Wake Up!
Notes
Transcript
Yesterday, Krista and I enjoyed a blast from the past. We met with some friends we had not seen since their wedding seven years ago and we did so at a concert held at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia. I went to quite a few shows there back in the day and last night was reminiscent of those times since we were there to see a tour featuring three bands from the nineties. Surrounded by thousands of middle aged and older fans - very few were dancing around as energetically as we used to - but all were belting out tunes we knew by heart.
A lot of fun, but then it was time for the drive home. Columbia to Cambridge is a long drive when it is past my bedtime. Last week, my brother took me to a Orioles game for my birthday - and Baltimore to Cambridge is a long drive when it is past my bedtime. Krista settles down in the passenger seat, asks “are you good” and I know that she will probably be out cold by the time we hit the Bay Bridge.
During those long drives it is imperative that I “keep watch and pray.” I need to make it home. I need to ensure my bride makes it home. I need to do whatever it takes to make sure I stay alert, stay on course, and finish the day well. Giving in to the temptation to rest the eyes is not an option. It is the same with our faith journey as well. We have a destination - we are not home yet. So keep watch and pray!
Last week we wrapped up our series on Great Prayers of the Bible with the prayer of submission found in Luke’s retelling of Jesus’ prayer to His Father in the Garden of Gethsemane before he was arrested.
saying, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.”
Today, we are looking at Mark’s gospel account of this same event, Jesus’ facing the point of no return and the horror of what He is about to endure, fighting the temptation to save himself, and submitting himself to His Father’s perfect will. Now I intend to shift the focus to the disciples’ response. In fact, if I were to give a theme for the next few Sundays, it would be “Our Response To Jesus’ Sacrifice.”
The response of the disciples that we just heard in the gospel reading is a failed response. Peter, James and John had one job: keep watch and pray.
The heaviness and danger of the moment would not have been lost on them. Jesus had been preparing them for this moment for quite some time. They heard him speak of his death and of his betrayal - although they did not fully understand it. They witnessed the open hostility of the religious leaders toward Jesus and they sensed the escalation of tension throughout the week. More importantly, they just saw the face of their teacher, covered in agony, his body shaking, as he went off a short distance and fell to the ground - crying out to His Father with sweat pouring from his brow. Jesus instructed them to watch and pray.
How many times has the Church witnessed Jesus’ sacrifice? How many times have we heard the story? Do we not remember the breaking of his body and the shedding of his blood every time we celebrate Holy Communion?
Yet what happens when the disciples are told to watch and pray. They fall asleep.
Among other things, this passage highlights one of the greatest threats to the Church - it is not persecution, it is spiritual sleepiness.
Let’s look closely at this text.
Why do you think Jesus called these three disciples, his inner circle, to accompany him into this field of olive trees to watch and pray?
Was he in need of their moral support and encouragement?
No, that can’t be it. He knew they would fail.
If we back up to the verses that preceded this account, we read:
And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives. And Jesus said to them, “You will all fall away, for it is written, ‘I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.’ But after I am raised up, I will go before you to Galilee.” Peter said to him, “Even though they all fall away, I will not.” And Jesus said to him, “Truly, I tell you, this very night, before the rooster crows twice, you will deny me three times.” But he said emphatically, “If I must die with you, I will not deny you.” And they all said the same.
Peter said he was willing to die with Jesus. A few chapters earlier, in chapter 10, James and John tried to positioned themselves to sit in seats of power and influence in the coming Kingdom.
Mark 10:37–38 (ESV)
And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.” Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?” And they said to him, “we are able.”
Peter, James and John overestimated their abilities. While probably sincere in their intentions, they did not possess the power to overcome the nature of their flesh. The same is true for the Church. We may call ourselves Christians (followers of Christ) and we may try to position ourselves and use our power to achieve what we think is good in the world, and we may declare that we will stand with Jesus to the end - and yet before you know it, we are spiritually asleep.
Jesus tells us “keep watch and pray.”
When we read this account, we need to ask ourselves, why did Jesus want his disciples there?
He tells them to keep watch.
What were they to watch? Did he need a security detail? Where they supposed to protect him as he prayed?
No, he knew where this was leading. He knew his betrayer was on his way. This passage concludes with Jesus telling them: Mark 14:42
Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand.”
They were not to keep watch for trouble. They were to watch Him.
Of all the times when you think Jesus would want to alone - he invites his disciples to come a watch him.
They needed to see him struggle. To witness the immense weight of what He was to endure and His willingness to see it through. To witness their Lord, in his moment of crisis, to lament in prayer and submit to the Father. This would imbed in them the knowledge that we can take anything before the Lord in prayer, trusting that God can change things, but also that His answer at times may be “no” - and even then - He will be with us and give us the strength to go forward. Our role is to keep watch, keep our eyes on Jesus, and pray.
What also strikes me in this passage is the fact that three times, Jesus in the midst of agony pauses his pleading to His Father to go back and check on his disciples. He is the Good Shepherd. The first time, he wakes and warns them:
“Watch and pray that you may not enter temptation. The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.”
Our flesh is weak. Anyone who has tried to overcome sin on their own power can attest that the spirit may be willing but the flesh is weak. It is through the flesh that Satan works to distract people from God’s good plan for their lives. We are vulnerable to his tempting strategies.
K.G. Kuhn defines temptation as “an invitation to be untrue to God.” How easy it is for us to accept that invitation.
As one writer put it “The weak flesh is up against the Strong Man (the devil). It requires constant vigilance and prayer for fortification.”
The power to overcome does not originate from within ourselves. It comes from above.
Overcoming our enemy requires vigilance - remaining spiritually awake. Seeing everything with our spiritual eyes wide open. And the key to being spiritually awake is to be engaged in unceasing prayer. Keeping the lines of communication open with the Lord.
Jesus instructs his disciples to watch and pray - He knew what they would very soon be facing. Their loyalty to him would be put to the test. Biblical commentator William Lane explains that:
The command to watch means to be spiritually awake so as to face the severe sifting of loyalties which was to come in the arrest and death of Jesus.
We all face times of testing when our loyalties to the Lord will face severe sifting. When a crisis strikes, will the praises you sing today be on your lips, or will you be shaken and deny you even knew Him?
Again, William Lane writes, “Spiritual wakefulness and prayer in full dependence upon divine help provide the only adequate preparation for crisis.”
Lane rightfully calls is adequate preparation, because if we are not spiritually awake and we are not fully depending on God through prayer today - then it will be too late when crisis strikes.
So my question for you today is this:
Are you awake or are you sleeping?
When you look at the world today, and you consider all that is happening around you, how are you interpreting what you see? What is your response as a disciple?
When one reads the gospel of Mark as a whole - from beginning to end - then Jesus’ rebuke of his disciples sleepiness is intended to point us back to his earlier teaching in chapter 13 where his disciples had inquired about the end of times:
Therefore stay awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or in the morning— lest he come suddenly and find you asleep. And what I say to you I say to all: Stay awake.”
The Apostle Paul would later amplify this warning in…
Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need to have anything written to you. For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying, “There is peace and security,” then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape. But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief. For you are all children of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness. So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober.
Church - let us be on watch and in prayer. Now more than ever, we need divine help and it is ours to receive. Our job is to stay awake, keep watch and pray.
Amen.
