Matthew 26:42 He went away a second
time and prayed, “My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be
taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done.”
In the
Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus prayed in Matthew 26:39, “My Father, if it is
possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.” A
little while later, at His arrest, He said to Peter in John 18:11, “Put your
sword away! Shall I not drink the cup the Father has given me?” The cup was
very much on Jesus’ mind that night.
What was
in the cup? We generally associate the cup with His crucifixion. We assume that
when He prayed that the cup might be taken away, He was asking that, if
possible, He might be spared from that horrible and demeaning death on the
cross. There is truth in that assumption and certainly, the cup was connected
with the crucifixion. But we still haven’t addressed the question of what was
in the cup?
In both
the Old and New Testaments, the cup of God is a reference to His judgement. For
example, in Psalm 75:8, we read, “in the hand of the Lord is a cup full of
foaming wine and mixed with spices; he pours it out and al the wicked of the
earth drink it down to its very dregs.”
Here we
see that the cup God pours out and that the wicked drink down to the dregs is
the cup of God’s judgement. Jeremiah 25:15 is even more specific: “This is what
the Lord, the God of Israel, said to me: “Take from my hand this
cup filled with the wine of my wrath and make all the nations to whom I
send you drink it.”
We also
see it in the New Testament in Revelation 14:9-10, “A third angel followed them
and said in a loud voice: “If anyone worships the beast and its
image and receives its mark on their forehead or on their hand, they,
too, will drink the wine of God’s fury, which has been poured full strength
into the cup of his wrath. They will be tormented with burning sulfur in the
presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb.”
So the
cup is a metaphor referring to the judgement of God as expressed in the pouring
out of His wrath on sinful nations and people.
What was
in the cup Jesus drank at His crucifixion?
It was the wrath of God.
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