What Was In The Cup?
Several years ago I had an uncle that was in the hospital preparing for open heart surgery. I went into his hospital room early on the morning of surgery and we talked a little about the surgery and I asked him if he was scared. He responded quickly with, "No!"
He told me that he was praying the night before with quite a bit of anxiety. The Lord spoke peace to his heart by reminding him of all that Jesus had suffered
just before and on the Cross. He told me that if Jesus endured such pain for him, then he would be willing to endure what was necessary to be a witness for Christ. At that point in our conversation the surgical nurses came to take him back to surgery. I prayed with him and on the way out of the room he asked me a question..... "What was in the cup?", he asked. I replied with confusion.... and he said, "You remember, Jesus was praying at Gethsemane about the cup", I responded that I remembered the passage, but I didn’t understand the question. As he was rolled down the hallway he asked me one more time...., "What was in the cup?". For the next four or five hours I dare say I was in more agony than he was in that operating room. I grabbed a Gideon Bible that was in the waiting room and began to study and pray. I knew that when he came out of that surgery and had a day or so to get his bearings, he would be quizzing me concerning his question about the cup. So I studied and prayed..... I was right, when he came out of that surgery and recovered, we had the discussion about the cup... and here is what the Lord (and my uncle Jimmy)
inspired me to see:
Matthew 26:36-46 (Read)
Here is Jesus approaching the betrayal and the cross as he enters this garden to pray. You can’t help but sense the anxiety in His words. What is that would cause the very Son of God to sweat as it were great drops of blood? What is it that would cause the Son of God to return to that spot in the garden three times to pray the same words?
What, you ask? I would submit to you that it is "What Was In The Cup"!
I considered how the text started in Matthew 26:36 by stating that "then cometh Jesus....." That was the name above every name. In that garden He was not referred to as Christ... though He was and is. You see, the name Christ refers to His deity and authority as the second person of the Godhead. Yet, when we see Jesus in this garden we see him filled with anxiety.
So... we see Him as Jesus. That is the name of his flesh, the name He was given 700 years before by the prophecy of Isaiah. He truly is Christ, fully God; but He truly is God with us (Jn.1:14), fully man! Nowhere else in scripture do we see the humanity of Jesus like we do in this passage. What caused such anxiety? What did Jesus see in that cup?
I. SIN
Perhaps on the first stop to pray Jesus looked into
the cup of the Father’s will and w/out a doubt He
was confronted with sin. Not just some sin, but
the sin of all the world. Rom.5:12 would tell us
that when Jesus looked into that cup He saw the sin
of all the world from Adam to the last sinner that
will ever be present on earth. He saw all sin,
past, present and future. You may ask why this
would cause anxiety in the Son of God. Jesus was
familiar with sin, but He Himself was spotless and
never had sinned. But now, He was about to become
sin (2 Cor. 5:21). This must have caused Jesus
anxiety as He looked into the cup! But there was
more....
II. SUFFERING
Jesus was not caught by surprise by the suffering,
but I believe that when He was praying in the
garden, it all became so real because now the hour
had come. We all know that our life (if we live
long enough)will be stricken with a certain amount
of suffering. We will all be betrayed by someone
we considered a friend, we will all face death in
some form... some of which will cause a great deal
of suffering and pain through disease or accident.
My point is this; just because we know that
suffering is going to come, it doesn’t make it any
easier to handle when it actually happens. Jesus
knew He would suffer and die (Luke 9:22). But now
that hour had come. He would face trumped up
charges during trial, he would be mocked, spat
upon, slapped, beaten, and His flesh would be
ripped to unrecognition. This is what Jesus saw
as He looked into the cup. But there was more....
III.SACRIFICE
Jesus looked beyond the Sin, beyond the Suffering
and recognized His role as Sacrifice. I do not
intend to be grotesque for any other reason than
to help you understand the scene at Calvary that
Jesus knew must come. The Day of Atonement was
not a pretty sight. It was an awful, awful bloody
sight at the tabernacle on that day as the lambs
would be slain at the altar. Imagine the small
lambs, white without blemish, being slain as they
stood helplessly. The sight of the blood that
must have overcome that altar as the lamb would be
numb at first, but then too late, realizing the
pain of sacrificial instrument the lamb would
thrash about literally throwing its life blood all
over the altar. I know that it is an awful image
to suggest... but such was the day of Calvary.
There is no artistic rendition of Calvary that has
done justice to what Jesus must have endured at
the Cross. It must have been a bloody, bloody
sight that day as Jesus lay down on that cross,
already covered with blood from his scourgings,
only to be mocked again and again.... then a crown
of thorns pressed into his brow which would only
add to the crimson scene that day as the blood
flowed out of his head, down his face, out of his
back and chest where he was ripped to pieces by
the scourging.... and then even in death, the
spear that came to his side to let the blood that
remained, flow down from the cross.
All of this, Jesus saw in the cup! He would be
the final, the once for all sacrifice. It was
necessary because His was the only blood that
would satisfy the righteous demands of God’s
justice that the wages of sin be paid. And Jesus
was that sacrifice (1Jn.2:2 - propitiation means
satisfaction.) But there was more....
IV. SEPARATION
Jesus looked beyond the Sin, the Suffering, the
Sacrifice... and maybe what led Him back into the
garden the third time is what He saw toward the
bottom of that cup; something that He had never
experienced before; perhaps even this is what
brought the blood drops of sweat dripping from his
body.... Separation!
Matthew 27:46 records that it was about the ninth
hour when Jesus cried, "Eli, Eli, Lama
sabachthani?.... My God, my god, why hast thou
forsaken me?"
For the first time ever, from eternity past, the
Son had never known separation from His Father,
but now the penalty of sin was bore upon His body
and the Father lay the sin of the world upon His
Only begotten Son.
Now I now that people say it was my sin and your
sin that put Jesus on that cross. Some say that
it was Rome or the religious establishment of the
Jews, but friends, there is only one correct
doctrine when it comes to Jesus dying on that
Cross... He was put there by the Father!
That’s right! I understand what people are saying
when they make all of those other statements, but
you need to understand today that it has always
been the plan of God the Father from the
foundation of the world, to offer Jesus on
that Cross. It was the Father’s will (Is.53:10).
And there on that cross, Jesus died; for my sin,
for your sin, for the sin of the world... He died!
That is what Jesus saw in that cup.
You may wonder, if Jesus really saw all that was
in the cup, then why did He go through with it?,
The cup was full of bitterness and Jesus had a
choice... Why do it? Well, because there was more!
You see, Jesus looked beyond the Sin, the Suffer-
ing, the Sacrifice and even the Separation....
and in the bottom of that cup was the bottom line,
the one thing that turned that bitter cup into
sweetness.....
V. SALVATION
He was (is) our only hope! First of all, Jesus
loves the Father and it was His greatest desire to
do God’s will in God’s timing..... that is why He
prayed the same thing three times.
But friends, Jesus loves you... He loves me... and
that is why He looked beyond all that the cup had
to offer and He got up from praying, dusted himself
off, released the disciples from the weariness of
prayer and he went down the ’via del a rosa’...
the way of suffering. All that you may be saved
today! (Rom. 5:8)
