Ashes on the Altar

[Music] [Applause] hly there is a phrase which sooner or later everybody in this country will almost certainly use what is it well let's imagine that you are hurrying along the dark Street on a cold winter night the wind is blowing bitterly and the icy rain is driving into your face but here at last is the house of your friends and a moment later you are being welcomed indoors and still shivering take off your things then come in where it's warm they say and you are brought into the living room where blessed sight a bright Fire Burns and then as you stretch out your hands and rub them before the cheerful Blaze you say yes yes of course you say there's nothing like a good Cal Fire but come down the next morning into that same room pull the curtains and the cold unfriendly light falls upon that same fireplace but what a difference where last night the liing fire danced its welcome to you there is now nothing but cold gray ashes and you know that no new fire can burn there until those ashes have been cleared away and that brings me to my text it's in a book you don't often read the book of numbers 4 and verse 13 and they shall take away text let me put it in its proper setting for you you remember how for long weary years the people of Israel endured captivity in Egypt how God raised up their Great Captain Moses and how under his leadership there came that great day when they stood on the shore of the Red Sea and looked back upon the destruction of their enemies the hosts of pharaoh Small Wonder they danced and sang this was Liberation day they were free now thought they now for the promised land and the milk and the honey but they were to find as many another liberated nation has found since that there are no short cuts to the promised land do you remember a song that used to come over the radio during the dark days of the war there's a new world over the skyline it wasn't great music and it wasn't great poetry but it was just what we thought and hoped that the destruction of our enemies would come the Brave New World we had been promised just over the skyline but the people of Israel found as we are finding that skylines have a way of receding as we draw near to them they were to know the heat of the Desert Sun the cold of the desert night they were to know hunger and thirst short rations and weariness hope deferred would would make their heart sick so that the days came when they even thought wistfully of the old times in Egypt those who had crossed the Red Sea as children grew up and had children of their own those who had left captivity as men and women in their Prime grew old and died and were left in their lonely desert Graves and still the weary March went on but they went on they went on until they reached the promised land what sustained them what kept them going it was a very simple thing but like most simple things it was essential they kept alive their faith in God that was all but it was everything for six days they would March but on the evening of the sixth day every week the March stopped camps were pitched and the next morning the Sabbath day had come again the day of rest and worship all that vast multitude gathered together and all eyes were strained watching for something and presently there it was a thin spiral of smoke Rising into the sky a spiral which soon became a cloud shot through with fire and then the living flame itself leapt up and as the fire of sacrifice burnt on the altar the heart of this Pilgrim people was lifted up there in that Holy Fire their sins were purged but there was more in it than that fire is a mysterious thing it is Elemental it is Beauty and life it can be Fury and death it is our humble slave will cook our dinner it may be our pitiless master and destroy our city I'm not surprised that the old pagans worshiped fire they saw in it the symbol of life of the spirit of that undying fire which is in every human heart aspiring to Heaven how natural it was that the Israelites should use fire in their worship but as they watched that flame on the desert altar they worshiped not fire but God it was that which kept them steady kept them on the road to the promised land their faith in God the god of Abraham Isaac and Jacob and their god without faith nothing can endure without worship Faith itself grows weak so they worshiped and found strength but then as they watched the fire on the altar burnt low smoldered went up and now as our text tells us the kites had a job to to do they had to clear away the ashes from the altar a humble job a job nobody likes but necessary for it is as true of the altars of God as of our domestic hearts that no new fires can be kindled until the ashes are cleared away God has many altars think of two of them the altar of our Nations life and the altar of your own life we have lived through great and terrible days but looking back do you not remember how the darkest days were lit by a flam likee faith and courage remember Don Kirk and how as our people read the Grim story of the beaches and The Little Ships we seem to pass beyond selfishness and achieved Miracles remember how everywhere we were asking not how much can I get but how much can I give and how much can I do in a great comradeship of suffering and Peril we forgot ourselves in serving others the war turned common men into Heroes and made neighbors of us all how brightly the flame burnt then do you remember too the days and nights when assailed by the might of the lbaa we had to entrust all our hopes of the future to that Gallant Fu and once again the flame Shone in the dark and lads who had barely left school or college leapt into the sky and facing fearful odds bought our future with their lives strange to think that this is the future for which they die the flame which burned on the altar of our nation's life then was essentially the same as the flame that burnt on the altar in the wilderness the flame of faith faith in our cause faith in our ability to win through to the promised land faith in God it could carry us through this long weary March of ours today but the fire has burnt low there are ashes on the altar ashes of selfishness of lawlessness and of a cynical despair no new fire can burn there until these ashes are cleared away and isn't that our job as Christians as the coites kept the desert altar clean and ready for the fire isn't it our task to help to clear the ashes from the altar of Britain's life we can help to light the flame again of Christian faith and worship but only if our altars are clean only if the Fire Burns in our hearts think of that strange interlude described in the last chapter of the Gospel of John the disciples had spent a long night fishing and had caught nothing tired disappointed they were pulling back to land when they saw something dimly through the Morning Mist they saw someone standing on the Shore by a brightly burning fire suddenly they recognized him it is the Lord cried John and soon Happ happy in his company they forgot their tiredness their disappointment by the fire he had kindled they warned themselves and as they talked with him one at least found that Jesus had lit a fire of faith and devotion again in his own heart that is a parable of what Jesus can do for every one of us he takes away the ashes of failure and faithlessness he lights the fire he sends us on our way again with courage and faith and when the fire burns again in our hearts will not its light and warmth be seen and felt by others isn't this our job as Christians our job and our opportunity let us make our own that great prayer of Charles Westley oh thou who came as from above the pure Celestial fire to impart Kindle a flame of Sacred Love on the mean altar of my heart then never fear we shall reach our Promised Land [Music]