From "Apostolic Foundations"
The Glory of God
… and he stepped down after making the sin offering and the burnt offering and the peace offerings. And Moses and Aaron went into the tent of meeting. When they came out and blessed the people, the glory of the Lord appeared to all the people. Then fire came out from before the Lord and consumed the burnt offering and the portions of fat on the altar; and when all the people saw it, they shouted and fell on their faces. (Leviticus 9:22b–24)
Everything had been done according as it was commanded, and then God Himself ignited the sacrifice supernaturally. It is interesting that the seventh day of waiting results in the eighth day of release. The number eight represents the resurrection life and power. Seven days of complete death and the eighth day of the power, which is the life of God Himself.
If we have not seen that glory, it is because we have not fulfilled all that the Lord commanded us to do. If there is any single distinctive that is at the heart of apostolic, it is the singular jealousy for the glory of God. That is what makes us fools for Christ’s sake, namely, a faith that believes for that glory, and a jealousy for the demonstration of that glory. To have any lesser criterion for success is to rob God’s people, and to frustrate the Lord Himself, and to fixate us at a lesser level. When the glory of God appears, then the Lord appears, for the Lord is His glory. It is this appearance that the church so desperately needs. His glory is not some ethereal thing, but a substantive phenomenon that can be seen and experienced. We have lived so long without it that we are satisfied merely with the phrase about it without any real expectation for it. "To Him be the glory in the church …" is Paul’s summation of the church in Ephesians 3:21a. There has got to be glory in the church, or it simply is not the church, and it has failed in its purpose. If glory does not come through the church, then it does not come at all, and if it is not in the church, then how shall it be communicated anywhere in the world?
… and when all the people saw it, they shouted and fell on their faces. (v 24b)
This is the effect of the appearing of the glory of God on men, despite their resistance, self-will and shallowness. Your face is what you are. Everything came down before God when they saw that. And that alone is true blessedness. There was none of that ‘Amen’ and ‘Hallelujah’ stuff that punctuates our charismatic services, but a prostration that is so profound and so utter that when you rise from that, you never rise in the same way in which you went down. All of your seeing, your whole perspective, all of your reckoning, valuing and plans are affected by that going down. You cannot again go on as before. That is what happens when you fall before the demonstration of the glory of God. The God of Moses and Aaron is God still, and if He will have a priestly people on the earth as consecrated as were Aaron and his sons, then that glory will again fall.
The priests were to teach the people the difference between the profane and the sacred. How then as the Body of Christ can we manifest this distinction to the world? How can we perform priestly ministry with such discernment when a priestly reality is absent from our own lives? Perhaps we have neglected to ascend the holy mount, or have lost all desire for transfiguration glory. We have not recognized that there is a holy place where one stands alone in the presence of God, ministering first to Him. We have grown content to remain outside the tent of meeting where our religious activity has become a kind of entertainment, technically correct, but devoid of glory, devoid of the fragrance of heaven and devoid of priestly ministry.
Jesus Himself came out of the holy place with God, and so must every minister who aspires to be priestly. The brashness, the metallic ring, and the human, earthly atmosphere of so much ministry is sure evidence that men have not waited in the holy place, or even recognize that there is such a place to which God is calling them, and which awaits them. Our voices, like our faces, are a trademark and a statement of a consistent relationship with the God of all grace. They indicate in an unmistakable way the truth and depth of a believer’s relationship with his God. When that radiance comes, the irony is that we will not even know it! We will have come to a total unselfconsciousness about ourselves, that we will not even be aware that we are shining. This radiance is obtained in one place only, namely, the priestly place, a place of waiting in the presence of God by those who believe that there is such a place, and have the faith to enter it, and live and move and have their being from that place. Then the world will know the difference between the sacred and the profane.
There has been a failure of the priestly ministry to be expressed in our midst that we have lost even the desire to experience the glory of God. We have grown content with so little, content with merely ‘good’ meetings and expecting no more. An expectation must first be rekindled in us, an expectation that the glory of God can actually fall from heaven like fire—men brought down on their faces, awe, gasps, hands clasped over mouths and deep breakings. If we desire this result for the wrong reasons, then we can forget of ever seeing it. Those of us who desire to see people coming down in great prostration can even secretly desire it for their own self-glorification: "Look what my preaching has obtained!" How many of us, who stand behind the pulpit, have in the back of our minds that we are the ones who are going to score a home run? How much of that is unconscious, yet nevertheless there? We want to see the glory of God, but we want to see it for our glorification, and therefore we do not see it. It is an abomination, and we are cheating people from God’s glory because such subtleties of self still inhere in our carnal ministerial hearts. When we seek to frame a message in order to impress our audience, then that is the end of the message - it is no longer a priestly word.