The Garden: A Place of Prayer
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The Garden: A Place of Prayer
Matthew 26:36-56
I’d like to welcome you to this Maundy Thursday service. Some of you may be wondering just exactly what that means. I know that the first time that I heard someone mention Maundy Thursday, I thought that they said a Monday – Thursday service. My first thought was that no one would ever go to church for that long – It’s hard enough for an hour!
Maundy Thursday is a time to commemorate the Thursday before Easter when Jesus spent time with his disciples in an upper room.
It was during this time that Jesus set the ultimate example of what it means to be a servant when he washed his disciple’s feet.
Maundy comes from the word mandate and this is where we get the name. Jesus gave his disciples a new mandate on that Thursday – a new command in John 13:
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.
By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
And in John 15 he defines what that means:
“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.
Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.
He also took the Passover meal that night and gave it a new meaning.
So, this evening we are going to observe the Lord’s Supper and spend our time together in praise, in reflection and consider Jesus’s last night before his crucifixion.
So, why don’t we stand and sing together.
And on that Thursday night, they celebrated the Passover together. Jesus was giving new meaning to a meal that the Jewish people had observed going all the way back to the exodus from Egypt. And he took some of the most common items of the meal and gave them new meaning.
He took a simple piece of unleavened bread and told them that this is my body that would be given for them. He took a cup of wine and said that this is my blood of the new covenant which would be poured out for them.
Jesus was telling them that their Passover lamb was about to sacrificed so that they could be free.
Matthew chapter 26 tells us:
Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.”
And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you,
for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
I tell you I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.”
We are going to do this a little differently this evening. Instead of us bringing the elements to you, I would like to ask that you come to the table, receive the bread and the cup and then go back to your pew. Hold on to each so that after everyone is served we can take them together.
Would you bless the bread?
Would you bless the cup?
This is the body of our Lord Jesus Christ, which is given for us. Let us eat together
This is the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ through which we have the forgiveness of sins. Let us drink together.
If you would, let’s stand and we’ll sing together.
If you have your Bible (and I hope that you do), open it to Matthew 26.
After the bonding experience of the Upper Room where He celebrated the Passover meal and instituted the ordinance of the Lords Supper, Jesus led His disciples to a place of prayer.
Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, “Sit here, while I go over there and pray.”
And taking with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, he began to be sorrowful and troubled.
Then he said to them, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with me.”
And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.”
And he came to the disciples and found them sleeping. And he said to Peter, “So, could you not watch with me one hour?
Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
Again, for the second time, he went away and prayed, “My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.”
And again he came and found them sleeping, for their eyes were heavy.
So, leaving them again, he went away and prayed for the third time, saying the same words again.
Then he came to the disciples and said to them, “Sleep and take your rest later on. See, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners.
Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand.”
Let’s look at why Jesus was drawn to this garden.
A Place of Support
A Place of Support
We see in verse 36 that Jesus wanted his disciples to be with Him so He took them to an Olive Garden called Gethsemane, which means, “oil-press.” It was a place where they would crush olives to get the oil out of them.
Luke 22:39 shows us He spent a lot of time here:
And he came out and went, as was his custom, to the Mount of Olives, and the disciples followed him.
John 18:2 tells us that when Judas came looking for Jesus; he knew the place, because Christ had often met there with his disciples.
It’s interesting how the suffering of our Savior begins; He wants to be with his friends.
We don’t think much about this, do we? Jesus had a need for fellowship. Eight of the disciples are told to sit down while Jesus takes three others deeper into the grove. Peter, James and John had also been given the privilege of seeing the glory of Jesus when He was transfigured and were witnesses of His power when He raised a little girl from the dead (Matthew 17:1-2; Mark 5:37).
And now they were about to see something they had never seen before: the sorrow of the Savior.
A Place of Sorrow
A Place of Sorrow
Verse 37 tells us that Jesus was sorrowful and troubled. His heart was heavy.
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.
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…
Have you ever had so much sorrow that you felt no one else could enter it with you? His sorrow was so intense that He could hardly think of anything else. In verse 38, Jesus put words to what was happening:
“My soul is very sorrowful, even to death”
This is sorrow in the highest degree. Grief had so gripped Him that He felt like He was dying. In the midst of this sorrow, Jesus wanted support as He asked the three to stay here and keep watch with me.
A Place of Solitude
A Place of Solitude
Here’s the picture. The eight disciples are somewhere near the entrance to the garden, the three are allowed to go deeper, but then Jesus leaves them and verse 39 says:
“And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed”
Luke adds that it was a stone’s throw away. Jesus is now alone as Hethe King of Kings falls on His face in reverence and awe before His heavenly Father. Spurgeon writes:
Be much in solitary prayer. As private prayer is the key to open heaven, so is it the key to shut the gates of hell.
The Bible mentions a number of different postures for prayer, so there is no right way to do it. However, whenever someone was really serious about seeking God they often dropped to the ground in prayer. Numbers 16:22 shows how intense Moses and Aaron were when they prayed on behalf of their people:
And they fell on their faces and said, “O God, the God of the spirits of all flesh, shall one man sin, and will you be angry with all the congregation?”
W.A. Criswell tells of the first time he met Billy Graham. Billy said, “I feel Gods call on me to be an evangelist.” Dr. Criswell encouraged him and said, “Lets pray about his matter.” After he led in prayer, Dr. Criswell said, “When I opened my eyes, there was Billy Graham flat on the floor, with his face on the carpet in prayer. And Criswell said, I knew right then that God was going to use that young man in a special way.”
A Place of Struggle
A Place of Struggle
The second half of verse 39 reveals His struggle:
“My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me;”
In the midst of all that Jesus is going through, I love how He addresses God in prayer, My Father. That reminds me of how Jesus taught us to pray, Our Father. We can call out to Him as Father in times of struggle.
In Mark 14:36, we read that Jesus actually prayed, “Abba, Father.” He’s literally saying something very affectionate, “Daddy, Father.” Jesus then asked that the cup might be taken from Him. The word cup in the Bible was figurative for Gods blessings (Psalm 23:5) and was also used to describe His wrath (Psalm 75:8). As Jesus looked into this cup, what did He see? Why did He want it taken away?
Someone has suggested that there were at least five things that He saw in the cup.
Sin
Sin
As Jesus is moving toward the cross, He realizes that the punishment for all the sins of the world is about to be poured out on Him. This was something we can’t even imagine. Isaiah 53:6:
…and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
2 Corinthians 5:21 says that the sinless and spotless Lamb of God actually became sin for us:
2 Corinthians 5:21
21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
The greatest Christians have always had the most profound sensitivity to sin. The closer you come to Jesus, the more clearly you see your own sin.
Suffering
Suffering
Jesus certainly knew that He was about to suffer, but in the Garden it suddenly became very real. He had already told the disciples what would happen to Him in Luke 9:22:
saying, “The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.”
Even though He knew what was coming, the anticipation of the physical, emotional, and spiritual pain was almost unbearable. Jesus knew exactly what faced Him in the hours ahead. He had seen crucifixion many times. But I think He agonized most about the fact that all the sins of the world (my sins, your sins, all of our sins) were going to be placed upon Him. He had never experienced that.
But without a doubt, Jesus is being tempted to not go through with the Fathers plan.
In his agony, Luke 22:44 says,
And being in agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground.
I have never prayed with that kind of intensity. Most of my prayers are pretty routine compared to that.
Sacrifice
Sacrifice
As He looks deeper into the cup, He sees beyond the sin and the suffering as He recognizes His role as a final sacrifice.
On Passover night, when Jesus was going to Gethsemane, He would have been reminded of all the lambs that would have been sacrificed for that holy day. He knew that in a few hours, He was going to be killed as the final sacrificial Lamb of God, His blood satisfying the righteous demands of Gods justice.
He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.
propitiation (the atoning sacrifice)
Separation
Separation
As He continued to look into the cup, Jesus saw something that caused Him to shudder in horror. He would face separation from His Father when all the sins of world were heaped upon Him, something that he had never experienced before. We see this in Matthew 27:46:
And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” that is, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
This cup was filled with bitterness and was almost unbearable. But there was more. In the bottom of the cup, was something sweet.
Salvation
Salvation
Ultimately, Jesus knew that He had to drink the cup in order to save us from our sins. This is why He came.
For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
Now, as Jesus struggled with what was in the cup, the disciples were sleeping.
Look at verses 40-41 in Matthew:
40 And he came to the disciples and found them sleeping. And he said to Peter, “So, could you not watch with me one hour?
41 Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
I wonder how Peter felt when Jesus singled him out. Peter had just said that he would never deny Christ, and now he was drooling and wiping the sleep from his eyes.
They had eaten a big meal. Now it was maybe one or two o’clock in the morning. And they wanted to stay awake, but they just couldn’t. Have you ever tried to pray and you went to sleep? Or have you ever had a hard time staying awake in church? I can’t imagine that ever happening!
I have some sympathy for these disciples who went to sleep in Gethsemane. They knew it was a serious time, and they tried to pray, but they just couldn’t do it. And Jesus said, “Couldn’t you watch with me an hour, I really need your support.” But He understood. That’s what I love about Jesus. In His time of stress, He gave grace. He said,
“The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
The second time He came back in verses 43 and 44, He didn’t even wake them up. A very real byproduct of prayer should be patience with people. If you are irritable with others, always on edge, maybe it’s an indication that you need to spend some time with the Lord because the Spirit of God produces patience.
A Place of Submission
A Place of Submission
Jesus is beginning to surrender to the cup of sin, suffering, sacrifice, separation and salvation in the last part of verse 39:
…not as I will, but as you will.
Look at how His prayer is a little bit different the second time in verse 42:
42 Again, for the second time, he went away and prayed, “My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.”
The first time He prayed, if it is possible, and now He prays, if it is not possible.
In his first request he asks for the cup to be taken from Him; now He mentions drinking it. In the first plea, He says, “not as I will” and in the second “your will be done.”
Warren Wiersbe writes, Jesus was not wrestling with Gods will or resisting Gods will, He was yielding Himself to Gods will.
There are two elements to Jesus prayer that should help us pray.
HE SHARED HIS OWN DESIRE. This is what I want! I want to avoid the cross.
HE SUBMITTED HIS WILL TO THE FATHER. Not My will, but Your will be done.
Prayer is simply expressing our thoughts and our desires to God, and then submitting our will to His direction. I like how Spurgeon puts it:
Let it be as God wills, and God will determine for the best. Be thou content to leave thy prayer in his hands, who knows when to give, and how to give, and what to give, and what to withhold.
A Place of Strength
A Place of Strength
We can see that Jesus has been strengthened in verse 46:
46 Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand.”
Something really special happened during this three-hour prayer time. Jesus had gone into the garden very sorrowful and now emerges strengthened. Before He finished His prayer, we know that the Father sent an angel to His Son.
And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him.
What did that angel do?
Did he sit and talk with Jesus?
Did he put an arm around His shoulder and tell him it would all be okay?
Maybe the angel prayed with Him.
Perhaps the angel had a towel and wiped His brow.
We’re not told, but when Jesus got up from this place of prayer, He had a spirit of resolve and assurance that He was ready to go to the cross.
When you do Gods will, God will give you the strength needed to complete it.
Let’s move through the next few verses to see how He showed strength.
Jesus was strong in the face of betrayal
Jesus was strong in the face of betrayal
Look at Verse 47:
While he was still speaking, Judas came, one of the twelve, and with him a great crowd with swords and clubs, from the chief priests and the elders of the people.
It is estimated that probably 60 soldiers, armed with swords and clubs, came along with the crowd.
John 18:3 says, that Judas came with a detachment of soldiers and some officials from the chief priests and Pharisees.
Now the betrayer had given them a sign, saying, “The one I will kiss is the man; seize him.”
And he came up to Jesus at once and said, “Greetings, Rabbi!” And he kissed him.
Have you ever been knifed in the back, verbally, by a family member, a close friend, or a church member? That really hurts. And your first reaction is to get even, to fight back. But Jesus had just spent three hours with the Father, and He responds to Judas in verse 50:
“Friend, do what you came to do.”
What composure Jesus displayed in the wake of Judas betrayal! We would want to punch his lights out but Jesus calls him, friend.
Jesus was strong in the face of attack
Jesus was strong in the face of attack
Look at verse 51:
And behold, one of those who were with Jesus stretched out his hand and drew his sword and struck the servant of the high priest and cut off his ear.
We know this was Peter from the other gospel accounts. Now, you have to love Peter. He is impulsive, yet inconsistent; courageous, yet cocky.
Because he said he would die with Jesus earlier in the night, he took a swing with his sword. He was a great fisherman, but a lousy swordsman. He aimed for the head and got the man’s ear.
Luke’s Gospel tells us that Jesus did an amazing thing. He performed one last miracle before He went to the Cross. After Peter was restrained, and the situation was under control, Jesus went over to the man, who was holding his head in pain and touched the man’s ear, and healed him.
If you think about, if Jesus had not healed this man, there may have been four crosses on Calvary.
Jesus was strong in the face of arrest
Jesus was strong in the face of arrest
Jesus takes advantage of a teachable moment and concludes that what was about to happen was prophesied in the Scriptures. Look at the first part of verse 56:
But all this has taken place that the Scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled.” Then all the disciples left him and fled.
But all this has taken place that the Scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled…
Jesus could have called down thousands of angels, or they could have taken one of the many escape routes out of the garden. But He didn’t because He was now ready to offer His life.
For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again.
No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my Father.”
And as Jesus was led away to face the worst day of his life, Matthew tells us:
…Then all the disciples left him and fled.
And Jesus went to face his hardest challenge completely alone.