It’s late on Thursday, and we find Jesus just hours away from His arrest. Again, it is Thursday night, and we are approaching midnight. Jesus and the Disciples have just finished the Last Supper.
It is a week that has been full of last things: Jesus’ last visit to the temple, His last sermon, His last supper, and now, with three of His inner circle, we witness His last known prayer before He goes to the cross.
Jesus enters Gethsemane for this time of prayer in what is a famous passage of Scripture. And hymns have been arranged about this very place and time where Jesus prayed. Gethsemane was a garden outside of the city of Jerusalem, and the garden is still there with olive trees nearby, dating as far back as the 7th century. I have walked through this garden along with my family and many others from this church.
I want to give you an opportunity to join me in tracing the steps of Jesus. The word Gethsemane literally means “olive press” but on this night, it’s Jesus who will be pressed.1 Let’s join Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane and see what He did for us there.
Today’s Scripture
And he came out and went, as was his custom, to the Mount of Olives, and the disciples followed him. And when he came to the place, he said to them, “Pray that you may not enter into temptation.” And he withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and knelt down and prayed, saying, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him. And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground. And when he rose from prayer, he came to the disciples and found them sleeping for sorrow, and he said to them, “Why are you sleeping? Rise and pray that you may not enter into temptation.” (Luke 22:39-46)
Jesus’ agony in the Garden of Gethsemane is well known, and it is one of the few events recorded in all four gospels.2 While Luke doesn’t use the word Gethsemane, he mentions instead the Mount of Olives as the general area Jesus has retreated to.
Look with me at what Jesus already knew…
1. Jesus Already Knew
When Jesus entered the Garden, He knew He would be arrested there. He knew it was the beginning of the end. When John described the arrival of the soldiers to arrest Jesus, he tells us this: “Now Judas, who betrayed him, also knew the place, for Jesus often met there with his disciples” (John 18:2).
Jesus often met with His disciples at this Garden. Even Judas knew where Jesus would be that night. When I think of the garden of Gethsemane, I consider what Jesus Christ already knew. You see, when everything was dark, when the disciples were asleep, and there were no soldiers there. This was the perfect time in which He could have gotten out.
He knew when He entered in the Garden of Gethsemane that the soldiers were on the way. He knew when He entered in the Garden of Gethsemane there was going to be torture. He knew when He entered in the Garden of Gethsemane there were going to be nails splintering His bones. He knew when He entered in the Garden of Gethsemane there were going to be thorns in His scalp and there was going to be a spear in His side. He knew when He entered in the Garden of Gethsemane there was going to be the slow death of suffocation awaiting Him on the cross. And He knew in the Garden what He was presently experiencing was nothing more than a mosquito bite compared to the pain and torment of the rejection of the Father.
“And he withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and knelt down and prayed, saying, ‘Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done’” (Luke 22:41-42).
What kind of pressure does it take for the eternal Son of God to felt so that He is tempted to call it quits? It was in the Garden that the Father, in a sense, comes to Jesus. Again, it’s the night before Jesus is going to receive the cup.
The very thought of this moment where the wrath of God is going to fall into His Son’s heart… … He is so upset just thinking about it. The Father was giving him a foretaste … … just a taste of what he was going to experience.
Jonathan Edwards, in a sermon called Christ’s Agony, talks about how is says that in the Garden of Gethsemane: “He had then a near view of that furnace of wrath, into which he was to be cast; he was brought to the mouth of the furnace that he might look into it, and stand and view its raging flames, and see the glowings of its heat, that he might know where he was going and what he was about to suffer. This was the thing that filled his soul with sorrow and darkness …”3
“… none of God’s children ever had such a cup set before them …”
1. He Already Knew
2. Jesus Repeatedly Asked
When you examine each time Jesus prays in the four gospels, there’s only one time we see Jesus praying the same thing more than once, and we find it in the Garden of Gethsemane.
The First Time
And he withdrew from them about a stone's throw, and knelt down and prayed, saying, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” (Luke 22:41-42)
The Second Time
“And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly…” (Luke 22:44).4
The Third Time
“So, leaving them again, he went away and prayed for the third time, saying the same words again.” (Matthew 26:44)
Jesus repeated the same prayer three times. Why was He feeling such agony? Let me assure you, it was not because He was afraid of dying. Look, here’s the best person who’s ever lived. And it’s here that Jesus really began to feel the wrath of God on Him. It’s here that Jesus really began to be in great sorrow, deep sorrow.
“Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me” (Luke 22: 2a). What did Jesus mean when He said, “If you are willing”? He said, “If it’s possible,” meaning, “If there’s another possibility. If there’s some other way to do the salvation.” But it wasn’t possible. Jesus was saying, “Is there some other way? I’d like to get out of this,” and He was turned down.
Again, there’s only one time do we ever see Jesus praying the same thing more than once, and we find it in the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus did what any real human being would do. He said, “I don’t want this. Let me out. I don’t want to die. Let this cup pass from me.” In effect, Jesus banged on the door to heaven, and it didn’t open. He says to the Father, “Father, I don’t think I can handle it. Let this cup pass from me.”
1. He Already Knew
2. He Repeatedly Asked
3. Jesus Lovingly Volunteered
This is the point of no return. What grabs you about this story is that even though He knew and even though He repeatedly prayed, He nevertheless volunteered for the cross. Here, toward the end of the message, let me share briefly about:
His Agony
His Rights
and His Love
3.1 His Agony
In the Garden, God the Father told His son, “I’m going to crush you with all the powers of hell.” “Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt…” (Isaiah 53:10a). Don’t blame God the Father for punishing His Son. Don’t for a minute think that the Father is the bad guy in all of this.
“In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence” (Hebrews 5:7).
The Father puts the cup down in front of him, practically, and swirls it around. The Father says, “Son, this is the cup. This is the thing. If you don’t take it, they will perish. If you do take it, no one has ever experienced what you’re going to experience. “Are you ready? You could leave. You’re in the dark. You’re all alone … even I will have to turn my back on you.” It was there at the Garden of Gethsemane that God actually let Jesus feel the cross.
You can draw a direct line from Gethsemane to Jesus’ Cry on the Cross: And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34)
You can draw a direct line from Jesus’ foretaste of God’s wrath to the full furnace of His wrath on the cross.
His Agony
3.2 His Rights
When God gave Jesus Christ a taste of His wrath before the cross in the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus Christ had every right to turn tail and run. Jesus Christ had every right to say, “Why should I leave all of my glory and all of my joy I’ve experienced with you, Father, for all eternity and give it all up for these people?” Jesus had every right to say, “Look at them. They’re still asleep. They can’t even stay awake with me. Why should I give myself for the likes of them? How dare they even expect me to do such a thing?”
Think of the quantity of Jesus suffering for a moment. The Son of God was under such pressure and was experiencing such inward agony just looking at what he was going to go through, the blood vessels close to His skin burst, and blood came out through His capillaries.
Doctors describe this condition as hematidrosis.5 This is a very rare but very serious condition. You actually start spilling blood from your sweat glands. His heart rate was off the charts. His blood pressure was out of the roof. Jesus felt all of this simply by looking at the wrath of God. If the eternal Son of God could sweat blood just thinking of the cross, how much worse must it have actually been to actually suffer it? I think about the costliness of God’s suffering in terms of the voluntariness of what Jesus did.
His Agony
His Rights
3.3 His Love
You must place Jesus’ incredible obedience to God’s will right next to the Disciple’s incredible failure. “And he said this plainly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him” (Mark 8:32).
What amazes me about this is God almost rubs Jesus’ nose in the unworthiness and the stupidity of the people He’s about to die for. Jesus is facing the ultimate decision of His life. He’s in the agony of the moment when the disciples fall asleep: “We don’t know what you’re doing, Jesus, and we don’t care.”
They Heard His Prayer
You have to realize they listened to the first part of the prayer. Yes, they heard the beginning of the prayer, and no, they don’t care. How do you think they knew about Jesus’ prayer here? How could they have written it down? Yet, they go to sleep. The Father comes down and says, “I want you to take a long look at who you’re dying for. Are you ready to do it for them?” It was as if God said, “Do you really love them that much? I’m going to crush you with all the powers of hell.”6
Now you listen to me carefully … If the Father wasn’t able to break Jesus’ grip of love on you, then how do you think you’ll break it? Some of you think, “If I begin to follow Christ, God will quickly get fed up with me.” You think there’s a day that Jesus might possibly look down at you in your sin and say, “That does it! I can’t take any more of Scott Maze!” If Jesus Christ could take all the hell the Father laid on Him… If Jesus’ love for you was that strong… if He valued you that much… … what is it you think you’re going to do to kick Him out of your life?7 Yes, you should feel convicted about your sin. Yes, you should feel terrible about the pain you are causing Jesus. But no, He’ll not quit loving you. Would that your hearts melt by feeling His mercy.
Closing Statement
You may think that the battle for our salvation was won at the cross, but it wasn’t. The war was won on the cross, but the battle was won in the Garden. If Jesus had said, “not your will, but mine be done,” we wouldn’t be here today. Jesus made up his mind in the Garden that He would rather experience hell for us than go to heaven without us. The war was won at the cross, but the battle was fought in the garden.
Closing Prayer
Father, I am amazed when I see your Son’s actions in the Garden … completely, utterly amazed. When everyone else would have run, your Son remains there to embrace the full frontal assault of your rightful anger for my sins. Thank you, Father. Thank you. Amen.
I don't know if you've ever thought about this or not, but much of the Bible is the story of two gardens: the Garden of Eden and the Garden of Gethsemane. What one man did in one garden ruined us. What another Man did in the other garden rescued us. The first Adam said, “Not thy will, but mine be done.” But when Jesus came to the garden, he said, “Not my will, but thine be done.”
EndNotes
1 “The name derives from the Hebrew gath schmanim (‘oil presses’).” “Gethsemane,” The Archaeological Encyclopedia of the Holy Land, ed Avraham Negev.
2 Jesus’ prayer in the Garden of the Gethsemane is mentioned in all four gospels: Matthew 26:36-46; Mark 14:32-41, and John 18:1-2.
3 Jonathan Edwards, The Works Jonathan Edwards, Volume 2 (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth Trust, 1974), 866-877. See also, http://brbl-dl.library.yale.edu/pdfgen/exportPDF.php?bibid=10708955&solrid=3801233; accessed February 28, 2016. “The thing that Christ’s mind was so full of at that time was, without doubt, the same with that which his mouth was so full of: it was the dread which his feeble human nature had of that dreadful cup, which was vastly more terrible than Nebuchadnezzar’s fiery furnace. He had then a near view of that furnace of wrath, into which he was to be cast; he was brought to the mouth of the furnace that he might look into it, and stand and view its raging flames, and see the glowings of its heat, that he might know where he was going and what he was about to suffer. This was the thing that filled his soul with sorrow and darkness, this terrible sight as it were overwhelmed him. For what was that human nature of Christ to such mighty wrath as this? it was in itself, without the supports of God, but a feeble worm of the dust, a thing that was crushed before the moth, none of God’s children ever had such a cup set before them, as this first being of every creature had.”
4 “Again, for the second time, he went away and prayed, ‘My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.’” (Matthew 26:42)
5 “Bloody Sweat,” Tyndale Bible Dictionary, logos. See also the Indian Journal of Dermatology, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2810702/; accessed February 28, 2016.
6 “if we are faithless, he remains faithful— for he cannot deny himself.” (2 Timothy 2:13)
7 “For this reason I bow my knees before the Father … may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” (Ephesians 3:14, 18-19)
