The Sorrow of Gethsemane

 

(These photos are not Gethsemane but maybe how I picture it to be a bit... :) )

Gethsemane - the pressing of the soul.  The meaning of Gethsemane is oil press. 

Gethsemane is where we see the agony of Jesus as He wrestled with what He was about to walk through.

We have the written account in Matthew 26:36-56 and Mark 14:43-52.

Jesus and His disciples went to this garden.  It was a garden often visited by Jesus.  He told His disciples to sit at a place while He went to pray.  Jesus took three of them with Him, further to the place where He wanted to be.

Jesus spoke to Peter, James, and John of the grief He was feeling.  It was a deep grief.  He invited them to keep watch with Him - to pray and then Jesus went a little further on from them.

Jesus falls on His face and wrestles with His Father about the cup that was His.

Jesus returns to the three disciples to find them asleep.   

Jesus wakes them up, disappointment etching His words, "What, could you not watch with Me for one hour?"  Remember - He shared His heart with them.  Again, He invites them to partner with Him in His grief.

And again, Jesus returns to find them asleep.  He lets them sleep and goes to pray a third time, wrestling with same cup, alone.

Gethsemane holds the moment of the time in our dark nights of our soul where it is just you and God.  As well meaning and unintentional people around us may be or not be, there is this space where we wrestle with our cup, alone with God.

Gethsemane is also the place of surrender.  Surrendering to the Father.  Surrendering to the possibilities that lie within the dark night of wrestling.  Surrendering to the love that God has for us and believing that that love will keep us through the hard and in the dark.

In some ways I'd love to know a bit more of the details.  Why did the disciples keep sleeping?  The Scripture tells us their eyes were heavy. Heavy with what??  Were they overwhelmed, scared and sleep seemed to be the way to calm their minds and fears?  Were they really tired?  

Jesus told them to arise and then He leads the way, stepping toward the one who would betray Him, giving Him away to a group of soldiers and onto the path that the cup held.

Have you felt this agony of the soul?  The darkness, the aloneness, the deep grief of crying out to God and wrestling with the moment that you find yourself in.  Pressed.  Wrung out.  For what? And why?

I too have felt the wrestling, wept the tears, and agonized for it to be taken away.   

And what about stepping toward the very thing that hurts - denial, betrayal, beatings, mockery, spitting, and even death.

Jesus went this way for you and me.  We go this way for Him.

Gethsemane - the place of the press.

Gethsemane - the surrender to the God who loves and believing that that love will keep you as you face your hard.

The Passion Week - Jesus, The King Who Comes to Save

 

This week, the Passion Week of Jesus' life, is one that knew deepest pain and agony and the highest joy of resurrection and life. 

Jesus entered Jerusalem with people shouting praises, rejoicing in the King that was riding on the donkey and wanting Him to save them.  They wanted a king to save them from the Roman rule.  He came to save them as their King, but it wasn't in the way they were expecting it to happen.

He entered and cleansed, first the temple and then touching hearts.  He spent the next several days in conversation with people and as the interactions continued the religious people became quite disturbed.  And because they didn't really understand the way of Jesus and how he really wanted to save them, by Friday they were shouting, "Crucify Him!"  The disappointment of not a political and physical saving, led them to want to do away with Him.  Jesus was wanting to save them from their own concoctions and ideas of following Him.  He wanted them to know true freedom in the midst of hard storms and unkind, even brutal times. He was calling them to salvation, preparing them for what He came to do, to give His life so they could have life.  Many resisted the invitation and the reaction to that, indignation and to get rid of Jesus.  So deep was their resistance and hatred that it was revealed in their exchange of a rebel for the crucifying of Jesus.  But that's what Jesus came to do, exchange His life for the life of each one of us and it started with Barabbas.

Mary, pours out her heart through the perfume and anointing Jesus, preparing Him for what was to come, His burial.

Judas sells Jesus.  I wonder what his fears really were, his disappointments that led him to betray the One he did life with for three years; the One who loved him deeply??  What are my fears that lead me to walk away from the same One who loves me and to try and 'control' an outcome?

Jesus, spending an evening celebrating the Passover with His disciples, of which He will fulfill for the last time.  He was the lamb to be slain and His blood spilt once and for all.  The Greatest serves; stooping and washing the feet of each man who he has walked with and did life with; teaching them His way and now teaches them what it looks like to serve and live with each other.  To be great is to give of your life for each other.  The serving and giving of His life to His disciples was met with deep, deep pain; and yet, He still loved and served.  This way of Jesus convicts me deeply.

The night of wrestling in the garden, then to be met by his friend Judas who betrayed Him in deep ways and later another, Peter, denies knowing Him to protect himself.  Oh the things and ways I turn to to protect myself in moments of fear and when life is not looking like I thought it would or should... 

And then Friday, the day Jesus gave His life.  Broken, bleeding, alone, and giving the gift of salvation to a thief beside Him; cries out for water and experiences the depth of being forsaken.  He, the King, who could've saved Himself didn't, to save us.  But the saving looked, oh so different than what so many imagined it to be.  And to be honest, my saving today still so often looks different than what I imagine it to be...

The sorrow of the disciples, the heartache of His mother Mary and others went deep as they watched His life ebb away and He takes His last breath.  Jesus told them that He must go, but still, in this moment, darkness filled the land, deeper than they had ever known, as they grappled with who He is and the reality of this moment.

Saturday, the next day, they were filled with fear, grieving and mourning.  I can imagine just a bit what they might have been experiencing, for I too, know the deep agonizing disappointment and the grappling of trying to make sense of what doesn't make sense.  This space, this day of grappling with hope buried, touches us too.

And we have the command to seal the tomb of Jesus and to guard it. Let's keep Jesus in and people out.  Only... Jesus cannot be contained!  Man will not stop life.  We can guard and keep our hearts, managing it or trying to; but in doing so we will not stop Jesus and the life He wants to give; we only have a choice to make... will we make excuses and stories to fit our agenda like the chief priests or will we go and tell others like the women did??

Then comes Sunday, the day Jesus arose, opening the grave for us to see that He wasn't laying there silent, but all the while on Saturday He was conquering death, triumphing over it.  Sunday revealed that to us.  Sunday reveals that death does not have the final say!  Oh friends, this is the best news and the greatest truth to anchor our Fridays and Saturdays in!

Sunday, the morning that has revealed to the world an empty grave is one we can choose to believe will happen in our darkest Fridays and Saturdays.  To know death is to experience life.

As the women approached the tomb in their grief, they met the Master.  Thinking Him to be the gardener they asked where he took their Saviour.  Jesus said, "Mary."  With that, Jesus broke through her grief and interrupted it with His presence.

To really know life and living, we must first know death and darkness.  To really understand one, we learn to know the other.

For Mary, the depth of grief gave way to the joy of seeing her risen Master; to see life!

Now, if you're like me, that is not something I run towards, to know death, dying, and darkness.  But I have learned in my darkest dark that I have experienced the truest life.

To fully live and to fully know life, we must also know death and darkness.  A dying to live, is the way of Jesus; and it is the fullest life.

May you, not only today, in this week, but in each day and in every moment; know the Master, the Risen Saviour who comes by to interrupt your grief with His presence and the hope of life; His life!  He is the King who still comes to save!