Reflection  ·  November 1, 2026

Sunday Service  ·  10:00 AM

Citizens of HEAVEN · Living on Earth

“LORD, I’m listening, I’m receiving, what do you want me to do?”

Pastor Hector Boucet opened this Sunday’s message where the series left off. Last week the church heard about the fire falling. Then came restoring the altar, and keeping the altar burning. Sunday, Pastor Boucet took it one step further: the fire must be carried. It is nice to come to church and feel pumped up, he said, but the question that matters is what you are doing when you leave out of here. Before the message even began, he asked the church to prepare their hearts to receive — and not only to hear what the LORD has for them, but to be willing to do what HE tells them to do.

The fire of GOD was never meant to be kept in church, Pastor Boucet said. You can listen to the best preaching, take a hint here and a hint there, enjoy the service and enjoy the food — and still walk out unchanged. Disobedience, he said plainly, is not love: you demonstrate that you love GOD by being obedient to HIS WORD, especially when HE tells you to do something you do not want to do. We are quick to believe GOD is speaking when the word is pleasant, and quick to doubt when it costs us something. But HE keeps repeating HIMSELF until we listen.

The test comes on Monday. Sunday you are pumped up; Monday you are back at your job, facing the people you are not too happy with. Pastor Boucet told the story of a co-worker who accused him falsely before a human resources manager, inventing curses he never said. Ten years passed without a word between them. Then one morning at seven o’clock, the phone rang from Salinas: the man was calling to ask forgiveness for the lies he had told. Pastor Boucet told him he had forgiven him a long time ago. That, he said, is how a Christian handles it: you do not carry the offense, you carry the fire — and you let the HOLY SPIRIT change the way you see the person who hurt you.

The first point is a daily decision. Have you ever committed to something and then not stuck with it? Pastor Boucet said most of us live in that mode: committed, but not sticking to it. Feelings go up and down like the Dow Jones. What matters is not staying stuck there. In the Old Testament, sacrifices were placed upon the altar and left there. But Paul introduces something more powerful in Romans 12:1-2: a living sacrifice. Worship cannot be limited to a Sunday. Offer GOD everything — your decisions, your conversations, your attitudes, your relationships, your priorities. A living sacrifice must make a daily decision to remain surrendered, every single day. What happened yesterday is history; today is another day, and today you decide again.

Romans 12:1-2 (KJV)

Then came the harder question: are you surrendered to GOD when things are going well, or even when obedience becomes uncomfortable? Many people want GOD’s fire but still want to control one part of their lives themselves — that part is off limits. Pastor Boucet said the renewing of the mind every single day is extremely important, because the only way you will be able to handle everything you are going through is by allowing HIM to control it all. Let HIM take control of your entire life: your decisions, your attitudes, everything.

The second point turns from commitment to visibility. The fire is not about how emotional you become during the service, Pastor Boucet said. People respond differently when they feel the presence of the HOLY SPIRIT — some raise their hands, some weep — but the real question is how surrendered you remain when the song finishes and the service is over. Your neighbor, he said, does not care whether you were in church or not. He is watching to see whether everything is nice and smooth in your life — whether the fire in you makes a difference wherever you go. When somebody offends you, do you pour a pail of water on the fire? Or does the HOLY SPIRIT still show?

Here is the encouragement: every time you catch yourself — oops, I just did something that was not right — that is the HOLY SPIRIT still working on you. It does not mean you will be perfect overnight. It means you are taking little steps every single day, and you are willing to change. That willingness is what lets the fruit of the SPIRIT show, as Galatians 5:22-23 describes it: love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. And JESUS said it first in Matthew 5:14-16: you are the light of the world, and your light is meant to shine before men.

Matthew 5:16 (KJV)

Pastor Boucet held up a living example: a woman in the church family who keeps saying no to Friday-night invitations because she does not want to fall back into the temptation she left behind. Her mother is not in good health. Her sister is not in good health. Her brother-in-law is not in good health, and she broke down when she left last week. She is not perfect, he said — once in a while the old ways come up, as they do for everyone — but she has given her heart to the LORD, and when you allow the HOLY SPIRIT to transform you, you start looking at things totally differently. That is a visible fire: not a perfect life, but a changed one.

The third point is the purpose of the power. Notice, Pastor Boucet said, that the power was not given simply so the believers could have a powerful experience together. It was given so they could become witnesses (Acts 1:8). The HOLY SPIRIT empowered them to take the message of JESUS beyond the place where they gathered, and that is exactly what HE is asking of us: we are equipped here, and then HE wants us to go out there. You could know the Bible from A to Z, he said, and it would do no good if you never carried it to anyone. Once you are totally equipped and ready, you will say, LORD, I am ready to go out there now — and you will go out there and do HIS will.

Acts 1:8 (KJV)

— Pastor Hector Boucet

Pastor Boucet closed with the call the whole message had been building toward: who wants to keep that fire on? Who is willing to lose their life for the lives of others? Listen to what the LORD has to say, and listen to what HE tells you. And remember — just don’t come here to church and let the fire end here. Do not let your worship end when the music stops. Carry the fire into Monday, into your workplace, into your home, and into every place where someone is watching to see whether the GOD you praise on Sunday changes the way you live on Monday.

Carry the Fire: When the Altar Becomes a Lifestyle is not a message to admire and forget. It is a message to answer — with a daily decision to remain surrendered, a life in which the fire is visible, and a witness carried to others this week.

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