The Unquenchable Fire

The  Unquenchable  Fire

from   Sunrise  Service  #197

Uranda   February 11, 1951

 

The patterns that human beings tend to accept as being fixed and more or less permanent are changed. If it were not for the reality of change we would have little hope. The conditions that now are in the world would not be satisfactory to anyone if they were to be made permanent. Man is making tremendous efforts to bring change about, with all kinds of plans and ideas, but we know that man cannot successfully change himself. We know that those improvements which are undertaken on the basis of high ideals but in human strength are not successful. There is, then, the evident need of change, and yet the fact is that man of himself cannot produce the essential change.

I would like to read to you a few words from the third chapter of Matthew, that they may help focalize meditation and realization. One cannot read or hear these words without recognizing and feeling the fire, the earnestness, the zeal, with which they were first spoken. They are the words of John, the Baptist, introducing the Master’s Ministry:

"Then went out to him Jerusalem, and all Judea, and all the region round about Jordan, And were baptized of him in Jordan, confessing their sins… I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance: but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire: Whose fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire."

Let us meditate for a little time on this introduction to our Master's Ministry on earth—the concluding words: "But he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire." We know that fire to be the Fire of God's Love; we rejoice in the assurance that the chaff, that which is not of God's perfect Plan, shall be burned away; but there is one word here that is of particular significance, something that brings our hearts great joy, a feeling of assurance, confidence in the outworking of God's Plan—that word, unquenchable. We recognize that many human beings have been inclined to conjure up frightful imaginings in relationship to "unquenchable fire," but to us it is a delightful word, a word in which we rejoice.

Looking back a little in history, we note that there was a great effort, even while our Master walked on earth, to quench that Fire. Those who were attempting to quench the Fire thought they had done so when they sent our LORD and KING to the ignominy of the cross, but it was an unquenchable Fire which He released on earth. As soon as His followers began, according to their highest understanding at the time, to preach the Gospel, and there was response thereto, there was a tremendous effort made to quench that Fire. The efforts to quench the Fire became so violent that the world was ushered into what is historically called, "The dark ages." But the Fire was not quenched. No matter how many suffered martyrdom, no matter how many were thrown to the lions, no matter if two thousand Huguenots were put to the sword in one day, no matter what was done by human beings in their efforts to quench that Fire, it still remained.

Sometimes it appeared that only a spark here and there remained, but the Fire of God's Love would burst out again. In the face of all human efforts to quench that Fire, in the face of all the godlessness, in the face of all the lawlessness, in the face of all the darkness, the Fire would again and again reveal itself—and it was not quenched. We see how there was a great resurgence of that Fire made manifest in Europe, and the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries began to see it manifesting more vigorously, and something of that Fire has spread around the world, reaching into the hearts and lives of all people in some manner. There has not lived on earth for some little time—a century or two perhaps we could say—a man or woman or child whose life has not in some manner been affected or influenced by that Fire as it was released and made manifest by our LORD, Jesus Christ. No matter how godless the individual may have been, no matter how remote from so-called religious or church activities, that life was influenced; it was different because that Fire was in the hearts and lives of others who lived at the same time.

As we noted, change is most essential. When we look at the world as it is, we know that change must come, and we should recognize our individual responsibilities and privileges in helping to promote that change in the right direction. We cannot just sit and trust that the change will come. We must do our part, but if we attempt to do that part which we conceive to be ours, in human strength and human wisdom, we will fail and be no better than those who seek to change the world into a vast camp of tyranny. Man of himself cannot achieve these things. That unquenchable Fire of God's Love is absolutely essential if we are, ourselves, to be changed, and if we are to let God’s Will be done in us so that we may promote that change in the world.

We cannot be successful in promoting this change in other places if we spend our days resisting that change that is essential in ourselves. We can find a multitude of people who would be happy to see things change far away—but while they would like to support that change over there, there is no fire burning in heart and soul which promotes a change in themselves. Only to the degree that we let ourselves be changed can we be successful in helping others change in the right direction. This Unquenchable Fire which has withstood every onslaught down through the centuries, is alive—it is here, it is available to anyone anywhere in all the world, and all over our fair land there are those who, to their highest understanding, are dedicated to God's Service.

What is wrong? Why the feeble, stumbling efforts in the United Nations Assembly? Why the hesitancy and uncertainty in the Capitol of our own Country? Why the confusion in high places? Because those to whom responsibility has been given are to be condemned? Because they are not doing their jobs properly? Oh, no doubt they make mistakes. Is that where the blame should rest?—that we should condemn our high officials and find fault with them? Such an attitude is blindness of the worst sort, an attitude wherein the individual wants change over there but is refusing to accept it in himself.

If this Fire which is unquenchable were allowed to burn in the hearts and lives of all the mass of our citizenry here in the United States of America, would there be fumbling in Washington? Would there be uncertainty in the U.N.? No, it is not our President who is at fault, or our Secretary of State, or our Ambassador to the United Nations Assembly. It is the American people that are at fault, because they are not letting that unquenchable Fire burn so freely and so fully, so vibrantly, that there is a spirit of support back of those who carry official responsibility. There needs to be a Light flaming from the hearts of the people that dispels the darkness and lights the Way for those who carry that official responsibility. Is there confusion in Washington? If it is so, then there is confusion in the people of all our states, of all our communities. We cannot have something better in Washington than we have in ourselves.

The Spirit of the Resurrection needs to begin to work as never before in our lives and in the lives of all those around us. The Spirit of that Resurrection must be allowed to have force in the world now. I praise God for the privilege we have of being Citizens of the United States of America, but we cannot complain, properly, about confusion in high places when we allow confusion to reign in our own hearts and lives, when we allow self-centeredness to breed all forms of ill attitude and selfishness in ourselves. No, indeed. This Fire IS unquenchable, and it shall burn with ever increasing force, but it will burn up the chaff only. Each one must determine whether he shall be wheat or chaff. The wheat has no need to fear the unquenchable Fire. It is an Unquenchable Fire and it has faced successfully every effort to put it out, but are we to wait in order to prove by our lethargies that it is an unquenchable Fire? Are we to let that wave roll over us and see if the Fire can be extinguished? That is no good. There is a crying need in all parts of our land—and right here—for that response which will allow that unquenchable Fire to burn as never before, that the essential changes may be wrought and that, letting change come and allowing that Fire to burn, we may be in position to render service to others.

Let the Fire burn. It is an unquenchable Fire, and being so, how foolish it is for human beings to struggle against it. What a despicable thing it is for human beings to try to put that Fire out in their own hearts and lives. It is an unquenchable Fire, and yet so much time and energy is used trying to put it out in heart and mind. All kinds of excuses and ideas develop to salve the conscience. Time? Oh, we do not have time. Or some other excuse. There are multitudes of them—human beings drifting, wallowing in a state of confusion within themselves, trying to put out an unquenchable Fire. If it is put out in the human being, or if it seems to be put out, then that human being, that human form, is dead. There is nothing left.

How foolish to try to extinguish the unquenchable Fire! How wise it is, on the other hand, to devote ourselves to pure devotion and allow that unquenchable Fire to have full sway in our lives. How wise it is to give ourselves in heart and mind, body and soul, to the purposes of the unquenchable Fire of God’s Love, allowing the Patterns of His Truth to bring beauty and symmetry into all the forms of life for which we are responsible.

The Fire of God's Love is an unquenchable Fire. So, in that Word which was used to introduce our Master's Ministry on earth, we find great cause for rejoicing, great cause for thanksgiving—the unquenchable Fire. But it is not enough merely to believe it is unquenchable. If we do not appreciate our responsibilities and privileges, if we do not truly thank God, for the opportunity we have of gathering in peace to consider the Word of God, those who drift and say, "It cannot happen here," will find that miseries are increased because, like the legend about Nero, they fiddled while Rome burned. Unless we are truly thankful to God for these privileges, we will not do that which is necessary to maintain them, and they will be lost.

If we salve our conscience by attitudes of condemnation toward those who are in places of official responsibility, the battle will be lost. No American has any right to complain about confusion in Washington. If all Americans will let the Fire burn, the darkness will be dispelled, the direction in which we should go will be clearly revealed, and it is an unquenchable Fire which, if allowed to work in our lives, will remove any official who refuses to walk in that revealed Path, or make it possible for him to walk therein effectively if that is his desire. Condemning the officials is such a ridiculous thing, so childish, so miserably contemptible. It is not the officials who need condemnation; it is the American people who are not awake, and if we do our part and let the change come and the Fire burn, the officials will move in the right direction, and if they do not, some other official will appear. We do not have to condemn them, and who are we to say, "They do not want to move in the right direction?"

To my mind there is not a place in officialdom in all the world that is more difficult to fill than that which our President at the present time is called upon to fill. There are many critics who are ready to condemn our President, to say ill things about him. Could they do any better placed in such a position? I doubt it. I have not heard one single critic of our President about whom I felt, "I wish he were in the presidential chair." Not one! It is not a matter of finding fault with our President or our Secretary of State, or any other. It is a matter of letting this unquenchable Fire have meaning in our lives, so that they will not be faced with an impossible task. If they fail it will not go down in the records of God as their fault, but the fault of those who should have been supporting, through whom the Fire should have been burning to dispel the darkness and light the Way and give support so that the Power of God could have meaning.

So, changes come, changes will come, and those changes will be shaped by the attitudes of the people. If the change is for the worse, then we will have to admit it is what we asked for, by our attitudes, by our own failures; but if we let God work these changes through that unquenchable Fire the changes will not be for the worse. We will be moving onward and upward toward Victory.

In this season we, as a Nation, have a glorious opportunity of letting the unquenchable Fire so work in and through us that we may partake of the Spirit of the Resurrection and allow changes to come which will dispel darkness in the world and open the Way toward the true realization of peace, not a peace that is merely a cessation of armed conflict but a peace that is the Gift of God's Love dwelling in the hearts and lives of men and women everywhere. Changes are coming. In what direction will those changes appear? In what form? It depends on us. It depends upon all of us, and now is the time to stop trying to extinguish the unquenchable Fire in our own hearts, but, rather, to nurture it, to give heed to it, and let that Fire burn; for it is that Fire shining, burning, in you that allows you to comply with the injunction: "Let your Light so shine."

If that unquenchable Fire is not aflame in you, you cannot let the Light shine, no matter how hard you may try. Trying to let the Light shine is a futile thing. Until that Fire is unquenchable in your heart and it burns in your words and deeds, you cannot let the Light shine; but once you let the Fire have full sway, your Light shines. And what happens? Others see your good works, the life you live, and glorify your Father which is in Heaven.

As we have shared this hour together, resting in that unquenchable Fire, let us remember that Peace is the Gift of God’s Love. Without that unquenchable Fire there is no Peace. Peace be unto you and God Bless you.

© Emissaries of Divine Light