By David Fritch

What happens when you put nine unique, fiery, and passionate, young adults together for nine-months to give their lives, full-time, to pursue the “one thing” that really matters in life?  Our journey as the Burn 24-7’s first pioneer, full-time internship is an experience that has forever changed the lives of those that have given their lives to this for the last year. However, this journey to the place of radical life-change was full of death to self, awkward relational conflicts, getting gut wrenching honest, facing fears, disciplining our flesh & winning and losing the battles against doubt and accusation. To be a part of this experience and to witness first hand the stunning transformation of these young adults has been one of the greatest privileges of my life.

Established in Love

I remember our first week of the internship, everything was so new, so exciting and everyone was so eager to give their all in every activity that we did—especially worship. One morning during worship the presence of the Lord was so thick that it was overwhelming. Many were weeping, and some were standing in stunned silence as God was revealing his love to us.  At the end of worship each intern shared the most amazing visions, and words that God spoke to them.  However, I noticed that one of our guys was visibly upset…almost mad.

He began to share his feelings of rejection and anger that he feels like he never encounters God like everyone else.  As he was speaking I saw in my minds eye a picture of a veil over his heart.  The Lord reminded me of 2 Corinthians 3:16 that speaks of the veil that covers the hearts of people whenever the law is read.  In an instant the Lord said to me, “whenever anyone tries to approach me by living by the law, and thereby trying to earn my love it is as if a veil covers their heart and they can’t see clearly who I am or who they are to me.”

This ministry time was a moment that is forever ingrained in my heart and it was the beginning of a journey of understanding God’s overwhelming unconditional love for us even in our weakness and immaturity! When someone feels love it changes everything about them. It changes the way they walk, talk, and how the prioritize their life!  It has been so beautiful to see the amazing transformation on the faces of these interns as they are discovering they are God’s treasure!

Humility displaces the Devil

About half way into the internship God began to deal with us about the sin of presumption and pride. As a result of this sin the general atmosphere of the internship house was heavy, apathetic, irritable and many began to complain that they felt burnt out.

One night during worship the Lord led us into corporate repentance for not listening to his voice, for depending more on our gifts and talents rather than operating out of a place of intimacy and anointing.  We had become experts at having good prayer meetings, and  ministering to others but had failed in our first priority—intimacy and dependency on the Lord.  The spiritual attack during this time was extremely intense and many were struggling emotionally and financially in big ways.  The day after we repented and realigned our heart to the Lord we saw instant breakthrough in finances—in fact several thousand dollars came in the next day. We also saw an overwhelming and dramatic shift in people’s emotions. People were lighter, they were reenergized, and full of joy.

From then on we decided that we would do nothing without consulting the Holy Spirit! There are too many stories to tell here of the healings, break-throughs and fruit that has come as a result of this—the main one being joy! Ministry and life is so much more fun when you do it with the Holy Spirit leading!

Healing from Hurts

During the last two months of this program the Lord told us that His agenda was “healing the heart.” We spent almost every other day learning about issues of the heart and how we develop bad life-patterns as a result of our hurt and pain.  During this time God gently removed all of our “band-aids” and the things we have used to avoid, cover and numb the pain as he gently ministered to the deep places of our hearts.

Deep issues of un-forgiveness, bitterness, self-hatred, fear and depression seemed to almost instantly break off of people as God set them free from the shame of their past. As God has been healing the interns many of them have said that many things we taught at the beginning of the year they never comprehended until God healed their heart.

From Law to Love

During the last month of the internship God has been teaching us not only to receive his unconditional love and grace in our weakness but to also learn to love each other with this same kind of grace. I believe the only way to have effective relationship in this life is to be full of grace.  Grace means that we are no longer concerned about punishing people for their shortcomings or for falling short of our expectations but that we are more concerned about our relationship with them.  How do relationships work outside of the law—outside of having to punish people when they fail, or fall short of our expectations?

If you transgress me and I punish you then I am saying I am the one in control of the relationship.  But under grace if you transgress me, and it’s not my responsibility to punish you or change you then we free the person to be convicted by the Holy Spirit, take responsibility for their own actions and to deal with the consequences of their sin with integrity. One of the greatest freedoms we have experienced is the being liberated from the lie that we can change or control anyone! We can’t! So they have to be responsible to change themselves. We are only at the beginning of this journey but our love and respect for each other is escalating!

On May 28, nine-radically transformed young adults will make history as they become the first full-time Burn 24-7 intern graduates.  The best is yet to come! If you’d like to send a word of congratulations you can go to www.burningonesonline.com and leave a short message!