The Aristocracy of Passionate Souls
“* Fervent in spirit.” — Rom. xii. 11.
Ir is possible to have in life a fervour of exceedingly limited range. In the house of my being there may be a fire in only one room. The warmth may be in single aspects of character, in particular powers and demeanours. The fervour may be in work and not in worship. It may be in controversy, but not in service. It may be in a hobby, and not in a calling. We may go from one room to another and find a startling change of temperature. In one room it is like summer-time, in another it is like winter, The business room is at blood-heat, while the oratory is at zero. Thomas Arnold, of Rugby, used to say that when he could go from his knees into his schoolroom and feel that the temperature changed in the transition he knew that there was something very faulty and perverted in his relationship to God. When the fire of the Holy Spirit is here and not there, there is somewhere a break in our communion.
The Apostle Paul enjoins a fervour which pervades and possesses the entire life. It is a matter of central heating, which keeps the whole house in the strength and comfort of a uniform temperature. It is not intensity of faculty, it is fervency of spirit. It is not a partial enthusiasm, it is a devotion which fills the life. We are to be spiritually passionate, and this is the basal passion which radiates warmth into all the faculties and powers, and imparts a sacred glow and vigour to every aspect of character and conduct. And to the great apostle this passion is just the fire of holy love, it is the ardour of entire consecration, it is the heavenly enthusiasm begotten of intimate companionship with the Lord. Yes, it is holy love, kindling everything with its hallowing flame, and transforming even the commonest bush into the radiant home of our God.
It is a familiar word, but one worth repeating, that no virtue is safe until it becomes enthusiastic. It is safe only when it becomes the home of fire. In the high realms of the spirit it is only the passionate that is secure. Noble passion carries immunity. Evil contagions find an easy prey in the lukewarm, in those whose moral fires are dull, and who do not confront the enemy with the power of a fierce destruction. The Seraphim, those pure spirits who are in the immediate service of the Lord, are the “burning ones,” and it is their noble privilege to carry fire from off the altar and touch with purifying flame the lips of the unclean.;
“As I mused the fire burned.” That is how every fire is kindled, whether it be clean or unclean. Fires begin to burn in meditation, in contemplation, in communion. When we humbly but persistently seek the intimacy of the Spirit it is inevitable that we shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit ‘and with fire.’’ We shall be seized in the mighty constraints of the eternal Lover, and we shall love Him because He first loved us.
The Armour of Light A5