Wine Mixed With Gall

"There they offered Jesus wine to drink, mixed with gall; but after tasting it, he refused to drink it" (Matt. 27:34).

In the middle of the story of the Crucifixion, as Jesus arrives at Golgotha, someone offers him a drink which he refuses. Why? The answer to that question has implications for our salvation.

The first thing to note is that what he was being offered was not just the regular wine that everyone drank. In fact, while Jesus hung upon the cross, he later accepts a drink of "wine vinegar" (Matt. 27:48; Mark 15:36; Luke 23:36; John 19:28-30). This occurs at the end of his ordeal.

The one offered before he was crucified was refused. The one offered at the end of the crucifixion was received.
The difference between these two drinks is important to note.

Mark tells us that the first drink was "wine mixed with myrrh" (Mark 15:23). Mark's Gospel is generally accepted to be the earliest one and Matthew drew upon it for his work. So, Matthew changes the specific word "myrrh" for a more generic word that really means "something bitter." You see, Matthew, throughout his Gospel, wants to emphasize that Jesus, in all He did, was fulfilling the scriptures. And here, he changes the word to
reflect the fulfillment of Psalm 69:21, "They put gall in my food and gave me vinegar for my thirst."

For both Matthew and Mark, the point is that Jesus was being offered a pain-killing drink, a kind of narcotic that would help him through the experience in a drugged state. It was  like offering Him a shot of morphine to put him into a stupor.

Jesus refused to deaden the pain of His ordeal. Why? Because He needed to bear the entire weight of mankind's sin and our offense against God. To numb the pain would be to lessen the efficacy of His substitutionary act of atonement. Jesus was not willing that anyone should perish and so He needed to be fully present to the task at hand.

For those of us who struggle with any kind of addiction (and that is probably all of us), we can find comfort that Jesus died for us, fully present to our pain, rather than opt for self-medication. Avoidance of pain is the essence of addiction. I am grateful that Jesus did not avoid the pain, but fully embraced the cross so that I can be fully free.

So, if Jesus refused the first drink, why did He accept the second one?

As John's Gospel makes clear in 19:28-30, Jesus was thirsty after completing the work of atonement. He had one more thing to do, and that was to fulfill the scripture quoted above, "and gave me vinegar for my drink." This drink was entirely different.

You see, people didn't really drink plain water very much. That is because the quality of the water was generally poor. Often they would mix it with wine vinegar to kill germs (although they would not know there were such things as germs). This drink would have refreshed Jesus and woken Him to the moment. Instead of avoiding the painful trial, it would have sharpened His senses.

In other words, Jesus wanted to stay alert until the very end. No swooning. No passing out. Even with the blood loss and probable dehydration, He stayed fully alert until the end. That is why He could cry out in a loud voice His final word from the cross, "Tetelestai" which means "It is finished!" Our obedient Savior had pushed through the pain and humiliation and temptation to quit and had completed the task that the Father had sent Him to accomplish, the atonement for ALL sin for ALL people for ALL time.

"Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are--YET HE DID NOT SIN. Let us then approach God's throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need" (Heb. 4:14-16).

"But when Christ came as high priest of the good things that are now already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not made with human hands...He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption" (Her. 9:11-12).

Day of Atonement

Yom Kippur is the highest holy day in the Jewish calendar--the Day of Atonement.

"Kippur" is from the same root word for the "mercy seat" or "atonement cover." That is, the solid gold lid that was placed on the top of the Ark of the Testimony. The Ark was a box made of acacia wood covered in hammered gold. In the box were placed the stone tablets upon which were the Ten Commandments written by the very finger of God. Also, a jar of manna and the rod of Aaron that budded (testifying to his selection as the High Priest--see Heb. 9: 4).

The Mercy Seat was made of gold with images of two cherubs looking downwards towards the box. In Isaiah chapter six, it is the cherubim who seem to protect the holiness of God. Thus, the symbolism here is that man's sinfulness contrasted with God's faithfulness is represented by the items in the box. The cherubim form a barrier to God's holiness.

And since their wings formed the back and armrest, the ark formed a throne where God, the Eternal King, would meet with Israel. But this could not happen unless God's holiness was satisfied.

On the Day of Atonement every year, the High Priest would enter the Holy of Holies behind the curtain and sprinkle the blood of the sacrifice on the Mercy Seat. Thus, God's holiness was guarded as the sins of Israel were expiated (covered) and God's wrath was propitiated (satisfied or appeased). This allowed God Himself to meet with Israel at the place of atonement.

Even the word "atonement" is a theological word introduced from the adverb "atonen" which meant "in accord" or "at one" and probably first used in Tyndale's translation in the early 16th century.

In Romans 3: 25, Paul tells us that Jesus was the "sacrifice of atonement" for us. The word is so difficult to translate that the KJV renders it "propitiation" and the NASB "expiation." Propitiation looks God-ward in relation to our sins (God is satisfied). Expiation looks sin-ward (sins are covered). Atonement actually has both aspects in mind. Our sins are covered, God is satisfied and we are now reconciled, or made "at one" with God.

But the underlying reality is that Paul has the Septuagint word-group that the Greek translators used for kofer in mind. Perhaps we should read it more like this:
"God presented Jesus Christ as the Mercy Seat--the place where our sins are now covered and His righteous wrath is satisfied--the place where we are now made at-one with God."

The same Greek word-group is used infrequently in the New Testament, but when it is used, to incredibly powerful effect. Four of these occurrences:

"God, be merciful to me, a sinner" (Luke 18: 13).

He is "the atoning sacrifice for our sins" (1 John 2: 2; 4: 10).

"For this reason he had to be made like his brothers in every way, in order that he may be made a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people" (Heb. 2: 17).

The good news for us is that the Day of Atonement happened when "he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption" (Heb. 9: 12). And now we ourselves can "have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way..." (Heb. 10: 19-20a).

Although the Day of Atonement has now happened, for each person, God is calling us to place our faith in Jesus so that we can experience at-one-ment with Him. In this sense, every day can be the Day of Atonement. Have you placed your faith in Jesus, the one who, in Himself, is "the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only ours, but the sins of the whole world" (1 John 2: 2)?