History – The Pillar and Ground of Truth

Apostolic Life Cathedral | 1/28/2024 | 6:30 pm

Text: Hebrews 12:28-29, “(28) Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear: (29) For our God is a consuming fire.”

Ancillary: 2 Timothy 1:6-7, “(6) Wherefore I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God, which is in thee by the putting on of my hands. (7) For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.”

November 11, 1861: The burning of Guyandotte[1]

The Civil War hit home in the Cabell County town of Guyandotte on November 11, 1861. Union troops burned the town in retaliation over a raid pulled off the day before by Confederate cavalry.

Joe Geiger, who has written a book about the Civil War in Cabell County, says Guyandotte’s fate was the result of suspected collaboration with the Confederate raiders and the town’s secessionist reputation.

Geiger said, It’s not really clear exactly how many buildings were burnt. But practically the entire business section was burned and a number of houses as well.

It’s interesting to note Confederate sympathizers’ houses were not the only ones targeted. Many houses belonging to people of Union sympathies were burned as well.

In the fall of 1861, Guyandotte served as a hostile host to a Union recruit camp. The recruits weren’t able to put up much of a fight against the raiders. They were taken prisoner and forced to march to New Bern, Virginia.

According to Geiger, some of the animosity came about because of the march of the prisoners. It began at a full run. They were tied two-by-two with rope and were herded out of town. Apparently, quite a few of the Guyandotte secessionist women were dressed up with their aprons and were yelling at the prisoners and such. The march was very torturous…

The Wheeling Intelligencer newspaper called Guyandotte the “ornaryest place on the Ohio River” and said it ought to have been burned earlier.

That event is called

“The Burning of Guyandotte.”

I’m praying that another fresh fire will begin to burn in Guyandotte tonight and its flames will burn through the Tri-State.

One hundred years ago, In 1924, a Pioneer of the Pentecostal Movement, Lill Horton had a dream. She was in a Church full of stoves, but she was shivering with cold. So, she sought for an interpretation and this was what she received:

“There’s plenty of people (stoves) who need to have the fire of God kindled in them, but they do not have the Holy Ghost to kindle the fire. You need to go where the Holy Ghost fire is burning.”[2]

You are in a Church tonight where God’s fire and shekinah falls and fills the stoves of all who will willingly reach out to Him in faith, call out in repentance and praise Him with their whole heart.

Others in this room tonight have received the Holy Spirit of God, but you’ve allowed the flame to become a barely glowing ember.

You need to hear, heed, listen and obey Paul’s words to Timothy:

“(6) Wherefore I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God, which is in thee by the putting on of my hands. (7) For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:6-7).

It is absolutely necessary that you stir the embers and bring forth a fresh fire tonight.

For 100 years there has been a fire in Guyandotte.

It started in Guyandotte and that same Holy Ghost fire is here tonight.

This campus in located at 350 Staunton Street in the Guyndotte section of Huntington…

But this fire I’m preaching isn’t confined to any street of section.

“Our God Is A Consuming Fire”

The fire of the Holy Ghost crosses rivers and bridges

Social divisions, economic disparities, prejudicial thinking, generational gaps

The Holy Ghost fire I am talking about is a cord of flame uniting every Spirit-filled believer together in their faith and experience:

“For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is Christ. For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit” (1 Corinthians 12:12-13).

Our God is a consuming fire!

Look at our text: Hebrews 12:28-29, “(28) Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear: (29) For our God is a consuming fire.”

This kingdom that began on the Day of Pentecost in Acts 2 (And when the day of Pentecost was fully come), placed in those 120 Holy Ghost divine power:

“But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth” (Acts 1:8).

This kingdom cannot be moved.

It is built and established on a Rock – The Lord Jesus Christ – and the gates of Hell cannot prevail against it.

A consuming fire?

God in Christ is a consuming fire. Our Lord Jesus is “full of grace and mercy, yet He will appear in great wrath to His enemies, who will not let Him reign over them.”[3]

There is a payday someday.

So, we worship Him with reverence – a humility recognizing our unworthiness, and Godly fear – a desire from our most tender area of faith and affection not to offend God.[4]

Why? Although we see Him in this present church age as a God of mild majesty, He still possesses the tremendous power He displayed at mount Sinai, and one day, maybe tonight, He will break forth as a consuming fire against all those who violate His law and despise his gospel.[5]

I used the fire pit last night while cleaning out my garage,

The fire was hot, bright and even singed hair on the back of my hand.

The smoke got all over my clothes, my skin, hair, and even nostrils were full of the smoke…the lasting residue of the fire.

Paul told us what lasting effect the Gift, the fire, of the Holy Ghost has on us:

Wherefore I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God, which is in thee by the putting on of my hands. For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:6-7).

No Fear – no timidity, no cowardice, but boldness
Power – a holy courage, dunamis, miraculous power, strength,
- “Power to encounter foes and dangers; power to bear up under trials; power to triumph in persecutions.”[6]
Love – God & Man
- “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love” (1 John 4:18).
Sound Mind – To think clearly. Discretion. The Mind of Christ.
- Philippians 2:1-11, (1) If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels and mercies, (2) Fulfil ye my joy, that ye be likeminded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. (3) Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves. (4) Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. (5) Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: (6) Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: (7) But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: (8) And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. (9) Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: (10) That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; (11) And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

[1] http://archive.wvculture.org/hiStory/timetrl/ttnov.html#1111. Accessed: 1/28/2024.

[2] Mary H. Wallace. (1981) Pioneer Pentecostal Women (Vol. I). Word Aflame Press. 119-120.

[3] Hebrews 12:29. John Gill’s Exposition of the Bible.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Albert Barnes.

Analysis: Jefferson and the Indians

Thomas Jefferson is an historical and philosophical enigma. As a philosopher and member of the “American Philosophical Society”, he held many personal ideals privately that he did not voice publicly as a politician and official.[1] I believe that this is what Anthony F. C. Wallace meant in the preface of his book Jefferson and the Indians: The Tragic Fate of the First Americans, when he wrote, “Jefferson was at times a shape-shifter, articulating one policy in public only to execute another in private, or later publicly. In no domain of his life as a philosopher-politician-official do such dilemmas appear more conspicuously than in his relations with Native Americans.”[2] It seems evident by the many references in the book that Jefferson held a great fascination for the Indians, but his personal fascination seems merely cerebral in scope. Some could say that his handling of Indian affairs proved his ideas to be preferences rather than convictions. The purpose of this analysis of Wallace’s book is to show how Jefferson’s Indian ideology was often in sharp contrast to the reality of the various situations he found himself involved in.

Wallace gives credit to Jefferson for establishing “the federal policy of removal – involuntary or voluntary – as the solution for dealing with Indians who rejected “civilization” or waged war on the United States.[3] However, according to Wallace, when the Cherokees (who were at this time “civilized” by Jeffersonian conditions) were asking “to be made citizens” of the United States, (1808) “Jefferson put them off.”[4] Jefferson, at this time, was President of the United States and could have very well done the Cherokees this service, but his inaction shows a refusal to accept the Cherokee into “civilized” society.

After reading this book, I came away with the general understanding that Jefferson’s response to the Indians was more detached and cerebral than up-close and personal. In fact, Wallace points out that Jefferson’s main focus involved linguistics and their relationship to Indian origins.[5] Wallace called this “the advancement of the vocabulary project.”[6] Jefferson’s disappointing loss of several years work in this area is sure to have bothered him as testified to in a letter he wrote later to Benjamin Smith Barton.[7]

Jefferson “lamented” the extinction of so many Indian tribes and the loss of their languages, but he was responsible for the continued displacement and removal of the Indians from their homelands and helped to destroy their culture, history and even language.[8] He even espoused the doctrine that even if the Indians killed “some of us; we shall destroy all of them.”[9] Such ideologies only served to do publicly to the Indians what Jefferson privately lamented.

Wallace also informs us that Jefferson never really saw a true Indian community, only two “civilized” ones.[10] I wonder then how he was able to define what an “uncivilized” community looked like. He made conclusions based on other’s writings or conversations about such things, which detached his understanding from the realities of Indian life and left him with a romanticized view. Wallace wrote, “Thomas Jefferson’s views of American Indians were formed not just in the peaceful study at Monticello and in the halls of the American Philosophical Society. They were also fashioned on horseback, in taverns, and in legislative chambers….”[11] With that in mind, is it any wonder that Jefferson’s Indian policies were often philosophically laudable, but nearly impossible to practice?

The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 mandated:

The utmost good faith shall always be observed towards the Indians, their lands and property shall never be taken from them without their consent, and in their property, rights and liberty, they shall never be invaded or disturbed, unless in just and lawful wars authorized by Congress; but laws founded in justice and humanity shall from time to time be made, for preventing wrongs being done to them, and for preserving peace and friendship with them[12]

Wallace calls this ordinance Jefferson’s “legacy”, but while its aims seem altruistic, the reality of the situation was that the frontiersmen constantly attacked and encroached onto Indian land with the unspoken consent of a government that desired to have as much land as the states and its individuals did. Jefferson realized this and even wrote to his friend, and treaty commissioner, Benjamin Hawkins, that “two principles on which our Conduct towards the Indians should be founded, are justice and fear. After the injuries we have done them they cannot love us, which leaves us no alternative but that of fear to keep them from attacking us, but justice is what we should never lose sight of & in time it may recover their esteem.”[13] Sadly, the wrongs dealt the Indians have only been compounded upon one another since that time and we as a nation should be brought to task for our failure to deal justly with the Indians. Jefferson understood that in order for the United States to survive any retribution from the Indians we had to be more powerful and fearful than they, but he also realized the futility of such action and regretted its necessity.

I think Jefferson justified his dealings with the Indians by convincing himself that the “Indian way of life” was doomed to extinction.[14] By espousing such a view, he could alleviate any problems of conscience and continue to displace and remove the Indians from their homelands. Today such schemes and practices are knows as ethnic cleansing and cultural genocide, but in that time a very different ethic was involved and practiced by many men of note and historical importance, and Thomas Jefferson was not immune to the zeitgeist of his day.

It appears that in Jefferson’s mind the final form of happiness for the Indian would be their assimilation into the growing American culture (223).[15] It is unfortunate that he did not do more to facilitate in public what he espoused in private. As mentioned earlier, the Cherokees were the test for his private ruminations and he failed them. Jefferson misjudged the Indians as a whole. He felt that they would eventually die out or assimilate into what he considered “civilized,” but the “native resistance has never ceased.”[16]

We are beneficiaries today of a policy that was framed and instigated by a man who justified himself in order to build a new nation. In my opinion, the enigma of Thomas Jefferson is how he managed to initiate public policies that he personally knew went against his private philosophy.

[1] Anthony F. C Wallace, Jefferson and the Indians: The Tragic Fate of the First Americans, (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 2001), 13.

[2] Ibid., viii

[3] Ibid., 275.

[4] Ibid., 274.

[5] Ibid., 150.

[6] Ibid., 151.

[7] Ibid., 152.

[8] Ibid., 145.

[9] Ibid., 235.

[10] Ibid., 180.

[11] Ibid., 13.

[12] Ibid., 163.

[13] Ibid., 165.

[14] Ibid., 222.

[15] Ibid., 223.

[16] Ibid., 337.