I came to cast fire upon the earth; and what will I, if it is already kindled?
But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished!
With the passages which we have already read in mind, I think we are able to see that this passage gathers them all into itself. What they bring before us is the relationship between the cup of the Lord and the scattering of the fire in the earth.
The Lord, in these words, gives us these two things in their relationship, indicating that the scattering of the fire was dependent upon the drinking of the cup.
In saying that, He only indicated an established law—a law which history has demonstrated and proved so deeply, so mightily, either negatively or positively. Where there has been no cup, there has been no fire. Where there has been the cup, there has always been the fire.
It is the story of all the persecutions, all the sufferings of the people of God, which have issued in the progress of the gospel.
It is something, dear friends, that we have to very clearly recognize and definitely accept. Right at the very heart of everything in the purpose of God, there is a cup; and only by the drinking of that cup is any kind of real spiritual progress, enlargement, possible.
But, to put that in another way, there is always a cup; but the drinking of that cup will always issue in spiritual progress, or increase, or enlargement, or deepening. It is a law.
Now, here we have to pause to clear up a difficulty always present to confuse our minds in this matter—to destroy a fundamental confusion.
On the one side, the Christian life ought to be characterized by joy, by hope, by life. On the other side, that same Christian life is not, in contradiction to that, characterized by suffering.
The Lord Jesus mingles those two things in the moment when He took the cup. He took the cup and gave thanks.
There should be, I say, no contradiction between these two things. Joy and sorrow mingle; rest and peace and hope are found in the very presence of suffering, adversity, and affliction.
If we do not clear up this matter in our minds, we are going to get into difficulty. We are going to argue that the Christian life ought to be one continuous, unbroken song—deep joy, exuberant enthusiasm, and light-heartedness—and that nothing whatever that is not that is right in the Christian life. You just read your New Testament if you think like that.
On the other hand, it is possible for us so to regard the sufferings, the trials, the difficulties, and adversities as the marks of a kind of holy Christian life which must exclude anything exuberant and joyous. Some people nurse that kind of complex, and they are afraid of joy. They are afraid even of spiritual laughter.
You see what I mean? We have got to recognize that we are not speaking about natural things now. There is that sublime, that wonderful, that divine paradox: sorrowing, yet always rejoicing.
In the midst of afflictions and trials, Peter says, “Ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory.” Somehow that has got to be reconciled, or we shall be in a muddle.
The true apprehension of the cup is not morbid; it is not morose; it is not a funeral thing. True apprehension of the Christian life is not that superficiality and frivolity. It is something that has, as we have said, a cup right at the heart.
Well, let us see to it that we get over the danger of having a contradiction in the back of our minds in this matter. Get that quite clearly straightened out. We have to deal with our difficulties as we go on.
That, apparently, is far more real than perhaps you recognize. We are meeting those who are having a very good time. They are in one of those phases and stages of the Christian life where all is good. It is springtime, or it is summertime. There are no clouds in their sky, and they are inclined to condemn the person having a bad time. Is something wrong with their Christianity because, for the time being, they are passing through some time of darkness, perhaps eclipse?
On the other side, let us be very, very patient if we are having a difficult time with those who are not. Let us reconcile these things and see that they may only represent two aspects of one thing, and not be contradictory at all.
Now, I do not want to take too much time, because I have a lot to say. Let us get on with this matter.
Firstly, then: the cup.
We all know that the cup of the Lord is central and basic to the Christian life, to the life of the church.
It has that place in the church’s life. It is there; it represents the very centre, the very focal point, of the church’s life and of the believer’s life. That is where the Word of God puts it. That is the place that the Scriptures give to it: the gathering centre of the people of God, the foundation of their life individually and collectively.
But there is a division in the cup which we must recognize immediately. There is a division in the cup—that is, His side and ours. Let us get this cleared up before we go further.
There is the side of the Lord Jesus in that cup with which we have nothing to do, so far as the drinking of it is concerned. It is uniquely His; it is His alone.
It has to do, we know, with our redemption. It has to do with our judgment under the wrath of God. It has to do with the final outworking of sin and judgment. It has to do with death. It has to do with the remission of sins.
This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is poured out for you.
It has to do with our justification before God—our being set in the position of the righteous. It has to do with our very life, eternal life. In all that, you and I have no part, only to receive it by faith.
In drinking the cup, we do not ourselves work out our redemption, or have any part or place in that great atoning, substitutionary, representative work for us. That is isolated to Him. No one can go back there with the Lord in His sufferings—that is His part.
But then there is our side—not in that. Our sufferings with the Lord are not vicarious as His were. Here we are brought in to share the cup, but our part is in another realm: that of sharing His reproach.
It is because we are standing with Him on His rights. We are being disputed and challenged, and so terribly fought against in this very universe and in this world.
It is because the Holy Spirit is doing something in us in relation to the character of the Lord Jesus. You know very well that no sooner is there the slightest sign of any Christlikeness in an individual than that seems to provoke something, bring out antagonism, which has in effect: “You must not be like Christ.”
They take knowledge that we have been with Jesus, and they counsel to put us to death. There is something, you see, in the spiritual realm which hates this character of Jesus, because its presence is an exposure and a condemnation of sin.
Evil hates good and cannot bear its presence. It is the very presence of good that causes this antagonism. It is in that—just being Christlike—that we are involved in His cup.
And in all, it is because we have taken sides with Him against the great enemy, Satan, and all that is sworn to him. With all his vicious malignity, he is determined that the last semblance and trace of this Christ shall be blotted out, if he can.
You and I, in our presence in this world, are a semblance of Christ—or we should be—and we come under those evil counsels. That is our part. We are partners with Him in His position in this world. In fact, in that, we are drinking of His cup.
That is where we begin with the cup. It is there as our ground—the ground of our salvation, our redemption, our justification, our life. We stand on that ground; we take the cup with thanksgiving.
But we commit ourselves when we do so, to this other side of the cup. We commit ourselves to return, in the power of His life, in spite of His enemy. There is no evading, or avoiding, or getting away from it.
We have got to recognize this. I said it is something to be clearly recognized and definitely and deliberately expected right at the outset, and continually kept in mind.
But after we have said that, there are other things about the cup. I am keeping, really, to the Word; you can check what I am saying by the Scriptures.
This cup expresses and represents the absolute holiness and apartness of Christ, and of all that is related to Christ.
You know 1 Corinthians 10:21:
Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of demons: ye cannot partake of the table of the Lord, and of the table of demons.
You cannot bring these together. Not discerning—not discriminating—that is the word there: not discriminating, not recognizing the tremendous apartness of two whole realms.
This cup speaks of that apartness, that holiness, that separateness of Christ and all that is Christ. It marks the difference—the fundamental and radical difference—between the Christian and everyone else.
That is the whole argument of the First Letter to the Corinthians, as you know. Throughout that letter, we have an unlawful bringing together of things, and focusing that unlawfulness at the Lord’s table.
It is a typical letter, which really does set out in this matter of the cup what the apostle is doing in that letter. He is seeking to point out that there is a discrimination which has got to be discerned. There is a difference.
This is the difference—not of degrees of Christian life, but of the very basis and nature of the Christian life—that a Christian is this and not that. These things are separated by the cup.
The cup is something very holy, something very separate, something very different. If you and I take the cup, if we drink the cup, we are supposed to be different from everyone else who is not the Lord’s.
There is a character required by this cup. There is a life that is different. There is a person that is different. The cup says so. It challenges everything that does not belong to Christ and says, “God stands against me, because that is against the cup.” This is a holy thing.
No wonder the apostle was so strong on this matter, and no wonder things were happening in Corinth.
For this cause many among you are weak and sickly, and not a few sleep.
They were not discerning at the Lord’s table.
This cup deals with and removes all the ground of Satan. Satan’s ground, of course, is the ground of nature—your nature and mine, what we are in ourselves. That is the playground of Satan.
The cup deals with that and takes Satan’s ground from him. It puts him out.
Why did Judas have to go? The cup drove him out. The very significance of it was that he was out of this; he was not of it. He must go. He represented Satan’s ground in the holy circle, and he must be eliminated. I was going to say, liquidated. There is something there which has got to go. The cup says so.
But then again, the cup is the great unifying thing with the Lord Himself. It is a great unifying thing with Himself—our common participation with Him.
The cup links us with Him. It not only distinguishes us as His, as different, but it establishes a relationship which is, to use the symbolism, a blood relationship.
But it goes beyond that. It establishes a relationship of that kind between all who are joined to the Lord. The cup is that which unifies His own.
These may sound simple things, but they are tremendously challenging. Let us look at this letter to the Corinthians again: the First Letter, chapter 10, verse 16.
The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a communion of the blood of Christ?
Now look over into the next chapter, in this continuous narrative in the original letter—chapter 11 and verse 18:
For first of all, when ye come together in the church, I hear that divisions exist among you; and I partly believe it.
See the contradiction. A common participation. It is not just that we participate with Christ; together we are on common ground in our participation. It is collective; it is corporate—a common participation, a together participation, a one participation. It is the church.
How can you come together as the church, and there are divisions among you? It is a contradiction. It is a violation of the very meaning of that cup.
You know, when you go back to the beginning of that letter, the apostle has much more to say about this matter of division. But the point is this: when he so early opens up the matter of divisions—“There are divisions among you. I am of Paul; I am of Apollos”—put what name you like there; put another name there; write it up to date if you like—it represents party spirit, does it not?
The point is this: the apostle steadily works his way right up to the table and makes that the climax. In effect, you cannot have the table in reality while it is like that. The reality of the table is impossible. It is a mockery to have it if it is like that.
It is a contradiction. It is a divine, fundamental subverting of the very meaning of the cup. If it is like that, you cannot have it in reality; but you can have it to your own undoing and judgment.
You see, this cup, dear friends, above all things speaks of love—love for the Lord. Yes, it speaks of love: His love, the Father’s love, the love of the Son, the love of the Spirit, and the mutual love of believers. All that is in the cup.
But that is not all about the cup.
I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished!
Are ye able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?
You see, two things go together. “I have a baptism.” The Lord was only saying, in other words, “I have a cup.” Until I have done it, that very purpose for which I have come is in suspense. “I am come to cast fire upon the earth.”
We shall see, perhaps, later. But here we are just dealing with this matter. You see, the scattering of the fire—and we are all very interested in that, put that how you will: the progress of the gospel, the extension of the kingdom, the salvation of souls, the expansion of testimony—put it how you will, it is all the same thing. It is the scattering of the fire.
The earth has got to feel the touch of something—Christ. The earth has got to recognize something burning, something living, something consuming, something against which you cannot stand.
“I am come to scatter fire.” Yes, but that is all dependent upon the cup. That is all dependent upon what I have been saying about the church from first to last.
You notice 2 Corinthians. Second Corinthians entirely rests upon those two things. You begin in chapter 1, verse 5:
For as the sufferings of Christ abound unto us, even so our comfort also aboundeth through Christ.
There you are: there is the cup. Chapter 4, verse 1: “Therefore seeing we have this ministry.” The ministry rests upon the cup.
The second letter, you know, is the letter of the ministry. But notice: it begins with the sufferings of Christ abounding unto us. The scattering of the fire, the fulfilment of the ministry, the service of the Lord, the expansion of the gospel—however we may put it—rests upon the cup.
Not only, dear friends, upon the cup for our salvation, but the cup in all those other aspects: the holy life, an inward separateness, something apart for the Lord.
It rests upon not only our oneness with Him, but our oneness in Him. Souls will not be saved while there is disruption in the instrument. Souls will not be saved while there are divisions amongst those who are taking their salvation.
The work will not grow and expand and enlarge if Satan is allowed a place to divide the people of God. You can take it that Christ Himself has established this law. We cannot get away from it.
We may try, make our effort, do all that we can, but it does not get anywhere. We ask, “What is the matter?” Well, this is the matter: there is sin somewhere, or there are divisions somewhere. There is party spirit somewhere. People are making parties.
And we are simply destroying our own work if it is like that. You see, this is the cup.
It is the church that the apostle is talking about and writing to. He is writing about the church again and again in these Corinthian letters: “When ye come together in the church.” It is a corporate matter—this fellowship with the cup unto the scattering of the fire.
Can we have the table? Can we have it? Have we a right? Have we got the ground for this?
I do not know if it is the word “foundation,” but there it is: it is the beginning of the work. There is more to follow, but you have got to get your basis, your foundation, right before you can have anything else.
It is lovely to go on with the scattering of the fire, to see the thing working out on the side of glory and power. Yes, we would like to be caught up in that; but we have got to get our basis right. The basis is the cup.
You see, there is no doubt about it, but the ruin of the church’s testimony and ministry is so often wrought out on either, or both, of these two things: a contradiction to the cup right in its midst, or an avoidance of the cup.
Trying not to face the cup and accept the involvement in the sufferings; having a good time and making everything like that. But the ruination of testimony and ministry comes as much by avoiding the cup as by contradicting the cup.
If the cup is not there, you cannot move. It is exactly all its meaning. It has to be.
I think those two were a little frivolous. Certainly the Lord was right when He said, “Ye know not what ye ask.” “We are able,” they said. Well, all right: “Ye shall.”
The first of those was the prototype martyr of the New Testament. We talk about him perhaps as he drank the cup—Herod killed James with the sword. “Ye shall. Ye shall.”
This is something very real. But we will see that it worked out for the furtherance of the gospel; leave that for the moment.
Let us get this one. Let us get this one. If this is right, the other will follow. It will follow quite naturally, spontaneously.
The cup leads to the scattered fire. The scattered fire waits for the cup.
He took the cup, gave it to them, and said, “Drink ye all of it.”
And if the message seems too heavy, do not blame me. Ask the Lord just how this applies, where it applies, what it means. I have not any doubt but that it is His word. Oh, Lord, give grace to receive.