Jn 18:11   Jesus commanded Peter, "Put your sword away! Shall I not drink the cup the Father has given me?"

                  

A violent response is so often our defensive reaction when we are opposed. When they came to arrest Jesus, a violent response was Peter's answer to the confrontation. In all the time Peter had been with Jesus, he still hadn't realised that violence wasn't Jesus' way. It wasn't that Jesus was a pacifist as such, it was just that violence would have hindered the Father's plan. That was why Jesus used these words: "Shall I not drink the cup the Father has given me”. Note, 'the Father has given me'. This was God's plan, this was God's way. The path to the Cross of Calvary was God's way of dealing with the sin of the world. We will probably never fully understand it this side of heaven, but that is what was happening there. It was the next necessary step to Jesus being taken and being sacrificed for us.

 

The violent response is so often the response of frustration; we can see no other way to deal with this. This is why some so-called pro-life supporters have resorted to violence and even murder in the USA over the abortion issue. It is a response that says we cannot leave this up to God, we need to take action ourselves. And so pro-life is demeaned and means life by pro-death. For Peter, or us so often, the failure to act violently leaves us, we feel, to give the field to Satan, but that is never the whole picture. Crying out to God is always the first step to countering evil; being obedient to what He genuinely reveals is the way He wants us to act is the second. Then He moves!