It would scarcely be necessary to spend any time in illustrating that
truth, but for the strange misapprehension of the words of our text
which I believe to be not uncommon. People sometimes read them as if the
first portion referred to those who trust in Christ, and who therefore
receive the blessings of His sanctifying energy, whilst the latter
words, on the other hand, were a threatening against unbelievers. Now,
whatever may be the meaning of the emblem in the preceding and
subsequent clauses, it can have but one meaning in our text itself--and
that is, the purifying influence of the Spirit of God. Baptism with the
Holy Ghost is not one thing and baptism with fire another, but the
former is the reality of which the latter is the symbol.
It may be worth while to dwell briefly on the force of the emblem, which
is often misunderstood. Fire, then, all over the world has been taken to
represent the divine energy. Even in heathendom, side by side with the
worship of light was the worship of fire. Even that cruel
Moloch-worship, with all its abominations rested upon the notion that
the swift power and ruddy blaze of fire were symbols of glorious
attributes. Though the thought was darkened and marred, wrongly
apprehended and ferociously worked out in ritual, it was a true thought
for all that. And Scripture has from the beginning used it. It would
carry us too far to enumerate the instances which might be adduced. But
we may quote a few. When the covenant was made between God and Abraham,
upon which all the subsequent revelation reposed, the divine presence
was represented by a smoking furnace, and a lamp of fire that passed
between the divided pieces of the sacrifice. When the great revelation
of the divine Name was given to Moses, which prepared for the great
deliverance from Egypt, the sign of it was a thorn-bush--one of the many
dotted over the desert--burning and unconsumed. Surely the ordinary
interpretation, which sees, in that undying flame, an emblem of Israel
undestroyed in the furnace of bondage, is less natural than that which
sees in it a sign having the same purpose and the same meaning as the
deep words, 'I am that I am.' The Name, the revelation proper, is
accompanied by the sign which expresses in figure the very same
truth--the unwearied power, the undecaying life of the great
self-existent God, who wills and does not change, who acts and does not
faint, who gives and is none the poorer, who fills the universe and is
Himself the same, who burns and is not consumed--the 'I am.' Further, we
remember how to Israel the pledge and sacramental seal of God's
guardianship and guidance was the pillar which, in the fervid light of
the noonday sun, seemed to be but a column of wavering smoke, but which,
when the darkness fell, glowed at the heart and blazed across the
sleeping camp, a fiery guard. 'Who among us,' says the prophet, 'shall
dwell with everlasting burnings?' The answer is a parallel to the
description given in one of the Psalms in reply to the question, 'Lord,
who shall abide in Thy tabernacle?' From which parallelism, as well as
from the whole tone of the passage, the conclusion is unavoidable that
to Isaiah 'everlasting burnings' was a symbolic designation of God. And,
passing by all other references, we remember that our Lord Himself used
the same emblem, as John does, with apparently the same meaning, when,
yearning for the fulfilment of His work, He said,' I am come to send
fire on earth--oh that it were already kindled!' The day of Pentecost
teaches the same lesson by its fiery tongues; and the Seer in Patmos
beheld, burning before the throne, the sevenfold lamps of fire which are
'the seven spirits of God.'
Thus, then, there is a continuous chain of symbolism according to which
some aspect of the divine nature, and especially of the Spirit of God,
is set forth for us by fire. The question, then, comes to be--what is
that aspect? In answer, I would remind you that the attributes and
offices of the Spirit of God are never in Scripture represented as being
destructive, and are only punitive, in so far as the convictions of sin,
which He works in the heart, may be regarded as being punishments. The
fire of God's _Spirit_, at all events, is not a wrathful energy,
working pain and death, but a merciful omnipotence, bringing light and
joy and peace. The Spirit which is fire is a Spirit which giveth life.
So the symbol, in the special reference in the text, has nothing of
terror or destruction but is full of hope and bright with promise.
Even in its more general application to the divine nature, the same
thing is to a large extent true. The common impression is the reverse of
this. The interpretation which most readers unconsciously supply to the
passages of Scripture where God is spoken of as flaming fire, is that
God's terrible wrath is revealed in them. I am very far from denying
that the punitive and destructive side of the divine character is in the
symbol, but certainly that is not its exclusive meaning, nor does it
seem to me to be its principal one. The emblem is employed over and over
again, in connections where it must mean chiefly the blessed and joyous
aspect of God's Name to men. It is unquestionably part of the felicity
of the symbol that there should be in it this double force--for so is it
the fitter to show forth Him who, by the very same attributes, is the
life of those who love Him and the death of those who turn from Him.
But, still, though it is true that the bright and the awful aspects of
that Name are in themselves one, and that their difference arises from
the difference of the eyes which behold them, yet we are justified, I
think, in saying that this emblem of fire regards mainly the former of
these and not the latter. The principal ideas in it seem to be swift
energy and penetrating power, which cleanses and transforms. It is fire
as the source of light and heat; it is fire, not so much as burning up
what it seizes into ashes, but rather as laying hold upon cold dead
matter, making it sparkle and blaze, and turning it into the likeness of
its own leaping brightness; it is fire as springing heavenwards, and
bearing up earthly particles in its shooting spires; it is fire, as
least gross of visible things;--in a word, it is fire as life, and not
as death, that is the symbol of God. It speaks of the might of His
transforming power, the melting, cleansing, vitalising influence of His
communicated grace, the warmth of His conquering love. It has, indeed,
an under side of possible judgment, punishment, and destruction, but it
has a face of blessing, of life-giving, of sanctifying power. And
therefore the Baptist spake glad tidings when he said, 'He shall baptize
you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire.'