“He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled.  He said to them, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.  Stay here and keep watch with me.”

Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me.  Yet not as I will, but as you will.”

Then he returned to his disciples and found then sleeping.  “Could you men not keep watch with me for one hour?” he asked Peter…

Matthew 26:36-46

     In the hour of Jesus’ greatest temptation He was overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.  He asked those closest to Him to keep watch with Him.  He went on to a place of sorrow, and when he returned He found them sleeping.  How disappointed and alone this must have made Him feel.  It’s as though in the moment of His greatest need, when he needed understanding and support the most, those closest to Him failed Him deeply, completely oblivious to His great need… His struggle… His sorrow… His pain.  They chose instead to serve their own fleshly self interest, and in so doing they abandoned Him. 

     This reveals there are places that God will call us to - our own personal place of Gethsemane - where no one will be able to go with us.  It is a place God is calling me to go alone.  If I look to others to see and understand how hard and terrible this place is for me - a place of overwhelming sorrow that brings me to the point of death - I will only find them sleeping.  They cannot begin to see… and know… and understand what it is that is being required of me.  Others can escort me only so far toward my Gethsemane.  Then they will stop along the way, and they will rest, and it will fall upon myself alone to move forward into the place of sorrow… aloneness… and death.  A place of surrendering my will to the will of God, regardless of the price I must pay in order to do so.  This is Gethsemane.  It is a place that has room for only two… me and God.  I should not be surprised when I find myself alone in this place.  It is as though God has been trying to get me alone so He can finalize His business with me.  As long as I have another with me, I will be tempted to turn to them and say, “Do you see what is being required of me?  Do you see the great price God is asking me to pay?”  I will look to the other for consolation, and this will prevent me from moving forward to the place of aloneness… where it is God and I… and I am left only to trust completely in Him for any consolation.
    

     Are you willing to follow Him to Gethsemane?

Posted by Tony Ingrassia on 12/22/03; 2:07:48 PM