The One Thing Jesus Refused on the Cross (And Why You Keep Saying Yes to It)
There was a cup at the crucifixion most Christians have never even noticed. What He turned down might be the same thing you reach for every night.
It’s a Friday night. I’m tired, my dog’s snoring against my foot, and there’s a half-empty cup of lukewarm coffee judging me from across the desk. I’ve been wrestling with some serious spiritual warfare lately and, by golly, I’m worn out.
So my brain does what brains do — it goes shopping for relief.
For some, that might be a drink. Or a scroll. Perhaps a nibble of something we shouldn’t eat. Whatever’s quick and convenient. Whatever takes the edge off without making us actually deal with the edge.
Sound familiar? Yeah. I thought so.
Let’s talk about it.
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The Drink Jesus Turned Down
There’s a moment in the Gospel of Mark I’ve always thought about.
Jesus is on the cross. Roman soldiers — and according to Jewish tradition, some women acting in mercy — offer Him a drink. Wine mixed with myrrh. A primitive anesthetic. Something to dull the worst of it.
It was a common kindness. Crucifixion was unimaginable. The drink wasn’t even a temptation, really — it was compassion.
He refused it.
“Then they gave Him wine mingled with myrrh to drink, but He did not take it.” — Mark 15:23 (NKJV)
Read that twice. Let it sit.
The Son of God, hanging on a Roman cross, offered relief — and He waved it away.
Why? Because relief wasn’t the point. The mission was.
That single moment — the wine and myrrh, untouched — is one of the most overlooked scenes in the entire Passion. And honestly? Most of us are out here drinking the cup He refused.
The Little Cup of Wine and Myrrh in Your Hand Right Now
Let’s not kid ourselves. We all have one.
Yours might be a glass of something. A bowl of something. An app that’s a black hole for your evening leading you into a scroll session that turns into three hours and a tension headache.
Here’s the thing — sin doesn’t usually show up in a black cloak with a pitchfork. It shows up with a soothing voice and a peppermint candy.
Have you ever told yourself any of these?
“I just need to unwind.”
“This helps me relax.”
“God understands the stress I’m under.”
Ouch. Me too.
“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?” — Jeremiah 17:9 (NKJV)
Your heart will dress up compromise as coping faster than you can say “self-care.” It’ll hand you the wine and myrrh and tell you it’s medicine.
Why this matters: if you can’t tell the difference between rest and escape, you’ll keep drinking from a cup that’s slowly numbing the part of you that needs to feel God most.
When Virtue Becomes the Excuse
Here’s the trickier version of the trap.
Sometimes we don’t cross the line because it looks evil. We cross it because we’ve convinced ourselves the reason is good.
“I needed the break.” “I deserved it.” “I’ve earned this.” “God knows what I’ve been carrying.”
Paul saw this exact mindset coming from a mile away:
“All things are lawful for me, but not all things are helpful; all things are lawful for me, but not all things edify.” — 1 Corinthians 10:23 (NKJV)
Translation? Just because something isn’t a flashing red sin doesn’t mean it’s doing your soul any favors.
And before I start sounding holier-than-thou, let me say it plainly — I’m typing this with my own hypocrisy showing. I’ve used “I deserve it” as a permission slip more times than I want to admit.
C.S. Lewis nailed it: “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”
If we keep numbing the pain, we keep missing the megaphone.
Why this matters: the relief that quiets the noise also quiets the voice you need to hear the most.
Your Brain Is Cheering for the Wine and Myrrh
Quick detour into the science, because it actually backs Scripture up.
Your brain has a reward system. Dopamine. When you do something that brings fast pleasure or fast pain-relief, dopamine fires off and your brain takes a note: “Do that again.”
A few favorite dopamine deliverables:
Alcohol
Marijuana
Scrolling
Pornography
Sugar
Online shopping at 1am
(That last one stings, doesn’t it?)
The National Institute on Drug Abuse explains that dopamine reinforcement is one of the engines of habit formation and addiction. What starts as occasional relief gets a frequent flyer card. Then a permanent address.
Long before MRI machines existed, Solomon was watching the same thing play out in his own life:
“I searched in my heart how to gratify my flesh with wine, while guiding my heart with wisdom… till I might see what was good for the sons of men to do under Heaven all the days of their lives.” — Ecclesiastes 2:3 (NKJV)
He was the richest, wisest man in the room. He had access to every cup of wine and myrrh you can imagine. His conclusion? Vanity.
Why this matters: your brain is wired for the shortcut. Your soul is wired for the cross. Those two are usually pulling in opposite directions.
Why He Refused
Back to that moment on the cross.
Jesus didn’t refuse the drink because suffering is noble. He didn’t refuse it to make a point about toughness. He refused it because dulling the moment would have dulled the mission.
He came to fully bear what we couldn’t bear. The wine and myrrh would’ve shortened the road to the end of Himself. He took the long way on purpose.
Why this matters: every time you reach for the easy cup, you’re skipping the very thing God might be using to bring you to the end of yourself — which happens to be where He actually meets you.
The Tightrope We’re All Walking
Faith is a tightrope across a canyon. The wire is thin. The wind is real. The other side is glorious.
You don’t fall because of one bad step. You fall because of a hundred little tilts you stopped correcting.
The wine and myrrh isn’t usually one big gulp. It’s a thousand little sips, each one labeled “just this once.”
Compromise erodes conviction quietly. You don’t notice until you look up one day and realize the rope is somewhere behind you and the canyon is below.
Why this matters: balance isn’t a one-time decision. It’s the next sip you don’t take.
A Door of Hope
There is something deeply transformative about a room full of alcoholics sharing their shame, pain, and struggles with addiction. The Church could learn a thing or two from their radical honesty.
There is also something beautiful about honest disciples who choose not to pretend and instead bring their hidden vices into the light. To live by grace means to acknowledge our whole lives, both good and bad.
Yet, most of Christianity still lives in a performance culture. Sin, vice, and addiction are sicknesses that need the healing touch of Jesus. I am reminded of Jesus’ words: “For the joy set before me, I endured the cross.” He also said, “Now is the judgment of this world.” The Greek word for judgment is krisis, a word used in ancient Greek to mean “the turning point in a disease,” akin to when a fever breaks.
Sin is a sickness of the soul. When we are dealing with vice or hidden sin, we need healing. When those things are brought to light, they lose their power in the presence of truth. This requires radical honesty, transparency and trust. In other words it requires repentance.
We are only as sick as our secrets. This is why James encourages us to confess our sins to one another, that we may be healed. In Greek, the word healed here is iaomai, and it speaks of the healing of our whole being.
God knows our whole life’s saga. He knows all the skeletons in our closet, our sin, shame, vices, and dishonesty. He calls us to trust that even in these things, He loves us. Jesus did not come for the super-spiritual; He came for the sick, the weak in faith, the addicted, the broken, and those weary of this world.
The scriptures tell us He is the Great Physician. He is the only one who can heal your hidden places. We must be willing and honest. As the scriptures say “He resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” As it has been said, “It is all grace.” We just need to open the door and let the light of grace heal our darkest places.
“And there I will give her her vineyards and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt.” — Hosea 2:15 (ESV)
References: Hebrews 12:2, John 12:31, James 5:16, James 4:6
We are only as sick as our secrets. That line right there is the door. The application section below is just what you do once you walk through it.
Let’s get practical.
Five Ways to Set the Cup Down
Name your wine and myrrh out loud. You can’t fight what you won’t admit. Whatever it is — say it plainly to God before bed tonight.
Add a 24-hour delay. When the urge hits, wait a day before acting on it. Most cravings die in less time than you think.
Replace, don’t just resist. A walk. A psalm. A call to a friend who loves Jesus more than they love your comfort. Empty hands grab the cup again.
Get one person in your corner. Accountability isn’t shame — it’s oxygen. Pick someone you’d be embarrassed to disappoint, and tell them the truth.
Sit with the discomfort for five minutes. Just five. Don’t reach for anything. Let the silence do its work. That’s where God often shows up.
You don’t have to be perfect. You just have to be honest enough to put the cup down once.
Christian Hotline & Prayer Support
If you’re struggling tonight and the cup is closer than the cross feels — please reach out. You’re not weak for needing help. You’re human.
Christian Hotline: 1-800-633-3446
National Suicide & Crisis Lifeline: 988
SAMHSA Helpline: 1-800-662-4357
References
Scripture All Scripture quotations marked NKJV are from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotation marked ESV is from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.
Mark 15:23 (NKJV) — “Then they gave Him wine mingled with myrrh to drink, but He did not take it.”
Matthew 27:34 (NKJV) — Parallel account of the offered drink, “wine mingled with gall.”
Jeremiah 17:9 (NKJV)
1 Corinthians 10:23 (NKJV)
Ecclesiastes 2:3 (NKJV)
1 John 1:9 (NKJV)
Hosea 2:15 (ESV)
On the wine mingled with myrrh
The drink offered to Jesus on the cross was a customary act of mercy. Jewish tradition records that “the noble women of Jerusalem” prepared a stupefying drink — wine mixed with a bitter substance such as myrrh or frankincense — and offered it to those being executed in order to dull their senses. See Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 43a. The parallel account in Matthew 27:34 describes the mixture as “wine mingled with gall,” reflecting the bitter character of the additive. For word study on the Greek terms, see Vine’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words (Thomas Nelson, 1996), entries on “wine” and “myrrh.”
Quoted authors
C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain (HarperOne, 2001 edition), Chapter 6, p. 91. Originally published 1940.
Dopamine, the reward system, and habit formation
National Institute on Drug Abuse, “Drugs and the Brain.” Available at: https://nida.nih.gov/research-topics/drugs-brain
Anna Lembke, MD, Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence (Dutton, 2021).
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The is incredible...such insight. Thank you for sharing.