The Collective Drinking of Wine in The Kingdom of The Father

Matthew 26:29 

"I tell you, I will not drink from this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.”

Luke 17:20-21

Once, on being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, “The coming of the kingdom of God is not something that can be observed, nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is in your midst.”

At one point I found it interesting that the only gospel where it is explicitly written that Jesus drank the wine vinegar offered to him on the cross was in John. At the time though I don't think I had been as focused on the gospels being iterative. Combining the details of what is written with the notion that each gospel describes events in sequence, rather than each gospel being parallel descriptions of the same events, creates a very promising picture.

Matthew 27:48-50

Immediately one of them ran and got a sponge. He filled it with wine vinegar, put it on a staff, and offered it to Jesus to drink. The rest said, “Now leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to save him.”

And when Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit.

Mark 15:36-37

Someone ran, filled a sponge with wine vinegar, put it on a staff, and offered it to Jesus to drink. “Now leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to take him down,” he said.

With a loud cry, Jesus breathed his last.

Luke 23:36-37

The soldiers also came up and mocked him. They offered him wine vinegar and said, “If you are the king of the Jews, save yourself.”

John 19:28-30

Later, knowing that everything had now been finished, and so that Scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, “I am thirsty.” A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus’ lips. When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

Now specifically in each case it is wine vinegar that is offered, not just vinegar. Wine vinegar is made with the "fruit of the vine," the same fruit that Jesus said he would not drink of until he was in his Father's kingdom. It seems like it was important for each writer to note that Jesus was offered the wine vinegar in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, but it was also important that they make no mention of a reply given- it is not said that he did or did not drink the wine vinegar in each of these gospels, so if the stance is assumed that each gospel represents a different series of events then it cannot be said with certainty that Jesus did drink in each of these three iterations. By contrast, in John, Jesus essentially requests the wine vinegar by saying "I am thirsty," and it is provided to him; in the gospel it is noted explicitly that he then drank of it. 

The option to claim that drinking wine vinegar is not "drinking of the fruit of the vine (grapes)" does not feel like a logically sound retort here, as it is specifically wine vinegar that is offered, which is made with grapes, and it is noted that Jesus drank it in John. Personally I could still see a stance taken regarding "this fruit" necessitating that either the same varietal or even the very same grapes "made new" be drunk of for these words to be fulfilled, but I personally enjoy nonsense technicalities, and taking this stance feels like it dives into the nonsense right alongside my theory, leaving only the question of the intention behind the interpretation. So if one does not take the stance of "grape specificity," and the reader takes the stance that Jesus was not a liar, nor was he made to be a liar due to the stress of the crucifixion he had to endure, then one must assume that when he drank of the wine vinegar that he was in the kingdom of The Father with his disciples, as he said he would be. 

This realization feels like it further reinforces the idea that convoluted methods are required for the details of this story to be aligned, but there is an intentionally narrow tightrope set up such that these convoluted details will align. Specifically, since the disciples were likely not drinking the fruit of the vine in any way while physically present at the crucifixion in John, then Jesus saying he would not drink of it again until he did so with them would mean he would have to be drinking of it with them another place and time that also either coincided with or came before this point in time in John. If one assumes, as I do, that Jesus has a wide array of abilities at his disposal beyond those seen explicitly in the gospels, then concepts like miniaturization and time travel become readily available options. As such one can picture a scenario where Jesus and his disciples were all in "the temple" which Jesus said in John that he would rebuild in three days, which is the body that was nailed to the cross in John. Perhaps the disciples had all time traveled back from some point after Jesus had said these words, thus staking his claim on what would happen, and likely even time traveling back from after this crucifixion event occurred, in their personal timelines. In this proposed solution, when the wine vinegar was offered, Jesus and the disciples all drank of it, knowing that they were in the kingdom of The Father. Personally I would assume that the vinegar aspects of this drink were filtered out and they instead drank wine, a filtering I assume Jesus could do given that he could also turn water into wine, but to each their own. 

I imagine that one could also imagine, since time travel would almost certainly need to be involved for the details of this story to be aligned anyway, that at a future point Jesus referenced where the Father's kingdom was entered the disciples and Jesus all drank wine prior (from Jesus' personal perspective) to Jesus and some or all of the rest of the party entering the temple that hung from the tree at the crucifixion in John. It feels, however, like the story here is wrapped up well if this moment written, of the drinking of wine vinegar in John, is the moment that the prophecied glass of wine is collectively raised, a marking of "it" truly being "finished," the complex moment reflected by the words "everything had now been finished, and so that Scripture would be fulfilled."