Notes. John XII. 27—33.
27.— [Now is my soul troubled, etc., etc.] This remarkable verse comes in somewhat abruptly. Yet the connection is not hard to trace. Our Lord had just been speaking- of His own atoning death. The thought and prospect of that death appears to draw from Him the expressions of this verse, which I will now examine in order.
[Now is my soul troubled."] This sentence implies a sudden, strong mental agony, which came over our Lord, troubling, distressing, and harassing Him. — What was it from ? Not from the mere foresight of a painful death on the cross, and the bodily suffering attending it. No doubt human nature, even when sinless, naturally revolts from pain and suffering. Yet mere bodily pain has been endured for weeks by many a martyr, and even b;> heathen fanatics in India, without a groan or a murmur. — No ! it was the weight of the world's imputed sin laid upon our Lord's head, which pressed Him downward, and made Him cry, " Now is my soul troubled." It was the sense of the whole burden of man's transgression imputed to Him, which, as He drew near to the cross, weighed Him down so tremendously. It was not His bodily sufferings, either an- ticipated or felt, but our sins, which here, at Gethsemane, and at Calvary, agonized and racked His soul.
Let us notice here the reality of Christ's substitution for us. He was made " a curse " for us, and sin for us, and He felt it for a time most deeply. (Gal. iii. 13; 2 Cor. v. 21.) Those who deny the doctrine of substitution, imputation, and atone- ment can never explain the expressions before us satisfac- torily.
Poole remarks : " There is a vast difference between this trouble of spirit in Christ, and that which is in us. Our troubles are upon reflection for our own sins, and the wrath of God due to us therefor; His troubles were for the wrath of God due to us for our sins. — Our troubles are because we have personally grieved God; His were because those given to Him had offended God. We are afraid of our eternal condemnation; He was only afraid by a natural fear of death, which naturally riseth higher according to the kind of death we die. — Our troubles have mixture of despair, distrust, sinful horror; there was no such thing in His trouble. — Our troubles, in their natu- ral teudency, are killing and destroying ; only by accident and the wise ordering of Divine providence do they prove advanta- geous, and lead us to Him ; His trouble, in the very nature of it, was pure, and clean, and sanative, and healing. — But that He was truly troubled, and that such a trouble did truly agree to His office as Mediator, and is a great foundation of peace, quiet, and satisfaction to us, is out of question. By some of these stripes we are healed."
We should remember and admire the prayer in the Litany of