The Sacred Fire of the Heart

As we approach December, our thoughts turn towards the holiday season and Christmas. It is a time for the celebration of many things – all inspired by the birth of a great Soul who came to demonstrate and teach a new way of living centred in the heart from where the love of the soul radiates to shine on all. The heart is like the Sun, its source, which shares its vivifying light and warmth with all – without distinction of race, nationality, religion or form.

Just as the sun is the heart of the system, the human heart is the sun of the organism. There are many sun-hearts, and the Universe represents a system of hearts; that is why the cult of Light is the cult of the heart. To understand this abstractly means to leave the heart out in the cold; but as soon as the Light of the sun-heart comes alive, the need for the magnet’s warmth will make it shine forth like a true sun. It has been said: “Let your heart lead you in crossing Santana.” That is how you can make the concept of the heart resistant to the cold. You can look upon the rhythm of the heart as the rhythm of life. The Teaching about the Heart is as bright as the sun, and the warmth of the heart speeds as swiftly as a sunbeam. Everyone has felt astonishment at how a ray of the rising sun can instantly insulate everything from the cold. The heart can do the very same thing!
I am speaking of the warmth of the heart now that it is especially necessary. A thought surging forth in aspiration sets space on fire, while the warmth of the heart is a constant hearth. Courage dwells in the warmth of the heart—remember this! The manifestation of the dark forces acts like frost on a sown field. Only the heart’s warmth provides a radiant shield. But just as we conduct tests on light waves with delicate care, we should approach the heart with caution and solicitude.” Heart 62.

That birth, in a stable 2,000 years ago, signalled the beginning of a great shift in human consciousness from a guiding thoughtform based on constraints maintained by fear of personal consequences, to a new thoughtform of God, as the loving Father, whose Son, or Soul presence, demonstrated the inclusive oneness of the Soul within all – if we enter into that soul-essence we share. As Jesus taught:

16 … I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; 17 Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.
18 I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you. 19 Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also. 20 At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.” John 14:16-20

The only way into this essential being is through the heart which knows no boundaries or sense of difference, for it is the one and same divine essence we all share – if we can but realise it. In the heart there is a place for all. It is where loving understanding guides every thought and action. The long journey of return, through the often bitter experiences of the material world of forms, is a process of leaving behind illusion after illusion until there is nothing left but the overwhelming sense of divine purpose and of oneness with all life. The Tibetan Master describes this moment of realisation:

For the first time the expanded consciousness of the initiate can contact Shamballa and the One Who rules there, the Lord of the World. For the first time, the focussed purpose which brought Sanat Kumara into incarnation makes an impact upon the enlightened brain of the initiate, bringing something new and different into his equipment, into his nature and his consciousness. I know not how else to express these ideas. It is a blinding conviction of an unalterable will, carrying all before it, oblivious of time and space, aware only of intensity of direction, and carrying with it two major qualifications or basic recognitions to the initiate: a sense of essential being which obliterates all the actions and reactions of time and space, and a focussed will-to-good which is so dynamic in its effect that evil disappears. Evil is after all only an impelling sense of difference, leading inevitably to separative action.” The Rays and the Initiations, page 175-6

Until that moment we are subject, in progressively lesser degrees, to the divisive forces unleashed by identification with our separate forms: physical, emotional and mental. Yet, seen from the reality of oneness, the many forms are all expressions of the One Life, the vastness of which can only be expressed in an infinite array of forms – held in right relationship through the power of the heart.

Looking at the apparently insoluble issues being fought out in conflicts around our world, it becomes apparent that lesser goals are not able to achieve the resolution needed. Violence begets more violence and the abused become the abusers in an eternal round of retaliation. But the Soul, like the Sagittarian arrow flying high in the air toward a far distant goal, sees through these lesser, short term goals and their obvious outcomes, to the true solution that will work out as the soul awakens in the human heart. The heart is far wiser than all the clever rationalisations and substantiations of the separative mind, for it sees the whole and all in right place within it. The heart sees and hears the greater truth.

To see with the eyes of the heart; to hear the roar of the world with the ears of the heart; to peer into the future with the understanding of the heart; to remember past accumulations through the heart—that is how the aspirant must boldly advance on the path of ascent. Creativity embraces the fiery potential and comes to be saturated with the sacred fire of the heart. Therefore, on the path of the Hierarchy, on the path of the Great Service, on the path of Communion, synthesis is the one luminous path of the heart. How can seekers radiate the rays manifested if there is no flame affirmed in their hearts? It is precisely the quality of a magnet that lies latent in the heart. The loftiest creativity is pervaded with this great law. Thus, every consummation, every unification, every cosmic union is achieved through the flame of the heart. In what way can a foundation be laid for great steps? Truly, only by way of the heart. The arcs of consciousness merge in the flame of the heart.
So let us keep in mind the wondrous attraction of the magnet of the heart, which links all manifestations. Indeed, the silver thread that connects the Teacher with the disciple is the great magnet of the heart. The unification of the Teacher and disciple affirms the essence of all aspects of evolution.” Heart 1.

As demonstrations against violence grow in number and voice around the planet, the awakening of the human heart is becoming visible and stronger. What the heart calls for is a world where Christ, the Prince of Peace, guides awakening souls on the upward way to the world we all long for. In the midst of the breakdown of law, order, and care for the common good, this fiery heart-call signals that the time is near for His return.

 

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