The Tongs and the Coal
An altar of burning coals, a seraph’s wings, one coal taken with the tongs to the prophet’s lips, and the tongs that held it unburnt. Scroll to watch it.
And one of the seraphim was sent unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar. And he touched my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin is purged.
Isaiah 6:6-7, as St Methodius gives it
For taking, as from a pure and undefiled altar, that coal living and ineffable, with man’s flesh invested, in the embrace of her sacred hands, as it were with the tongs, she held Him out to that just one
Methodius, Oration Concerning Simeon and Anna