LIKE FIRE BURNING 

IN MY HEART

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this 22 Sunday in Ordinary Time A is, “Like Fire Burning In My Heart.”

Isn’t that a great image -“Like Fire Burning In My Heart.” It’s from Jeremiah the prophet - Jeremiah Chapter 20, verse 9.

I wonder if anyone has that as a tattoo: “Jeremiah 20: 9.”

Here’s the full text again from today’s first reading: “I say to myself, I will not mention him, I will speak his name no more. But then it becomes like fire burning in my heart, imprisoned in my bones; I grow weary holding it in, I cannot endure it.”

Hot stuff.

SEVERAL WONDERINGS

As that text hit me I began to have some wonderings. Here are 7:

1) There has to be some great sermons down through the years on this text in Jeremiah. It certainly is a preacher’s text. Who preached those sermons and where can I find them?

2) How come I don’t have the passion that Jeremiah had - in preaching on the Lord? Silence. That was a very humbling realization. That hit me on Friday evening when I began reflecting on this text. I also realized again that I never used a script for preaching till I got to Annapolis. That’s at least 35 years of preaching without using paper. I figured out the sermon beforehand - jotted down notes - and often wrote the sermon after I gave it. A sermon has more energy that way. But when I got here to Annapolis, I found myself putting words together beforehand on paper. That reality sometimes triggers what I once read - some words by Charles Peguy - the poet/essayist (1873-1914). He wrote, “A word is not the same with one writer as with another. One tears it from his guts. The other pulls it out of his coat pocket.” For weekday sermons I reaching into my pocket and pull out two pieces of paper. For Sunday sermons I have a folder - with 5 pieces of paper. So that question about how much fire and passion I have in preaching hits me. That’s a self centered question. How about you? Do you have enough fire and passion?

3) What is my passion? What have been my passions? Does anyone have the passion for the Lord, our God, that Jeremiah had?

4) Listening to what Jesus says in today’s gospel, would I go to my Jerusalem knowing they wanted to kill me there?

5) Would I be like Peter who said to Jesus: “Don’t do it! Are you crazy?”

6) Would Jesus then say to me what he said to Peter, “Get behind me Satan! You are thinking not as God does, but as humans do.”

7) As we heard in today’s gospel, as well as from Paul in today’s second reading from Romans: Is there any cause - any reason - I would lay down my life for - to follow Jesus - to offer my body as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God?

SOME PONDERINGS ON THESE 7 WONDERINGS

Certainly Paul - Saint Paul - had that fire - that passion - that desire - that dream - as we see in his letters. He was burnt by Jesus - on the road to Damascus. It was a wake up call - and he woke up - switching his passion for crucifying Christians to reaching out to make Christians. That’s a complete pendulum swing and switch. I’ve often given new converts - plenty of space - and time - when they make a conversion switch - because they are often in high energy mode.

Certainly Saint Augustine had that fire - that passion - as one discovers in his great book, Confessions - which everyone better read at least 2 times in one’s life. The first time is to know the book and get its grabs - its great words like, “You have made us for yourself O God and our heart is restless until it rests in you.” (Book 1, Chapter 1) And, “Too late have I loved you, O Beauty, so ancient and so new, too late have I loved you! (Book 10 - Chapter 27) Then one has to read his Confessions many years later - well into the Christian Life - and during this second or third time reading and pondering and praying, one realizes - how Jesus can be a fire burning in one’s heart.

Certainly Francis Thomson, the poet and the drug addict, had it - as discovered in his great poem, “The Hound of Heaven” - when he too confesses what Paul and Augustine confessed “I fled you down the nights and down the days…. I fled you down the labyrinthine ways…" but you found me. Like a hound, God, You found me. God sniffs us out.

We can run - but we can’t outrun God. We can hide, but God finds us.

GENTLE BREEZE OR BURNING FIRE?

Three weeks back - August 7th - on the 19th Sunday in Ordinary Time - we had a reading from 1st Kings - where Elijah - who is running from King Ahab and Queen Jezebel as well as from God - discovers God as a gentle breeze.

Question: Reflecting on our experiences of God - has that been our experience - experiencing God like a whisper - compared to a fire or an earthquake or heavy winds - very close to what we experienced last night as well as last Tuesday?

Certainly last night’s storm - got many people to pray - as well as say to God - “Why can’t You just move this storm 300 miles east of us?” Certainly last night’s storm got us to ponder how God works, how nature works, how life works?

Amongst other words, I’m sure many people last Tuesday when they felt the earth quaking, said, “Oh my God….” That’s one of the most basic prayers there is. We say God’s name in shock, anger, fire, storm, surprise - usually in the unexpected - in the uncontrollable.

The storm is over for us. Once more do we speak to God - do we wonder and ponder with God - in the aftermath? Do we pray to God, the Gentle Whisper, in our mind and heart? Do we see, connect with God, bringing God into the inner conversations we all have with ourselves? Do we feel God when we are holding a baby or seeing a baby sleeping on a father’s shoulder? Do we connect with God in the gentle quiet - like on the back porch by ourselves - or watching a wedding - or the moments after communion - or while the bread and wine hear the words, “This is my body…. This is my blood…. given for you … given for all?”

Or have our God experiences only been when fire and storm and tragedy hit?

This morning Jeremiah and Jesus take us to another level.

This morning Jeremiah and Jesus challenge us with another question.

Take a moment. Close one’s eyes. Go into one’s heart. Can you spot a fire place there? Is it lit? Is it burning? Has it gone out? Have we given up? Are we sleep walking? Are we on hold? Have we pushed the mute button on God?

When was the last time I was on fire - firing on all pistons as they say? When was the last time I took stock of my lifetime dreams? Did I ever have a passion - something I couldn’t wait to finish other things to get back to it?

Just as God called Jeremiah and Jesus to give their lives to his will - his hope for what to do with the gift of one’s life, God calls us. The readings are read so we can hear the same wake up call.

God calls all of us to lay down our lives - to give of ourselves.

That’s God’s passion. That’s God’s will. That’s what we pray for in every Our Father, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven!” That’s the fire God has placed in every human being. That’s God’s fire and desire.

So the question for today is: What am I using my passions, my energy, my fire for? And: is that fire burning or has it gone out?

The fire that Jeremiah felt when he said, it’s “like fire burning in my heart” it’s in my bones challenges us to go inside. That fire is there or can be there. It’s underneath. It’s more like those fires in them their hills in Pennsylvania - ongoing mine fires deep in the heart of the earth.

The fire that Jeremiah felt in his words, “like fire burning in my heart” is like what Joseph Campbell reflected out loud about in Bill Moyer’s TV series from years ago. Remember when he Joseph Campbell said the secret of life is to, “Follow your bliss and the universe will open doors for you where there were only walls.”

He said that one’s bliss is when one is full alive - fully alert.

I remember when I had a job called Novice Master up in Oconomowoc Wisconsin. Monday to Friday the novices would be half asleep at morning prayer and my morning conference or talk - but come Saturday morning - if they were going on a trip - say to Chicago - they were alive and alert - ready to roll. I prayed that they would have that same passion for Christ - and for the ministry - for the people they said they joined the Redemptorists in order to serve.

It’s my discovery that the key fire - the dream fire - is about a person or persons.

When we’re young or if we never grow up - or if we’re a narcissist - or selfish or self-centered that person is me. That’s my fire: me, me, me. What’s in it for me?

As Jesus says loud and clear in today’s gospel, “For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” Then he adds, “What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life?”

When we discover the fire is not about me, we can be furious. We can scream with Jeremiah as he begins the first reading, “You duped me, O Lord…. You tricked me O Lord.” It might get us to say, “God, You mean after all that I have done to get to where I’ve gotten, it’s not for me or about me?”

And God laughs at that. Hopefully we arrive at that day and then say with Jeremiah, “I let myself be duped by you.”

That’s Step One - the realization that my life is not about me.

Step Two is the rest of our life - giving our life for a person or persons - other than myself.

Hello! That’s the message Jesus gives at every Mass. This is my Body. This is my blood, I’m giving it to you.

This is the fire than can fire us up every day, inspire us every day.

This is the “why” people get out of bed each day. It’s love. It’s one’s spouse. It’s one’s kids. I’m in this for you!

And then - as life goes on - hopefully - people wake up to an even bigger picture. The call is to love all kids - love all spouses - love all people - of all skins and creeds and languages.

When we get to that stage, we then have the passion to spend time with our kids friends and other kids. We find ourselves volunteering to coach or teach other people’s kids remedial reading. We find ourselves visiting neighbors in nursing homes or next door. It’s then we turn off the computer or TV and turn and see that there are a lot of people all around us. It’s then that the father says to his two little kids, “Let’s go next door and play rummy with Mr. X. He’s all alone and loves to play cards - especially now that his wife has died. Remember how Mrs. X always stopped to talk to you kids.”

Seeing and being that way is the fire of love. It’s loving one another.

Take Martin Luther King Jr. His fire, his passion was for people. Read his great speeches and sermons - like the “I Have A Dream” speech. You’ll hear fire in his words. You’ll hear his concern for all children -white and black - civil and human rights for all. He had a fire in his belly for justice.

Speakers and preachers like that get shot.

Take Jesus - at 30 he left his home and began teaching and preaching - about treating people right - to get religion right - to give one’s life for the world as we heard in today gospel.

People like that get crucified.

CONCLUSION

Message: That fire is down there in our heart. Stir it up today. Stir it up this week and watch what happens.