Shlohavot, or, The burning of London in the year 1666 commemorated and improved in a CX discourses, meditations, and contemplations, divided into four parts treating of I. The sins, or spiritual causes procuring that judgment, II. The natural causes of fire, morally applied, III. The most remarkable passages and circumstances of that dreadful fire, IV. Counsels and comfort unto such as are sufferers by the said judgment / by Samuel Rolle ...

MEDITATION XXXIX. Upon the word of God it's being compared to fire, Jer. 23.29.

HOw shall we understand that question, Jer. 22.29. It not my word like as a fire saith the Lord? Wherein consists the resemblance betwixt the word of God and fire? Surely it's warnting the hearts of men in whom it takes place, is one reason of it's be∣ing so called: For so said the Disciples of Christ Did not our hearts even burn within us, whilst he opened the Scriptures to us? Luk. 24.32. Or else it may be so called from it's efficacy; in which sense it is also called a Hammer which breaketh the rocks in pieces: Fire is able to demolish the strongest places, of w^ch we many have sad instances at this day; & so the Word is said to be mighty through God to pull down strong holds. We read of Gold tried by fire, 1 Pet. 1.7. and is not the Word of God a trying thing? It is said (I shall not here examine in what sense) that God sent forth his word and tried Joseph. Psal. 10.19. Who knows not the purifying nature of fire, whereby metals are refined? and did not Christ ascribe the like virtue to his Word, saying, Now are ye clean through the word that I have spoken to you? What more piercing then fire, and in that ••espect also, it is much an Embleme of the Word of

God, which is said, to be sharper than a two-edged sword piercing to the dividing a-sunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, Heb. 4.12.

These are but some of the Parallels that might be made, betwixt the word of God and Fire. He, whose word it is, would have it to be as Fire. And if it be Fire, where it hath once broken out, and got head, it will be hard to smother or suppresse it (as that Evangelical Fire, which was kindled by Luther in Germany, could never be extinguished to this day). Saint Paul saith, though he suffered bonds, yet the word of God was not bound, 2 Tim. 2.4. And in Phil. 1.12. he saith, that the troubles which befell him, had happened rather to the further∣ano•• ••f the Gospel; and many did wax confident by his bonds, to speak the word without fear. If the word of God be Fire (as it is), I wonder not that there are such combustions in the world by means of it; as Christ, telling us what (through the corrup∣tion of men) would insue upon his Gospel, saith, He came not to send peace upon earth, but a sword, Mat. 10.34. It is not Gods word, but something else those men would have, who would have no∣thing preached to them, that should be as fire to consume their Lusts, or to make their consciences smart, at the remembrance of them. That which is not apt to search and pierce, is nothing akin to fire, and therefore cannot be the word of God, which is said to be quick and powerful as fire its self. The fires which God kindleth for the good of the world (whereof his word is one of the chief) woe be to any that shall go about to quench. Quenching of prophecying is next unto quenching of the Spirit, yea, and is one way of doing it, as Divines ob∣serve.

I see cause, to blesse the God of heaven, who hath created some fires as profitable as others are mischievous, namely, his word for one, a fire that ne∣ver doth hurt, otherwise than by accident (neither indeed would other fires, kept within their due bounds) but so much good, as no tongue can ex∣press. O Lord, that through thine insinite good∣ness, I might experiment in my self and others, all those excellent properties of fire meeting in thy word, of which I have now been speaking; that my heart and theirs might burn within us at the hearing of it, as did the hearts of thy Disciples, that it may be mighty through thee to pull down all the strong-holds of Sin and Sathan that are with∣in us, that it might trye us as gold is tryed in the fire, and at the same time resined and purisied; that it might pierce, unto the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow; that the sin, which is, as it were, bred in our bones, may be gotten out of the very flesh. May the fire of thy word, have such influence as this upon us, we shall then be sure to escape the fire of thy wrath, and to arrive to that happiness, which is called, The inheritance of the Saints in Light, Col. 1.12.