The Garden Series

“THE GARDEN” Luke 22:39-53

FBCF – 3/17/24

Jon Daniels

INTRO – When you think of a garden, what do you think about?

- Flower garden

- Vegetable garden

- Herb garden

- Olive Garden!

A garden is a place of life – a place where there’s growth – most of the time, it’s a place of beauty w/ healthy plants, beautiful flowers.

It’s also a place of work. It must be tended & cared for. That’s why some people employ gardeners whose job it is to make sure the garden produces what it is intended to produce.

The garden that we are considering today in this message is a garden like no other.

- The Garden of Gethesemane - It is a literal olive garden found on the western side of the Mount of Olives which is just to the east of Jerusalem & about 300 feet above the city. I’ve been to this garden. In this garden are olive trees that are at least 800-900 years old (show pics). Massive trunks that are knotted & gnarled. Some people believe that some of these trees in the Garden of Gethsemane may have actually been in the garden on the night when Jesus was in the garden. If that’s so, & if these trees could speak, oh what a story they could tell.

- Gethsemane literally means, “oil press” – Had a giant oil press to get the valuable olive oil out of the olives. Heavy stone slabs would be lowered down onto crushed olives to squeeze the oil out of them so it could be collected.

Let’s step into the garden now as we continue in “These Final Moments” of Jesus’ life. After today, we will only have the cross & the empty tomb. But we have to go through the garden. So let’s go.

EXPLANATION – Luke 22:39-53

APPLICATION – Jesus’ submission to God’s will is the only way we could be saved.

WHAT HAPPENED IN THE GARDEN?

HE PRAYED – v. 39, 41 – Jesus was a prayer warrior. This prayer in the garden definitely wasn’t His 1st time to pray. It was His regular practice to come to this garden to spend time in prayer – “…as was His custom…” (v. 39).

- Mark 1:35 – “Very early in the morning while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house, & went out to a solitary place where He prayed.” (NIV)

- Luke 6:12 – “At about the same time, [Jesus] climbed a mountain to pray. He was there all night in prayer before God.” (MSG)

- Luke 5:15-16 – “But despite Jesus’ instructions, the report of his power spread even faster, and vast crowds came to hear him preach and to be healed of their diseases. But Jesus often withdrew to the wilderness for prayer.” (NLT)

But this prayer was going to be different. It was going to be a prayer filled w/ struggle, w/ the extreme heaviness of a burden that no one had ever had before or will ever have again. It was a burden that only He could bear. And that burden led to this prayer that drove Him to His knees before His Father – v. 41 – “And He withdrew from them about a stone’s throw & knelt down & prayed.” Mark wrote, “And going a little farther, He fell on the ground & prayed…” (Mark 14:35). Matthew – “…He fell on His face & prayed…” (Matthew 26:39). One commentator wrote: “The usual manner of prayer at that time was to pray in a standing position. That Jesus knelt down proves the violence of His struggle in Gethsemane.” (Geldenhuys)

- Do you feel the weight of this time of prayer? Moments of tremendous burden & life-altering decisions demand deep struggling in prayer – even “violence” in prayer.

HE AGONIZED – v. 42-44 – We regularly share prayer requests in church & w/ other Christians. But none of us have ever shared a prayer request of the magnitude of what Jesus as requesting of His Father – “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me.” Matthew & Mark record that He made this same prayer request 3 times to His Father.

He agonized in this prayer.

- Hebrews 5:7 – “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.”

- Amazing that His disciples were able to sleep as He cried out to His Father.

He was in such an awful state of agony that His Father dispatched an angel to come & strengthen Him (v. 43). What a beautiful, touching display of the love of the Father for His Son! We are not told what the angel said or did, but the angel could have: