Just a Walk in the Park??

They went to a place called Gethsemane and Jesus said to his disciples, "Sit here while I pray." He took Peter, James and John along with him and he began to be deeply distressed and troubled.  "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death," he said to them . . . Going a little further he fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him.  "Abba Father . . . take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will."  Mark 14: 32-36

We have a tendancy to sanitize this story and think that these few words pretty much cover the Nazarene's last night on earth.  This is one of those times and stories when we like to emphasize the divine side of his nature.  It helps us cope with what he went through the next day, for us. It soothes our guilt. After all, God can take anything.  He feels no pain, so can readily endure the scourges tearing flesh from his body, ignore the stinging thorns piercing deep into his scalp, effortlessly bear the weight of the cross as he stumbles up Golgotha and readily dismiss the agony of the crucifixion. 

God in the Garden is easier for us to bear than the Nazarene in the Garden. God on the cross is glorious, Jesus on the cross is much too personal. But the truth is, a human being exactly, fully and completely like us, agonized all through his last night in the Garden of Gethsemane.  And whether we like it or not, it was no walk in the park.

Jesus himself tells us he was overwhelmed to the point of death.  Luke says he sweat drops of blood and if we read the story closely we see he prayed all night; all night.  So that raises the question - what did he pray about all night?  Did he just ask God one time to "remove this cup" and then easily submit to the trauma and torture he knew was his to absorb? An emphatic No!  If he was praying all night, agonizing all night, sweating blood all night, then he was petitioning God all night to remove it. Begging may be too strong a word for some, but I know what I would be doing in that situation.

So don't shy away from Jesus' humanity that night in the Garden.  Embrace it.  Learn from it, allow it to humble you. Then focus on what his divinity allowed him to do and endure the next day for you.  The only way Jesus could have stood silent before his false accusers, through trial after trial, was  by completely wringing all his humanity out of himself that night in the Garden.  As he agonized, as the salty brine pouring off his body muddied the ground around him, as he pleaded with God throughout that terrible night, he was actually preparing himself for the next day, when he would wage the greatest battle ever fought.  As a result, he was able to face his destiny divinely.  He had no thought for himself that day. His sweat had mingled it all in the dust of Gethsamene. His tears had drenched the rocks over which he lay prone for hours with all human pride, and the air that morning was fragrant with the scent of all human selfishness, pride and vanity.

That is how, on his final day, he had only one thought.  You.  He had only one thought as they shouted, "Crucify him!"  You.  He had only one thought as he walked up that hill.  You.  He had only one thought as he voluntarily lay down on that cross. You.  He had only one thought as he whispered, "It is finished."  You.

The victory is His!  It can be yours as well.