Our text tonight is found in
the Gospel according to Mark in chapter 15 and verse 23. Mark chapter 15 and verse 23. We'll also read the previous
22nd verse. And they bring him unto the place
Golgotha, which is being interpreted the place of a skull and they
gave him to drink wine mingled with myrrh but he received it
not. These words in verse 23 and they
gave him to drink wine mingled with myrrh but he received it
not. And the refusal that we read
of here indicates to us the determination of the Lord Jesus that he must
be fully conscious in all of those sufferings that he was
now to endure as he makes the great sacrifice for sin. He is the priest making the sacrifice
as well as being that fulfillment of all the Old Testament types
and figures. He is not only the Lamb of God
who takes away the sin of the world but he is the sacrificing
priest and he must therefore be very much aware. He is so
active upon the cross. I know that theologians are wont
to speak of the obedience of the Lord Jesus in his earthly
life in terms of his active obedience and his passive obedience. His
active obedience being the life that he lived, that life in which
he honored and magnified God's law in keeping every commandment
and so accomplishing a glorious righteousness. Righteousness
with which he closes people in their justification. So the theologians
do speak of his active obedience and then when he comes to his
death upon the cross they refer to that as his passive obedience
as he bears the awful penalty of the broken law as that punishment that was due
to the sinner is visited upon his holy person. But in some ways we have to say
that that distinction is artificial because Christ is as active in
dying as he was in living. We know that his death was a
voluntary act. He says as much himself in John
chapter 10, Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay
down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from
them. I lay it down of myself. I have
power or authority to lay it down. And I have power, I have
authority to take it again. No man was able to take that
life that the Lord Jesus gave himself. as that great sacrifice. And so, here in verse 23, we
see how Christ must have felt. He must have felt those awful
sufferings that he had to endure. They gave him to drink wine,
mingled with myrrh, but he received it not. First of all then, to
say something with regards to this refusal on the part of the
Lord Jesus. A precise mixture is mentioned
here in the text. We read of wine mingled with
myrrh. It was a very sour and a very
bitter drink. and so elsewhere for example
in Matthew's account in Matthew 27 it is spoken of as vinegar
mingled with gall very bitter to the taste and how it was offered
to him and repeatedly offered to him we're told for example
in Luke's account and of course when we come to consider the
dying of the Lord Jesus we have so much detail contained in the
four Gospels, each of the evangelists gives their own particular account,
and certain truths are brought out in one, and certain truths
in another. So, it is always wise that we
compare these different accounts, and the great detail. This is
the purpose for which Christ came into the world. to make
the great sacrifice for sins. Now in Luke, in Luke 23 verse
36 we're told how the soldiers also mocked him coming to him
and offering him vinegar. Coming to him and offering him
vinegar. And the verb that we have there,
that verb to offer, is in the present participle active. In
other words, it indicates that that is a continual action on
the part of those soldiers. They were continually coming
to him. They repeatedly came to him, as he was hanging there
upon the cross. and they were mocking him as
they were offering him this particular drink and the Lord refuses the
drink. Why did the Lord refuse it? Well,
as we've said, because he would feel those things that he was
having to suffer at this time. This drink was a sort of drug
and it was given to stupefy the person being crucified, to deprive
them in some sense of their sensibility. It is mentioned as one of the
first things that happens when the Lord arrives there at Calvary. That's why we read the connecting
verse. They bring him unto the place
Golgotha which is being interpreted as the place of a skull, and
they gave him to drink wine mingled with myrrh. One of the first
actions when they arrived there, but not just then, subsequently
as we see, they would have come again and again. But the Lord
Jesus refuses to drink. Calvin, the Protestant reformer,
commenced here that this particular concoction was something that
was given because it was thought that it would make the blood
to flow, so that the person being crucified would bleed more profusely,
and so the death would be hastened. But the Lord's death must not
be hastened, all of these things were ordained, all of these things
were appointed by God in the eternal covenant. And so when
he tasted thereof, he would not drink. Oh the Lord Jesus, what
a man was this. Here is a man of deep feelings. Here is a man who will experience
all the bitter thing that death is. Oh how death is that that
has come upon man because of sin. when God created man as
we know he formed his body out of the dust of the earth and
he breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man is
a living soul and this is how God has created him this is how
man is meant to be body and soul but God told Adam quite plainly
concerning the consequence of the sin of disobedience or if
you would disobey God and partake of that forbidden tree, the tree
of the knowledge of good and evil, in the day that they eat
us thereof, thou shalt surely die." And so death comes, and
death is a separation, a separation between body and soul. And this is what the Lord Jesus
is to experience there upon the cross. He would taste death,
that's what it says. There in Hebrews chapter 2 verse
9, he tasted death. He felt it, he experienced it.
Oh, he drank the very dregs of that bitter cup that the father
had given to him. He says himself, the cup which
my father hath given me, shall I not drink it? And he will drink
it. And he will drink it to the bitter
end. He is obedient. unto death, even the death of
the cross. Or they would give him this drink,
this stupefying drink, but he will have nothing to do with
it, he refuses what they offer him. But how in offering they
are really just mocking him. This is what they do constantly.
They mock the Lord Jesus, they mocked him in the judgment hall. when he had to endure that mock
trial and it was a mock trial, it was necessary of course that
he should be tried because his death was to be seen to be a
judicial death he is condemned as a criminal but how the soldiers
there in Pilate's judgment hall mock the Christ of God In John
19, then Pilate therefore took Jesus, it says, and scourged
him. And the soldiers plaited a crown
of thorns and put it on his head, and they put on him a purple
robe, and said, Hail, King of the Jews! And they smote him
with their hands. or the mockery of these hardened
Roman soldiers, and still they mock Him upon the cross. They're deriding Him, and they're
deriding Him with this drugged potion. The soldiers, it says
there in Luke 23, the soldiers also mocked Him, coming to Him
and offering this drink. and the Lord refusing it. Though
they constantly bring it and set it before Him. And remember
how at the end of His sufferings upon the cross He does cry out
in agony of soul, I thirst. Oh, how easy to take of the drop,
to take of the drink. How He was parched there upon
the cross and yet the Lord refuses their offer. Let us consider
then more carefully, more specifically the way in which we see Christ
refusing what they present to him. It says quite clearly here
in our text, but he received it not. As I said, the reason
for that was because he would be conscious in the midst of
all these sufferings. he is that one who is so active
as the priest he is the one who is making the sacrifice and he
is going to feel all the pain and all the anguish of what it
means to be the great sin offering because he is not only the priest
as we have said but he is also the sacrifice itself they gave him vinegar to drink
mingled with gall and when he tasted thereof he would not drink. Oh the wonder then of the Lord
Jesus Christ as we behold him here in the midst of all the
agonies of his soul. He says the cup which my father
hath given me shall I not drink it? And remember how previously
we have the record of all that he endured in the Garden of Gethsemane
All that agony of Saul as he was contemplating the very purpose
of his coming into the world. We see the reality of his prayers
unto God. Abba, Father, He says all things
are possible unto thee. Take away this cup from them.
Nevertheless, not what I will, but what they will. Oh, there
was a cup and it was full of wormwood and gall and He was
the one who must drink that cup and drink it all even the dregs of that cup He
must partake of as He comes as the great sin offering and so He cries to the Father
He is no stoic you see as He contemplates the cross as He
thinks upon that cup If it be possible, if it be possible,
take away this cup from me nevertheless. Nevertheless, not what I will,
but what thou wilt. He is ever and always subject
unto the Father in dying. He is obedient. His obedience
extends unto that death upon the cross. He is obedient in
life. He is obedient in death. That's
how it's stated by the Apostle there in Philippians chapter
2. He became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
And what was the death of the cross? It was a cursed death.
Cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree. Christ is the one
who has made a curse for his people. We see Christ then in
His refusal to partake of what these men are bringing to Him. We see Him as one who will endure
all that the Father has appointed for Him and we will feel the
bitterness of the punishment that is to be meted out because
He is tasting death. for those that the Father had
given unto him in the eternal covenant. Oh, is it not a truth,
friends, that Christianity is very much a religion of feeling? And we see it in Him who is the
Savior. True faith is so much more than a mere intellectual
ascent to the truth. Now, we don't despise the mind,
how Paul in his epistle speaks of the necessity of a sound mind,
how we should have our mind stored with the great truths of the
word of God. We should be those who would
meditate in these things and seek to understand the significance
of the language that is constantly employed here in Holy Scripture. I remarked on it even this afternoon
at Hegen. We have somewhat technical terms
in the New Testament. Remember John writing in his
first general epistle twice uses the word propitiation concerning
the Lord Jesus we have an advocate with the Father Jesus Christ
the righteous and he is the propitiation for our sins he says and not
for us only but for the sins of the whole world not just for
Jews the propitiation also for sinners of the Gentiles and he
goes on later in chapter 4 does John to say here in his love
not that we love God but that he loved us and sent our son
to be the propitiation for our sins. Now we should seek to understand
the significance of such a word as propitiation. You don't find
it in any of the modern versions. They substitute some other word,
they don't like the word propitiation. and the fact that it stands there
in our authorised version should therefore make us to be more
diligent in seeking to understand the significance of it. Speaking
of the importance, you see, of having our minds clear with regards
to right doctrine. And what does this word propitiation
mean? Well, it deals with that Godward
aspect of sin. The Lord Jesus has dealt with
sin both in its man-wood aspect and also in its God-wood aspect.
The sinner is one who is alienated from God, an enemy of God. And
so Christ comes and makes that great sacrifice whereby He reconciles
the sinner unto God. He brings the sinner back to
God. We see that so clearly in what the Apostle says in that
first chapter of his epistle to the Colossians. Christ reconciling
the sinner. Look at what he says there at
verse 21. You that were sometime alienated
and enemies in your mind by wicked works yet now hath he reconciled
in the body of his flesh through death to present you holy and
unblameable and unreprovable in His sight. Christ has come
to reconcile the sinner who was in that condition whereby he
was God's enemy and he had no thought for God, no desire towards
God. All Christ has dealt with sin
is that that separates. He has covered the guilt of the
sin of His people He has blotted out all their guilt. His sacrifice
was an expiation for sins in that sense. But this word propitiation
it has to do with the Godward aspect. And the effect of sin
upon a God who is holy and righteous and just and good. A God who
will by no means clear the guilty. A God who is angry with the wicked
every day. See, this is why the modern versions
don't like the word propitiation. They don't like the idea of a
God who is angry with sinners. They like to speak of a God of
love. But God who is a God of love is also a holy God and a
just God. And he cannot wink at sins and
sin must be punished. And this is what the Lord Jesus
Christ has done. It is profitable for us to consider
these great truths and sometimes word study in our reading of
the Bible is profitable to us to look at words and to examine
words and sometimes to get a lexicon and to see what the word was
in the original and how that word has been translated in our
English it's all profitable it is good to have a sound mind
there is that intellectual aspect to our faith there is something
to be believed But Christianity, as I said just now, is so very
much a feeling religion. When J.C. Philpott uttered that
statement, a true beginning is a beginning felt. No one has to a sense to the
truth of what he is saying there. Or we feel something when the
Lord deals with us, we feel something. True religion is more than notion.
Something must be known and felt. Not enough just to give a mental
ascent to doctrine. Faith is more than intellectual
ascent. There is that element of trust.
There is that looking to Christ. and that resting in Christ, and
that rolling of our souls upon Christ, that trusting Him as
the only One who can save us from our sins. And we see Christ
as that One who is touch. Oh, remember the language of
the Apostle in Ezekiel to the Hebrews? He says, for we have
not had high priests which cannot be touched with the feeling of
our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are,
yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly
unto the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find
grace to help in time of need." Oh, the Lord Jesus, He's a man,
He's a real man and He's touch, He sympathizes, He feels for
us. Again, in that same epistle,
what does Paul say in chapter 5 of Hebrews speaking of the
Lord Jesus who in the days of his flesh when he had offered
up prayer and supplication with strong crying and tears unto
him that was able to save him from death and was heard in that
he feared though he were a son yet learned the obedience by
the things that he suffered he was he is the eternal son of
God and yet he is that one who learns obedience or how he feels
for his people and those who feel their sins they need just
such a savior as that one who can sympathize with them Lord
Joseph Hart says how true the words are to cease in smarts
but slightly to own with lip confession is easier still but
oh to feel cuts deep beyond expression or we can trot out the words
We can confess our sins to God in that sense. But do we feel
the things that we are confessing? When we feel our sin we want
a Saviour who can also feel with us and feel for us. One who is
touched with the feeling of all our infirmities. All this was
a real human nature. Yes, He was without any sin but
He knew what sort of temptations were. He knew what it was to
be assaulted by Satan. He knew what it was to be ridiculed
by men. And here we see how those soldiers
would come and they'd mock him. But here is Christ so determined
to make the great sacrifice, the sacrificing priest, the one
who will feel those things that now he must endure as he comes
to make atonement for the sins of his people. And so, he refuses. He refuses what they present
to him. They gave him to drink wine mingled
with myrrh, but he received it not. Now, though at first he
refuses the drink, we see that later he actually comes forward
and requests. He requests a drink. And we see
that in John's account of the crucifixion. There in John 19,
28 after this, Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished,
that the scripture might be fulfilled, said, I thirst. Now there was
set a vessel full of vinegar, and they filled a sponge with
vinegar, and put it upon Hesab, and put it to his mouth. When
Jesus, therefore, had received the vinegar, he said, it is finished. And he bowed his head and gave
up the goat. It's not the same drink that
they're offering throughout his crucifixion, but it is a drink
and he requested. He cries out, I thirst. One of
those sayings upon the cross. And they present the drink to
him and he receives the drink. all throughout he was so very
conscious of all those sufferings that he must endure no stoic
but at the end you see as he comes to die he cries in all
the agony of soul his thirst he wants drink now with regards
to that particular request just observe two things first of all
what do we see? we see his reverence for the
Word of God. Oh, how he reveals all that God
had said in Holy Scripture. Why? Jesus is the very Spirit
of Prophecy Himself. What does it say there in John
19.28? Jesus, knowing that all things
were now accomplished, that the Scripture might be fulfilled,
and that clause that is introduced by the word that is a very strong
one literally Jesus knowing that all things were never accomplished
in order that the scripture might be fulfilled he is concerned
for the fulfillment of the word of God and what was the word that had
to be fulfilled? why it was that very word that
we read in the scripture reading There in the great 69th psalm,
that remarkable messianic psalm, they gave me also gall for my
meats, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink. He
knew. He knew that that scripture must
be fulfilled. And so he says, I thirst. And
they come again and they offer him the drink. and he receives
a drink all of the scripture all that was prophesized concerning
him in the Old Testament and not only the prophetic scriptures
all the Levitical law every detail had to be fulfilled in the Lord
Jesus Christ and how conscious he was of all of that throughout
his sufferings remember his words to those two that he meets on
the roads to Emmaus there in Luke 24 verse 27 verse 26 really ought not Christ
to have suffered these things he says and to enter into his
glory and beginning at Moses and all the prophets He expanded
unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.
How He knew the Scriptures. But not only knew the Scriptures,
how He revered the Word of God. And then later, when He appears
to those at Jerusalem, verse 44 of that chapter, He said unto
them, These are the words which I spoke unto you while I was
yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled. which were
written in the Lord of Moses and in the Prophets and in the
Psalms concerning me. There we have the familiar threefold
division of the Hebrew Old Testament Scriptures, the order of the
books in the Hebrew Old Testament are quite different to what we're
familiar with. and they are set out in terms of the law, that's
the five books of Moses, and then the prophets, and then what
they call the writings, the Agiographer. And at the head of the writings
is the book of Psalms. So he is quite clearly there
referring to every part of the Old Testament that the Hebrews
were familiar with. all that is written in the Lord
of Moses, and in the Prophets, and in the Psalms concerning
me. And then opened he their understanding,
that they might understand the Scriptures, or that the Lord
would so open our understanding also. You know the Reformers
would speak of the perspicuity of Scripture. the clarity of
the word of God yes there are difficult passage in scripture
but this is God's word there is a clearness here all but our
poor sin benighted minds how dark our understandings are but
when the Lord opens the understanding to understand the scriptures
he knew it he understood the scriptures he knew that all these
things that were written concerning him must be fulfilled and therefore
he cries out, I thirst. He has a reverence for the Word
of God or do we revere the sacred page of Holy Scripture? The hymn writer says, Say, Christian,
wouldst thou thrive in knowledge of thy Lord? Against no Scripture
ever strive but tremble. at His Word? Do we tremble at
the Word of God? Tremble at the things that are
written here concerning the Lord Jesus Christ? Or do we not see
the awful nature of sin in the light of all His suffering? Yes,
we see sin in the light of that Holy Law of God. Sin is the transgression
of the Law of God. And there is a Law to be accomplished
in the soul of the sinner. Paul makes it quite clear that
there is a ministry of the law, it's that ministration of condemnation,
it ministers death to the soul, it condemns us. Whatsoever things
the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law that every
mouth may be stopped and all the world become guilty before
God and we have to be brought in for what we are guilty. condemned
by the Lord of God that Lord and terrors do but harden all
the while they work alone but a sense of blood-bought pardon
soon dissolves the heart of stone or to look upon Christ in all
his awful sufferings remember the language that we find there
in the book of the Prophet Zechariah or how Zechariah speaks of that
mourning over the Lord Jesus Christ. Mourning as one would mourn over
a firstborn or over an only son. Same in that twelfth chapter.
In Zechariah chapter 12 Verse 10, I will pour upon the
house of David and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of grace
and of supplication and they shall look upon me whom they
have pierced and they shall mourn for him as one mourners for his
only son and shall be in bitterness for him as one that is in bitterness
for his firstborn. What do we know of that, friends,
to feel the awful nature of our sin in the light of the sufferings
of the Lord Jesus Christ. When we come now shortly to the
Lord's table, does it not touch us, does it not move us that
in this simple ordinance we remember He's dying in the broken bread,
in the poured out wine or do we not desire to see something
beyond the outward sign to discern the body and the blood of the
Lord Jesus Christ to have him as it were set before us in a
picture our suffering saviour and to mourn over him we are
to be those who would examine ourselves and prove ourselves
and know ourselves or let a man examine himself says the Apostle
and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup. We are to be those then who would
reverence the Scriptures because the Lord Jesus Christ himself
had such a high regard for all those things that were written when he'd accomplished that great
sacrifice as he comes to the end as he's about to die knowing
that all was now accomplished in order that the scripture might
be fulfilled he says I thirst or let us be those then who would
learn of him and also reverence the sacred page and delight in
every part of the word of God and not be partial were to be
those who would not only delight in the promises, and all the
promises of the Gospel exceed in great and precious promises.
Why those words we were considering even this morning, that gracious
Word of God in Isaiah 41.14, fear not, thou worm Jacob and
ye men of Israel, I will help thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer
and the Holy One of Israel. Oh how God has given us so many
fear not's and not only fear not's but promises and all the
promises we are told they are yay and they are amen in the
Lord Jesus it's no yay nay gospel it's yay, it's amen, it's all
that God has promised and all that God has promised has been
accomplished and this is what Christ was about in dying upon
the cross But we're not only to delight in the promises or
what do we make of the precepts? Do we love the precepts of the
Gospel? Do we love those parts of Holy
Scripture where we're given exhortation and direction with regards to
the way in which we're to live our lives? Do we desire to be
a people who are truly sanctified and set apart? The people who
are evidently called out of this world who don't conform to the
ways of the world but know that gracious transforming ministry
of the Holy Spirit and desire to conform more and more to the
image of the Lord Jesus. He reverence the scripture and
that's why he makes that request at the end such a regard for
the Word of God and then finally this again the reality the reality
of his sufferings, how real they were. He said, I thirst. And there we see how real the
sufferings were, how profound, how deep were the agonies of
the soul of the Lord Jesus Christ. That was a real human soul. That
was a real human soul. He was experiencing a real death. He was experiencing the separation
of the soul from the body. If he didn't have a human soul,
and you know, there are those who call themselves strict Baptists
who deny the reality of the human soul of Christ. If he had no
human soul, how could he die? What is death? It is that awful
separation of body and soul. or the profundity of the sufferings
when he ultimately says it is finished and he commends his
spirit, his soul into the hands of God and he dies Newton said, did Christ my Lord
suffer? and shall I reply or to know
something of what Paul speaks of to those Philippians in that
third chapter the fellowship of his sufferings that's what he desires to know
the power of his resurrection the fellowship of his sufferings
being made conformable onto his death what fellowship can there
be between such a Saviour as Christ is a broken hearted Saviour
as He died so feelingly there upon the cross what fellowship
between such a Saviour as that and a whole hearted sinner or
that we might be broken hearted to present to God that acceptable
sacrifice a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart O God thou
will not despise or that our hearts might be those hearts
in that are so broken as we consider the Lord Jesus Christ. And here
He is. Set before us in this text, they
come. They come to that awful place
called Golgotha. The Hebrew name was Golgotha,
the Greek name for it was Calvary. It's one and the same. They bring
him onto the place called Gotha which is being interpreted the
place of a skull. And they gave him to drink wine
mingled with myrrh. But he received it not. The Lord bless to us his own
word. Amen.