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We Can

“You don’t know what you are asking,” Jesus said. “Can you drink the cup I drink or be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with?” Mark 10:38

James and John were asking (through their mother) for special consideration in the Kingdom. Mrs. Zebedee asked that her sons sit in the seats of honor right beside Jesus and His Father. Jesus asks them a hard question: “If that is what you want, do you think you can face and go through all that I am about to go through, even to the point of dying?” Without really knowing what they were saying, they answered, “We can.”

We want God to give us special attention and honor, but in doing so we don’t always understand what we are asking for. He was not speaking of a dunk in water here. He was speaking of immersion in a life of sacrifice, becoming “obedient to death, even death on a cross.” James and John would face difficult days ahead. James was shortly hereafter executed for his faith. And while John outlived the other disciples, at one point he was boiled alive in oil and miraculously survived. They did drink from the same cup as Jesus.

The question for us is are we willing? Praise the Lord He delivers all those who drink from this cup and uses them for His glory and honor. Be encouraged today if you are in a time of baptism in difficulty, the Lord knows how to protect and deliver His own out of peril.

Prayer Focus: Lord, thank You for Your grace to us. Help me today, when I don’t even know what I am asking, to receive what You have for me with hope and trust so that You will be glorified in all things.

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