Jeremiah 25:28
And it shall be, if they refuse to take the cup at thine hand to drink, then shalt thou say unto them, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Ye shall certainly drink. And it shall be, if they refuse to take the cup at thine hand to drink, then shalt thou say unto them, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Ye shall certainly drink.
The chapter containing the verse was given very soon after the beginning of the Babylonian captivity, and it states the plain number of years to be accomplished in the desolations of Jerusalem, seventy years, with the sure promise of return from captivity. More than sixty years afterward, in the first year of Darius the Mede, Daniel prayerfully studied this prophecy in books while perplexed over the relation of the seventy years of captivity to the twenty-three hundred years to elapse before the cleansing of the sanctuary.
The cup holds the wine of divine wrath, and its draining pictures the fate coming upon the nation. The imagery was given to make a deeper impression, because the sentence of doom had been clearly pronounced yet its awful import could scarcely be understood. Refusal to take the cup from the hand does not avert judgment, for those commanded to drink will certainly do so. Jerusalem and the cities of Judah and their kings are among the first to drink this cup of woe, followed in turn by Pharaoh king of Egypt with his servants and princes and all his people and by many other nations of earth, until the divine purpose is fulfilled.