“After this, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the scripture might be fulfilled, saith, I thirst,” John 19:28.

We want to look today at:

THE CRUELTY OF MEN

“Now there was set a vessel full of vinegar: and they filled a spunge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth,” John 19:29.

This is not the same as the drink offered by the soldiers, Matt 27:34. That drink was meant as a tranquilliser to reduce suffering but the Saviour refused it. He was there to suffer for our sins.

1. The method of offering the Saviour a drink shows little sympathy for Him. “They (likely the soldiers and not any Jew) filled a spunge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth.” No cup, just a sponge on a stick! Mankind has always dealt cruelly with God’s servants.“That the blood of all the prophets, which was shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this generation,” Luke 11:50.

2. Even the Saviour’s cry of thirst was in fulfillment of Scripture. Long ago David complained in what was a prophecy of the cross: “They gave me also gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink,” Psalm 69:21.

3. We are reminded of the dreadful reality of the Saviour’s sufferings. In hell the rich man sought water, Luke 16:23-24.

4. There was another thirst and hunger at work in the Saviour’s being of which men knew nothing. He was on the cross because He thirsted to see His people redeemed from their sin.“But he said unto them, I have meat to eat that ye know not of. . . . my meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work,” John 4:32, 34.

This was the Saviour’s meat and drink.