aspect I’ve seen… recognized… in His winnowing… was Judgment Day… the day He will come to separate… wheat from chaff… sheep from goat… Believer from unbeliever…
But the Word says… He is ready to separate the chaff from the wheat…
He’s ready to do it NOW…
And what I see now… is His work in our lives… by the power of the Holy Spirit…
Allowing sin to toss our lives about… turn us upside-down… so He might reveal… and remove… what keeps us separated from Him… blowing conviction into our lives…
The winnowing begins now… with the process of sanctification…
For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.
Titus 2:11-14 ESV
As He works in our lives with His winnowing fork… He sifts out the sin… and then He cleans up where we’ve been threshed…
Our chaff… our sin… is swept away forever… while the wheat… the fruit He’s grown in our lives… is stored in heaven…
We cannot thresh ourselves… we cannot remove the chaff from our lives… only He can do this… when we submit… surrender… to the work of His winnowing…
“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. …”
Matthew 6:19-21 NIV
Winnowing is heart work… and He’s doing it now…
[Photo from: https://womenfromthebook.com/category/gleaning/%5D
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