They
bring them and give them to us, hoping they will be our death; they
give them therefore with many a foul curse; but God blesses them
still.
Nor is this cup so bitter but that our Lord himself drank deep of
it, before it was handed to his church. He did, as loving mothers
do, drink thereof himself, to show us it is not poison, also to
encourage us to drink it for his sake, and for our endless health.
Therefore the cup is called Christ's cup: "Are ye able to drink of
the cup that I drink of? Ye shall indeed drink of my cup." Here you
see they are joined in a communion in this cup of affliction.
But these are not all the cups that belong to the church in the
wilderness. There is also a cup, out of which, at times, is drunk
what is exceeding sweet. It is called the cup of consolation, the
cup of salvation; a cup in which God himself is, as David said, "The
Lord is the portion of my cup."
This cup, they that are in the church in the wilderness have usually
for an after-draught to that bitter one that went before. Thus, as
tender mothers give their children plums or sugar to sweeten their
palate after they have drunk a bitter potion, so God gives his
children the cups of salvation and consolation after they have
suffered awhile: "For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so
our consolation aboundeth by Christ.
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