Trinity 9 (20C) ‘Holy Fire’ Presentation Church, Haywards Heath & St Peter & St John, Wivelsfield 18.8.19

I came to bring fire to the earth… is not my word like fire, says the Lord. Luke 12:49a & Jeremiah 23:29a

Holy fire is an unfashionable image of God.

We are warned though in the letter to the Hebrews to offer to God an acceptable worship with reverence and awe; for indeed our God is a consuming fire. (Hebrews 12:28a-29)

Just as God fashioned earth out of the fire of the lava that lies below he is fashioning heaven through the holy fire from above whose first appearance came in tongues of flame upon the disciples at Pentecost.

Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit we pray at the eucharist. May we whom the Spirit lights give light to the world.

Were not our hearts burning within us while he was… opening the scriptures to us?  the disciples said of Our Lord in their Easter experience on the Emmaus Road (Luke 24:32). The good news of Jesus comes like fire, like dynamite flashing out, bringing light for the mind, kindling of the heart and power to live a holy life.

I was talking the other day to a young man whose wife had been unfaithful. His Christian faith was affronted by her unholy deed. As we talked he recognised his own unholiness in neglecting her. He saw his need of cleansing as well as hers which brought me hope for reconciliation for their good and the good of their children.

Holy fire is an unfashionable image of God yet it is thoroughly biblical and we need its reality in our age and in our lives as much as any believer in any age!

There are several Old Testament incidents in which God’s anger, judgment, holiness or power are displayed in fire from heaven bringing cleansing and a new start. Moses speaks of God as a devouring fire going ahead of the Israelites into the Promised Land destroying their enemies. He receives the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai through fire and thunder. Elijah confronts the false prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel calling down fire from heaven to make his sacrifice acceptable. 

In the eucharist priests sometimes pray these words, silently recalling Elijah’s offering, as they arrange the gifts at the altar: Come thou fount of holiness eternal God and bless this sacrifice made ready for thy holy name. 

We make ourselves one today with the sacrificial gifts of bread and wine, work of human hands, in asking the fire of the Holy Spirit to descend upon us to cleanse the thoughts of our hearts and make the self offering made in worship a holy offering.

God is God - different and more powerful than us - but also having sameness to us in Christ. Through the gift of his Son God can work to overcome the evil within us and fit us for eternal company with himself. Our love for God and people matters most in this world because that alone survives into the next world in the communion of Saints… the resurrection of the body and the life eternal. 

God’s holiness burns up anything unholy including our lack of love for him and for our neighbour. His holiness is part of his nature holding him apart from us as the sinners that we are. Who among us can live with the devouring fire? Who among us can live with everlasting flames? Isaiah complains in Chapter 33v14 and he gives the following answer in v15 Those who walk righteously and speak uprightly, who despise the gain of oppression… and shut their eyes from looking on evil. 

I heard someone speak of how God’s holy fire cleanses them from looking at pornography. When I see the pictures or texts I imagine the Holy Spirit as like a fire extinguisher they said. I ask him to fire on me, quench the lust within me, and take me from the situation as quickly as possible. Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit. 

In the passage I read from Isaiah Chapter 33 we heard how only the righteous can withstand the consuming fire of God’s wrath against sin, because sin is an offense to God’s holiness he needs to overcome. Later in Chapter 64 Isaiah troubles his readers by questioning whether anyone can actually be righteous by God’s standards. We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy cloth he writes. Such pessimism prepares the world for the coming of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

I came to bring fire to the earth… is not my word like fire, says the Lord. 

Out of the great love with which he loves us God provided the cleansing righteousness we need by sending Jesus Christ to us.  On the Cross, as Paul says to the Corinthians, God made him to be sin who knew no sin so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21). The hatred of God for sin was engaged with by Jesus whose crucifixion both demonstrates this and provides God’s loving remedy of the forgiveness of sins. Jesus died in our place so he might live in our place, live within us bringing the holy fire of his Spirit, a consuming fire indeed, one that cleanses us from the deadliness of pride, anger, lust, envy, gluttony, avarice and sloth.

The French priest, geologist and theologian Teilhard de Chardin, who lived in the last century had a great love for the eucharist. His vision of its cosmic implications has enriched and given purpose to my own engagement with the Sacrament. Like the best theologians his writings evidence a rooting in prayer and worship, as in his great ‘Mass on the World’, one of my favourite spiritual texts. In the invocation of the Holy Spirit at the eucharist I referred to earlier he sees an echo both of Our Lord's desire to 'cast fire upon the earth' in today's Gospel and the stellar fires and molten lava that energise the earth's development. In the elevation of the Host in the eucharist Teilhard sees earth and heaven coming together. The consecrated bread and wine show nature transformed in anticipation of the ultimate transformation of all things on the return of Christ, what he calls the 'Omega Point', a point anticipated in our service when the Bread and Wine are lifted up for adoration.

I came to bring fire to the earth… is not my word like fire, says the Lord. 

Teilhard was aware of that fire both as a geologist and as a Christian. God fashioned our planet by the fire of lava but sent his Son to refashion things through casting down upon earth the holy fire of the Spirit. This he does by entering human hearts especially at this service as we seek cleansing and empowering for ourselves, those on our hearts and for the whole created order.

Come down, then, Love divine, seek thou this soul of mine, and visit it with thine own ardour glowing; O Comforter draw near, within my heart appear, and kindle it, thy holy flame bestowing…. cast out our sin and enter in through the eucharist we celebrate! 

Lent 1 14th February 2016

In Lent we are called to discover afresh the power of Christ’s Cross.

This is why we started Lent with the signing of the cross on our foreheads and why the symbols of glory and resurrection are backstage for the next six weeks, so that the Cross shines forth.

Last month I was in Tenerife walking in the mountains.

I visited the small town of Santiago del Teide perched on the lower slopes of Mount Teide which towers almost 4000 metres above sea level, the highest point above sea level of any island in the Atlantic Ocean, and third highest volcano on any volcanic island in the world.

The volcano last erupted in 1909. When it did so the inhabitants of Santiago del Teide were faced with the prospect of their town’s obliteration.

It’s a deeply Christian place, Tenerife. When they saw the volcano erupt the villagers didn’t hesitate to act.

They took the cross from the altar and went up the hill to meet the lava. The flow stopped where they met and each year since there’s been a thanksgiving procession.

I walked to the place where the lava stopped and said a prayer by the Cross there and before the original cross that’s in the beautiful church there.

The people saw burning lava halt before the Cross and the victory of their Christian faith.

In my own experience the Cross is as sure a weapon against no less fiery assaults against my spirit.

To believe in the Cross is to believe in the risen Lord Jesus Christ who stands behind it and beside each one of us. His power in us, by his Spirit, is greater than the power of any enemy, however powerful.

For the next six weeks Christians are paying special attention to the Cross of our Saviour and how it engages with our personal struggle against sin.

You may struggle with lack of faith in yourself – the Cross says God loves you, turn from such disbelief.

You may struggle with lack of faith in other people – the Cross says God loves them as well as you and much more, so forgive those who upset you or who seem to be against you.

You may struggle with lack of faith in God – the Cross tells you God loves you enough to die for you.

Jesus said God loves us so much he numbers every hair on our head.

In Wednesday’s rite of ashing those who received the ashes of last year’s Palm branches on their foreheads heard the words Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return. Turn away from sin and be faithful to Christ. These words can be paraphrased, as I did with the school children, as ‘God loves you. Turn from sin’.

‘God forbid that we should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ’ Saint Paul once wrote (Galatians 6:14) and he goes on to invite us to let the Cross bring God's grace into our lives.

In Lent we seek more than usual such grace for the empowerment of our loves, grace that comes from the foot of the Cross.

Let’s turn there now as we think in a quiet moment of the immense love shown to us by the God and Father of Jesus in sending his Son to die for us and pouring the Holy Spirit into our hearts to bring assurance of that love.