“Let This Cup Pass from Me”

By Steve Gwin

On the night before Jesus was crucified, He prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane.  His prayers were “with loud cries and tears to Him who was able to save Him from death” (Hebrews 5:7).  Matthew 26:39 records some of the words Jesus prayed, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will.”  What was this cup that Jesus wanted to pass from Him?

Jesus had mentioned a cup He was going to drink in a conversation that seems to have happened only a couple of weeks earlier when the mother of James and John asked Jesus if her sons could sit, one on Jesus’ right and the other on His left, in His kingdom.  Jesus responded in Matthew 20:22-23, “You do not know what you are asking.  Are you able to drink the cup that I am to drink?” They said to him, “We are able.”  He said to them, “You will drink my cup, but to sit at my right hand and at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.”  It seems clear that Jesus used the words, “drink the cup that I am to drink” to refer to His suffering.  James and John would indeed someday each suffer because of being His apostles.

When Jesus prayed “if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me”, He was using “cup” figuratively to represent all the suffering He would endure within the next several hours:

• falsely accused in repeated mock trials the rest of the night and into the next morning (Matthew 26:59-61; 27:1-2)
• repeatedly mocked, slapped, and spat upon (Matthew 26:67; 27:30-31)
• scourged, which was a brutal whipping that was so very painful as His flesh was ripped away (Matthew 27:26)
• a crown of thorns put on His head (Matthew 27:29)
• humiliated by stripping Him of His clothes (Matthew 27:28)
• the excruciating pain of crucifixion (Matthew 27:35)
• even more than all of the above, bearing all the sins of all humans, past, present and future (1 Peter 2:24).

It is likely that Jesus had an additional idea in mind when He prayed “if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me” because we read in Jeremiah 25:15-17, “Thus the LORD, the God of Israel, said to me: ‘Take from my hand this cup of the wine of wrath, and make all the nations to whom I send you drink it.  They shall drink and stagger and be crazed because of the sword that I am sending among them.’ So I took the cup from the LORD's hand, and made all the nations to whom the LORD sent me drink it:”  In verses 18 through 27, numerous nations are mentioned, and then in Jeremiah 25:28-29, “And if they refuse to accept the cup from your hand to drink, then you shall say to them, ‘Thus says the LORD of hosts: You must drink!  For behold, I begin to work disaster at the city that is called by my name, and shall you go unpunished?  You shall not go unpunished, for I am summoning a sword against all the inhabitants of the earth, declares the LORD of hosts.’”  Drinking the cup of God’s wrath represented nations receiving God’s judgment for their sins.

A similar use of the “cup” figure of speech is in Revelation 14:9-10, “And another angel, a third, followed them, saying with a loud voice, ‘If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also will drink the wine of God's wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.’”  Again, drinking the cup of God’s wrath represented receiving God’s judgment for sins.

Let us every day give thanks for Jesus enduring the judgment we each deserve for our sins.  Jesus had no sin, but He drank the cup of God’s wrath for our sins, so we won’t have to drink it. 

“What an Awesome God You Are”

By Steve Gwin

After the church sings the song “Listen To Our Hearts” in one of our assemblies, I will have the chorus of that song in my mind for several days.  I recently learned there is a name for that: earworm.  The words in the chorus that reoccur in my mind most often are: “We will use the words we know to tell You what an awesome God You are.”  Truly, “our God is an awesome God,” which are words in another song, “Awesome God,” that the church also sings.  Let’s think about what an awesome God we have.

In the New King James Version of the Bible, awesome is used to describe God in several verses: 

• In Deuteronomy 7:21, when the nation of Israel would soon be entering the Promised Land, Moses told them not to be terrified because the Lord, “the great and awesome God,” is among them.  God is awesome in power to give victory to His people. 
• In Deuteronomy 10:17 Moses explained that “the great God, mighty and awesome” administers justice for the fatherless and the widow.  One reason God is awesome is because He cares for those in need. 
• Nehemiah said, “I pray LORD God of heaven, O great and awesome God, You who keep Your covenant and mercy with those who love You and observe Your commandments,” (Nehemiah 1:5).  Another reason God is awesome is because He always keeps His promises. 
• “For the LORD Most High is awesome; He is a great King over all the earth,” (Psalm 47:2).  Our awesome God is King of kings (1 Timothy 6:15).
• As David praised God in Psalm 68:35, he wrote, “O God, You are more awesome than Your holy places.”  God is awesome in His holiness. 
• “Holy and awesome is His name.” (Psalm 111:9)  Every aspect of God is awesome. 
• Jeremiah wrote of the hardships he faced from those who did not want him to tell them the Lord’s words, but Jeremiah took strength and comfort in knowing that “the LORD is with me as a mighty, awesome One” (Jeremiah 20:11).  In our struggles against evil, we can be strengthened and comforted by remembering that the awesome God is with us.
• When the 70 years of Babylonian captivity were nearing their end, Daniel prayed, “O Lord, great and awesome God, who keeps His covenant and mercy with those who love Him, and with those who keep His commandments” (Daniel 9:4).  Daniel was confident God would keep His promise to return His people to their land, and we too can be confident that God will take those who love Him and keep His commandments to heaven, because our God is an awesome God.

The word awesome is used to describe God’s works, “Say to God, ‘How awesome are Your works!’” (Psalms 66:3).  After God promised David that He would set up his seed and establish his kingdom forever, David praised God, “And who is like Your people, like Israel, the one nation on the earth whom God went to redeem for Himself as a people, to make for Himself a name – and to do for Yourself great and awesome deeds for Your land – before Your people whom You redeemed for Yourself from Egypt, the nations, and their gods?” (2 Samuel 7:23).  We should praise God for the awesome deeds He accomplished to deliver us from our sins.

The song “Awesome God” mentions four characteristics of our awesome God: His reign, His wisdom, His power, and His love.

• “God reigns over the nations; God sits on His holy throne,” (Psalms 47:8).  When we hear news of nations developing missiles and nuclear warheads, our anxious minds can be put at ease by remembering that our awesome God reigns over the nations.
• “Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen,” (1 Timothy 1:17).  Because our awesome God has all wisdom, we should trust His way and not depend on our own understanding, (Proverbs 3:5).
• As King David neared the end of his life, he blessed the Lord before all the assembled Israelites, “ Yours, O LORD, is the greatness, The power and the glory, The victory and the majesty; For all that is in heaven and in earth is Yours; Yours is the kingdom, O LORD, And You are exalted as head over all,” (1 Chronicles 29:11).  We, too, should bless our awesome God before others.
• The apostle Paul wrote of the awesome love our awesome God has for us, “For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord,” (Romans 8:38-39).

Let us use the words we know to tell Him what an awesome God He is!