The wars of the Protestants on the Continent after the Refor- mation, and the American war between North and South, fur- nished melancholy proofs of this. Some of the best Christians have died on battle fields. Taking the sword, they perished by the sword.
St. John, for wise reasons, does not mention the miraculous healing of Malchus. Burgon takes occasion to remark that even in the hour of our Lord's apparent weakness He gave His enemies a miracle of power and a miracle of mercy, — power in striking them to the ground, mercy in healing.
[The cup... Father. ..given...drink it.] This beautiful saying is peculiar to St. John's Gospel. It was meant to show our Lord's perfect willingness and readiness to drink the bitter cup of suf- fering which was before Him. It should always be read in connection with the two other expressions about "the cup" which our Lord had very shortly before used in the garden of Gethsemane. First came the prayer, " If it be possible lettliis cup pass from Me." Then came the resigned declaration, " If this cup may not pass from Me except I drink it, Thy will be done." And last of all comes the firm and composed assertion of perfect readiness for anything : *' Shall I not drink the cup given to Me by my Father ? " The three expressions taken to- gether are deeply instructive. They show that our Lord in His agony prayed for relief. They show that His prayer was first answered by His being able to submit entirely to His Father's will. They show that His prayer was finally answered by His being able to show complete willingness to sufibr. What an example this is for all believers in the time of trouble ! Like our Master we may pray about it, and hope that like Him we shall obtain help by prayer. What a proof this is of our Lord's power to sympathize with suffering believers. He knows their conflicts by experience.
The absolute voluntariness of Jesus Christ's suifering for us is nowhere perhaps more remarkably brought out than in this passage. He resents and rebukes the effort of a zealous dis- ciple to repel force by force. He speaks of His sufferings as "a cup" given to Him by His Father, and appointed in the everlasting counsels of the Trinity, and as one which He cheer- fully and willingly drinks. " Shall I not drink it? Would you have me refuse it ? Would you prevent my dying for sinners ? " It is the more marvellous when we reflect that He who thus willingly suffered was God Almighty as well as man. Nothing can account for the whole scene but the doctrine of atonement and substitution.
To the eye of some, our Lord's sufferings were forced on Him by the Jews. Yet when He speaks of them here. He looks far above second causes. He says. His sufferings were " the cup given to Him by the Father." Are not all the sufferings of God's children to be regarded in the same light ?
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Calvin warns us here that while we ought to be ready to drink any cup appointed by our Father, " we must not listen to those fanatics who tell us that we may not seek remedies for diseases and any other kind of distresses, lest we reject the cup pre- sented to us by our heavenly Father."
Henry observes on the word " cup " as applied to affliction : " It is but a cup, a small matter comparatively, be it what it will. — It is not a sea, a Red sea, or a Dead sea, for it is not hell ; it is light, and but for a moment. — It is a cup that is given us : suflferings are gifts. — It is given us by a Father, by one who has a Father's authority, and does us no wrong, — a Father's affection, and means us no hurt."
Bengel remarks that John here evidently pre-supposes the particulars detailed by Matthew about " the cup," named by our Lord in prayer, to be things known by his readers. Paley also notices the expression as one of the undesigned coinci- dences of Scripture.