What I’d like to speak about today is the opportunity that opens to us when the heart makes the creative choice to be centered in the origin of our being. If we name what that is, it can sound like we’re naming something separate from us. But if we are going to speak about that opportunity, we have to talk about it somehow.
Uranda, who founded Sunrise Ranch and Emissaries of Divine Light, had a wonderful name for the originating source of our being—the Wonderful One Within. You could use more religious-sounding words—like the Lord God, Almighty God, or Jesus—but they might sound as though you are speaking of something distinctly different from you, something other than you. Yet, the truth of the matter is something else.
Think about this inner reality as the Central Flame. When we turn to the power within, we are turning toward a flame that is central to who we are. Magnificent. You turn toward it, and it’s like turning toward the sun. You feel the warmth of that sun in your soul. There is that eternal Central Flame.
The term Central Flame sounded so familiar as I thought about it this week. I was sure the founding literature of Emissaries of Divine Light must have spoken about it. But I looked all over and even asked a friend about it—it’s nowhere. So, it wasn’t familiar for that reason.
I looked around to see if the term had been used elsewhere. The answer is yes, though sparingly. In the 5th century B.C., Greek philosophers known as the Pythagoreans spoke about the Central Flame. As they envisioned it, this was a reality distinct from the physical sun. They also referred to it as the Hearth-Altar of the Universe. Up to that point, Greek culture—and much of world culture—saw the cosmos as revolving around the Earth. This is thought to be the first concept of reality that changed that ancient view.
Rosicrucian texts from the 19th century reference the Central Flame, and a New Thought mystic from the early 20th century did also.
But I hadn’t read any of those texts. So, the term was familiar to me for another reason—it names my experience. The term Central Flame names something I know for myself. It is something we know together. And as that happens, there are all kinds of possibilities.
We live in a world filled with the practicalities of life. They are present in our individual lives and in the world at large. If you look out at the world, the practicalities tell us that we are facing challenges that seem almost insurmountable. What is the answer to those challenges?
A friend wrote recently that spirituality, as it is known in this postmodern age, cannot address the mega-crisis we face as humankind. He shared a comment from the founder of a well-known center for spiritual study saying that contemporary spirituality has ultimately failed to give us the answer for the world we face.
What is the spirituality of today that will meet that need? I believe it is what we are speaking of—it is a reorientation of the heart, a much-overlooked dimension of the human experience. Until there is a change of heart, you can believe what you want, practice what you want, meditate for as long as you want—but if the orientation of the heart is not turned toward something higher than itself, there is essentially no change.
The heart rules the human experience. It sets the rules of the game of life. It establishes the conditions in which we experience our lives. It creates the lens through which we view the world.
And so, until the heart reorients, there isn’t the essential change in the human being—or in humanity—that will allow for the transformation called for today.
A true turning is to the Central Flame. This flame is the central nature of our being. It is composed of the Fire of Love.
In the human experience, there must first be the ascending nature of that flame—meaning that all the fuel of our lives comes together in the heart and ignites, setting fire to our experience. The flame rises, ascending in love to the source of our being—the Wonderful One Within.
This world needs teachers of the ascending flame. Of course, you can’t teach the ascending flame if that is not your experience. But simply by having that experience, you are teaching it. You are being it. You are inviting others to know the ascending flame in themselves—to reorient, to allow that flame to ignite the heart, and to let all the factors of human experience ascend as incense before the Lord.
We are in this space together to know that for ourselves and share it among ourselves. As that transpires, the heart leaps with joy, pleasure, and praise.
The ascending flame unites us with the source of Being—the Wonderful One Within. That is worship. And if collective worship has meaning, it is that we are participating in the ascending flame together. What a pleasure! What a joy!
As the ascending flame is known, something else begins to appear. There begins to be a unified experience of one heart. Yes, there are individual dimensions of that heart. And yet, we share a collective heart. In sharing that, there is a feeling of being ourselves, of being at home. While who we are has an individual component, we belong to a Family of Souls and to the collective heart of that family. When we experience that collective heart, we are more ourselves than ever.
There is a knowing of oneness—of union with other Beings, with the source of Being, with the source of Creation, and with the Central Flame.
In that oneness, the descending flame appears. This is the fire brought by the Family of Souls into the world. We need that fire. The world needs that fire. It is the Fire of Love that transmutes and transforms. It has the magic and power to do that like nothing else.
In France, prominent world nations have come together to build a nuclear fusion reactor. Recently, the superconducting magnet system was completed. The initial phase of operations is projected for 2035. Perhaps that fusion reactor is symbolic of who we are meant to be together—fused with great power, the descending flame of Creation brought into the world to transform and create.
Here is a verse from a favorite song of mine, familiar to many of us. It’s from the Wailin’ Jennys, a group of Canadian women:
This is the sound of all of us,
Singing with love and the will to trust,
Leave the rest behind—it will turn to dust,
This is the sound of all of us.
—Ruth Moody
The song reminds me of the descending flame that we are bringing to the world. All the rest that is not of that flame can turn to dust—it ultimately does, whatever we do about it. I think we would be better off if, as the world turns to dust, there is the Central Flame that is alive and burning—so that something else is being known by humanity, out of which everything else can be created.
No longer a cacophony of ideas, communication, and misunderstanding. No longer a Tower of Babel among us as human beings. All that turned to dust. This does not mean there is nothing left—but what is left is of the Central Flame, born of human beings dancing in that fire together.
I love how Cheyne Morros named the significance of understanding between men, between women, and between men and women. As that truly happens, we participate in the Central Flame together.
There are both men and women in the ascending nature of that flame. And we all have the opportunity to know the descending flame. It is all a gift.
If you know what it is to allow the ascending flame to be present in your experience, I invite you to teach it to others within this spiritual community—to share it with others and make that ascending flame available to them. Bring it so that they may recognize it in themselves, and so it may live in this community. Let this be a community of the ascending flame.
And if you know what it is to bring the descending flame—the Fire of Love coming into the world with power, blessing, and creativity—I say Bring it! Bring it with all you’ve got. That fire is welcome here. Let us know that fire together. And if you know it for yourself, teach it in this community. Share it with others. Invite others to find that descending flame—that power and strength, that creativity, that fire—in themselves.
Here it is, and there it is. Let this be a community of the descending flame. Let us know that together. Let us teach it to each other and to anyone who wants to know it for themselves.
We are the Central Flame. This is the basis for ease in living and creating. Creating without knowing this Central Flame is hard work. That is the story of Adam and Eve leaving the Garden of Eden:
In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground.
—Genesis 3:19
We know another reality. Both these elements of the Central Flame are appearing in our experience—individually and together—so the Tower of Babel can come crashing down. We are beginning to see each other, to find each other in the Family of Souls, known by us as human beings, no longer fooled by the elements of the Tower of Babel that have deceived us all this time.
We are finding each other. We are finding ourselves. I give praise that this is happening. I could not tell you how happy I am that it is.
By the Majesty of Love
By the majesty of Love,
I am brought low;
and lifted up:
how, what the cynical world would call a mere sensation
beggars the World
and yet, every kind and style and type of loveliness bows down.
Can what we feel so deeply,
So ephemeral, inexpressible, barely able to be named,
be so greater than all the thunder of high towers and wide cities
and also at the heart of this whole, beautiful wide blue World,
spinning gracefully and fine to the admiration of stars
in their uncountable myriads,
of myriads of myriads?
These so complicated gowns of flesh,
these fragile, agile palaces of being
are in themselves, articles and garments of faith,
Heady gates and great, vaulted windows:
All that changes and fades and passes away, peers in
In adoration;
Looks in toward that which, in its burning, ever-turning times and seasons,
authors all, and
never dims, never bends, and
never ends.
I just ran across this excerpt from a transcript of a class by Uranda on a theme that parallels the theme of this Pulse of Spirit. Let’s allow his message to be relevant to us today.
THE MOTHER TONGUE
From Jehovah — Jesu
May 27, 1953
Uranda
But now, with respect to the Mother tongue, perhaps I should remind you that it utilized somewhat different or higher principles than we have in any language in use on earth today, the dependence upon the vibrational factors released by the speaker or comprehended by the hearer; in other words the feeling factors. No word in the Motherland tongue could be set down and defined as Webster undertook to do with the English language. It could not be done. It did not need to be done in the first place, but it could not be done. There could be an outline of certain significant keys in relationship to the proper use of the word, but words were fundamentally channels for the release of vibratory factors which had to be internally perceived. “The letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.” So words, within the scope to which they were used, were channels for the interplay of vibratory factors which were perceived heart to heart. It entered into the field of what we would classify, using a very limited term, as mind reading. Actually it was not mind reading. It was heart exchange. Heart exchange. But impure hearts cannot function correctly in this regard in relationship to the divine design. It cannot be done. So we see why it was that the language was lost–the tower of Babel. They had to make up new languages in order to convey specific ideas which could be intellectually comprehended. Now the mind, the conscious mind or intellect, did comprehend with respect to these other things, but you have already studied something of the functional aspects of mind and heart, so that you know that so-called mind reading is never conscious mind to conscious mind. It is always heart to heart, or subconscious to subconscious. The proper correlations of conscious and subconscious aspects of mind are necessary if there is going to be any intelligible interchange, any effective interchange.
The Central Flame — What a compelling image! Even while experiencing a feeling resonance with the phrase, many might rightly ask, “What does it mean? Can I really experience this flame, and if so, how is this image or experience useful in my life, and in this crazy life as it is happening on the planet now? It is merely a metaphor? Is this a tangible reality or is it only a poetic way of referencing something?” The phrase itself “conjures up” something ancient or timeless or eternal — a magical incantation that may possibly bring forth a knowing. The Central Flame. Here we are now, engaged in an important meditation on a very great symbol, a symbol of something that may well be real in our living experience. How does it move from phrase, to image, to symbol, to magic, to reality and knowing in meaningful living?
You have opened a significant and Sacred Door here David, through use of this image — even if it has only been opened a crack in this current Cycle of Illumination — nonetheless a Door of considerable significance has been opened now. And I am staying right with you while we, together with others, bring forth something quite real and meaningful, and indeed magical, from out of the realms of illusion into the realms of functional daily reality and meaning, because we know and meet and bring forth more, learn more, function and create more fully, within these realms of Divine Magic wherein the Central Flame is vivid and real. I say, let’s go all the way home with this, together; let’s go through this Door and go all the way Home.
As I think about it, and share with you here in this living exchange that you invite so openly and so freely in the “Pulse”, we have the Descending Flame and the Ascending Flame, and we have this meeting point in the Central Place of the Heart, and the Flame which burns upon the Altar of the heart. One Central Flame operating in the Core of each of us, and in the Core of the Whole Body of humanity, and we have this meeting point in the Central Place we call the Heart. And we know this radiant spirit of love and truth and life, coming from higher vibrational realms, vibrationally from above; and passionate response even what might be called radiant response, in spiritual expression, mind and body, vibrationally from below — here in this Meeting Place of the Heart — as above so below — a living thing. And when this happens, “O what Glory fills Thy Temple, in this place, our Holy Home.” Holy Spirit fills the space of this Temple of love and Light, our Holy Home.
Considering this symbol and image and metaphor, the fact is that I Am become this Central Flame: Heart is a Burning Fiery Furnace; Conscious Mind is a Light Bearer; Subconscious Mind is an Illumined Holy Ghost space, at Peace; and the Holy Ground of this Physical Body is a Burning Bush — and so it will be, and is ordained to be, and must be, in the Collective Heart and Conscious Mind and Subconscious Mind and Christ Body. And all of this is focalized in specific God Beings — You are here and I am here and many significant others are here too, right here and right now, in this phase in the Cycles of Recreation and Restoration of Divine Man and Woman; and we now begin to work together with one accord and in one place. Behold, the sound of a rushing mighty wind, and the appearance of tongues like as of fire, and it begins to fill the Whole House where we sit together; and we hold it all steady and true, and let the Central Flame do its Almighty Work of recreation.
David, you have opened up something wonderful through the use of this phrase in our collective meditation: The Central Flame. I am with you, and everyone else who is prepared to follow it out to the end of the mystery, all the way through to the reality of the manifestation of the Central Flame in this One Seamless Generation. Thank you Brother. Thank you for your Focus of Leadership — a Leader among Leaders — in this Shekinah Pattern that will bring it all Home as we work together and let a consciousness of the Holy Family be restored in Presence and in Function, restored to order and to beauty on earth as it is in heaven. db
Every day do these three things:
Remind yourself that you are going to die…
Spend as much time as you can in a natural out-of-doors setting…
Never ever compromise your inherent conscious awareness of who you truly are…
In the evening ask yourself these three simple questions:
This day…
Have I really lived?
Have I truly loved?
Have I joyously laughed?
Have I lived?
Have I loved?
Have I laughed?
Jai Ma,
DaveO’
AS the fire was burning so bright During this Service last Sunday A Piece of The Poem By Babatunda Olatunji came to Mind. I am The drum, You are the Drum, We are the Drum, where ever you go it’s the same. And Like the Hymnal Song says Perfect Love Increased. Thanks So Much!
Many might think a change of heart means an organ transplant. But, we can change our heart in the manner of respecting the central flame. I was introduced to the revelation of the human heart as a torus not a pump. As we know, it has arterial and venous functions; blood flows from the heart and flows back.
The other revelation was to learn that Saggitarius A*, a seeming black hole is a torus, a portal of cosmic significance, giving and receiving. We, in our human capacity, reflect the cosmos. This is a remarkable and expansive thought.
Thank you David, for conveying so many profound elements for us to consider, often hidden in the poetry of historic texts and cultures. Our hearts are expanding in the invisible realms and we are beginning to understand the true magnitude of who we are – singular and plural.
The flame of Love in you, David, is what obviously inspired this beautiful Pulse. I particularly resonated with these words: I think we would be better off if, as the world turns to dust, there is the Central Flame that is alive and burning—so that something else is being known by humanity, out of which everything else can be created.
The dysfunctional world of humanity is indeed turning to dust. I don’t believe this current version of civilization will survive climate change. But the Central Flame burns on and our oneness with it opens the possibility for a regenerated and transformed world to emerge.
This is such a beautiful and meaningful presence of grace in our lives – the opportunity in your words David, to open our hearts even more than maybe we have been – becoming so much more aware of what is unfolding in our world and what opportunities we have to expand all the good possible out to the world, with each other, and deeply within.
The opportunity you have offered to align with the terms, “the Wonderful One Within” and the “Central Flame” via the heart, is truly magnificent as you indicate.When focusing on this reality there is a presence and a radiant quality I find becomes inevitable…there is warmth, power, and a feeling of oneness available to be shared with others.
How glorious too that you point to the fact that the answer to the global dilema relates to a change in heart. Change from hate to love, from saddness to joy, for example, and all originating from the Central flame Intimacy with that presence being the key.
I so appreciated your description of the ascending and descending nature of the central flame and the acknowledgement that this flow of fire rightly occurrs within each one of us.Your reference to individual and collective Worship, brings a higher stance in my awareness.
Moving from the place of Oneness in the Central Flame, in male and female relationships is truly revolutionary for this day! Thank you for this vital sharing! Again releasing what no longer serves, and living into the reality of expressing Divine Light, individually and together.
David, I am inspired to see the many facets represented in this paper. It excites the scientist in me! And the attunement server within.
There is this existing central flame within that ascends and blends with the descending flame. This happens when we allow our trauma, our limiting culture, our personality to be transformed by the fire. We don’t disappear, we finally arrive as our unique individual self. Purified by fire, ignited by fire and bringing the fire.
From that perspective we see the wonderful one within in each other. We are delighted by the creative field between us. We compliment and nurture the field because it belongs to the source of the flame.
I find it essential to take time for this work. Pretending all is well is not effective or pleasant. It is useful to slowdown, center myself and let the fire heat up. Things will change. As you said in the last paragraph “I give praise that this is happening”
Jane