The Fire of God – The God Who Answers By Fire

Pennsylvania, 1928

THE FIRE OF GOD
By Rev. Oscar W. Carlson

(There lives in our community a remarkable old lady. She has the most accurate and comprehensive memory. Her memoirs, if they were executed in writing, would become literature of the highest rank. An invalid, she retains the liveliest interest in modern affairs. Her favorite readings are "The Christian Herald" and the sermons and other writings of Dr. J. H. Jowett, one of the finest preachers America and England ever listened to.

It has been my privilege to know this truly great soul. The idea for this article I gleaned from one of Dr. Jowett's books which she gave me some months ago. To her and to all other and old men and women in whom the fire of God flows radiantly I pray tribute.)

We can build our altars of stone; but we need God to set our hearts on fire with love and holiness. When Elijah disputed with the prophets of Baal as to who should be God, both parties agreed on this test: "The God that answers by fire, let Him be God." We build our churches, write our prayer books and organize our societies. Good enough. Too often we forget the most essential. We need the Lord's "radiant gift" to convert our efforts into a religion of power.

Any man can build a house; we need the Lord for the creation of a home. "A house is an agglomeration of bricks and stones, with an assorted collection of manufactured goods; a home is the abiding place of ardent affection of fervent hope, and genial trust." The bitterest loneliness is sometimes found in the costliest mansion, and the sweetest love in the poorest cottage. We need the fire of God to make a home.

It is easy to proclaim moral ideals. We need the fire of God to practice them. We can tell one another what we ought to do. The worst scoundrel may be able to draw up a very noble code of ethics. We may hang the sublimest mottoes on our walls and yet they may no more influence of lives than the wall paper which covers the walls." TO live as nobly as we know how requires fire. "The Lord that answers by fire, let Him be God."

We need in our day the Holy Fire of the Lord. Without it humanity is cold and dull. Incantations, pow-wows, bellows and frantic efforts will not set the dying embers of the moral and ritual life aglow.

We need the God Who answers by fire!

—The Monessen Daily Independent, Monessen, PA, Oct. 27, 1928, page 5.

Note: Rev. Oscar Carlson was pastor of St. Paul's Lutheran Church, eighth street near Donner avenue. On Sunday, Oct. 28, he was to begin a series of sermons on the parables of Jesus, the first being "The Wise and Foolish Virgins." At the vesper service, 7 o'clock, the sermon was to be on the Old Testament theme, "The Call of Moses."