It’s not exactly clear how the fire started. Some believe it happened when a huge storm rolled through the valley along with a brilliant lightning show with plenty of strikes up and down the area. It started burning slowly and then grew in intensity, quickly consuming the dry underbrush and trees. The first people that discovered it burning were surprised as it hadn’t happened in quite a while. Filled with elation and excitement, they started telling everyone else about it – as well as taking a branch, lit by the fire, back to their homes which had been cold for so long. Not familiar with the best way to keep safe, numerous accidents and injuries resulted and countless dwellings were incinerated. The fire grew in ferocity and spread. More houses were consumed but visitors started showing up, mostly informed by word of mouth to watch the conflagration. They too tried to transport the fire home but found that the flames were not controllable or containable.
Others in the valley and town leaders watched in horror as the destruction increased. They began to speak out against the fire and the people that, in their opinion, had been more fascinated by it than in trying to put it out. They rallied and railed against the fire and the people they accused of helping it spread and get out of control. Those suspect were denounced and driven out of the valley in order for the proper fire fighting personnel and machinery to come in and deal with it. It was a difficult, costly and time-consuming effort but finally, the fire was extinguished and all that was left was smoldering remains of houses, acres of scorched land, smoking ash heaps.
But before the last ember was doused with retardant, the village leaders took a small branch, still burning, ever so slight and placed it in a great steel stove in large, vacant hall, converted just for the purpose of display. The mayor gave a grand speech. “We have through the mercy of God escaped the terrible destruction of the fire. We have been able to eliminate it but have reserved enough so that the dear, good-hearted people of this valley can come and visit it and be reminded of the fire’s terrible ferocity and how dangerous it truly is, as well as the proper method of containing it and controlling it.” The crow was grand that day, and it took hours for the people to pay their admission price and then slowly, ever so slowly, walk through the hall, with hushed “oohs” and “ahhs” (and numerous “shushes” to the eager children) by the great steel enclosure that contained the fire.
As the sun set, the mayor gathered his staff and congratulated them on a job well done. “That’s that! Now we can get back to life as normal! And frankly, I don’t ever want to see any fire again!” As the cool night descended upon the town, the crowds dispersed, the great hall locked up good and tight, no one noticed that the small branch, slowly burning all day, dwindled slowly, until the last red-orange embers changed to ash dull and cold grey.
The next day, the discovery made that the fire had died, and the news communicated to the mayor, he gathered his staff. Amid the questions and queries about what was to be done and what now and oh the waste, the mayor stood up and pronounced – “No fear! No fear! We will continue to have tours of our great hall, and people will continue to pay admission to see where the fire once brightly burned. Even better we will organize tours to the mountainside to show the people the dangers of the fire and the power and mastery we have displayed in defeating it.”
And so, it happened – the tours continued, visitors from all around kept coming and (perhaps most importantly) continued to pay admission for the esteemed privilege of seeing the place where the fire once burned brightly, but no more.
Weeks later, a small child, playing outside, watched as storm clouds started to build over the mountains of the valley. The wind picked up, and a few raindrops sprinkled her face. Farther away, she also noticed brilliant and terrible flashes of bright white, as the lightening, crackled from the clouds, skipped across the sky and headed once again to earth.
“I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!”
Luke 12:49
"...a better country" 
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