So we're going to Mark chapter
14 and verse 32. And we're going to be reading about
the Lord Jesus Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane. And they came to a place which
was named Gethsemane. And he saith to his disciples,
Sit ye here while I shall pray. And he taketh with him Peter
and James and John, and began to be sore amazed, and to be
very heavy. And saith unto them, My soul
is exceeding sorrowful unto death, tarry ye here and watch. And he went forward a little,
and fell on the ground, and prayed that, if it were possible, the
hour might pass from him. And he said, Abba, Father, all
things are possible unto thee. Take away this cup from me. Nevertheless,
not what I will, but what thou wilt. And he cometh and findeth
them sleeping, And saith unto Peter, Simon, sleepest thou? Couldst not thou watch one hour? Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter
into temptation. The spirit truly is ready, but
the flesh is weak. And again he went away, and prayed
and spake the same words. And when he returned, he found
them asleep again, for their eyes were heavy, neither wist
they what to answer him. And he cometh the third time,
and saith unto them, Sleep on now, and take your rest. It is
enough. The hour is come. Behold, the
Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise up, let
us go. Lo, he that betrayeth me is at
hand. Amen. May the Lord bless to us
this reading also. The prophet Isaiah calls the
Lord Jesus Christ a man of sorrows. And truly, he was a man of sorrows. That little reference comes from
Isaiah chapter 53 and verse 3. And the whole verse says this. He is despised and rejected of
men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it
were, our faces from him. He was despised and we esteemed
him not. And as I was reading over that
verse and just thinking about my introduction here, I realised
that every clause in that verse emphasises another level, another
aspect of the shame and suffering of our divine friend, the Lord
Jesus Christ. It speaks not only of physical
pain, but emotional pain. Pain that was mental, pain that
was spiritual. And I don't say that Jesus never
was joyous or that Jesus never laughed. He knew joy. But what characterised this life,
what characterised the life of the Lord Jesus Christ more than
anything else was his sorrow and his suffering. The humiliation
of the God-man for our redemption, for the redemption of his people,
it confounded angels and it amazed men. He was a man of sorrows
and acquainted with grief. and to retain, I think, our proper
perspective on this time, this incident, this encounter of the
Lord in the Garden of Gethsemane. We need to remind ourselves that
not only was there a full measure of suffering as far as the quantity,
but there was also an intensity and concentration of the Lord's
suffering before even the death on the cross that went beyond
anything ever experienced by men and women on this earth. And I want us to pause on that
for a moment or two, because we've kind of been working up
to this for a long number of weeks now. The Lord turned His
face to go towards Jerusalem, knowing the suffering that He
would encounter, knowing the pain that He would have to endure.
And here we are now, upon the very edge of that suffering. And we need to bear in mind the
words of Jeremiah upon the lips of our saviour because they spoke
of him where he says, behold, behold, he's calling upon us,
he's calling upon you and me today to behold and see if there
be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is done unto me, wherewith
the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger. This is speaking about the Lord
and he's speaking about this moment, this period, This hour,
not necessarily just the 60 minutes of this hour, although it appears
as if this was an hour of suffering in Gethsemane, but this whole
period from Gethsemane to the Lord giving up his ghost upon
the cross. This was the fierce anger of
God being vented upon the Saviour. God knows there has been plenty
of pain. There has been untold tears in
this world as a result of Adam's fall. Man is born unto trouble
as the sparks fly upward. Job tells us that in chapter
five, verse seven. But nothing in this world is
as horrific or as hopeless as hell. Nothing in this world is
as horrific and as hopeless as hell. And the Lord Jesus Christ
was now being afflicted with hell in his soul, with the fierce
anger of God upon him, which is damnation of the soul. So as we enter the gloom of Gethsemane
with the Lord and his disciples, we do so, as we have seen, with
a sense of awe and wonder and reverence and maybe even dread,
because we're going to see some things here that speak of what
is yet to come for those who are outside of Christ. And we
will see something of what the Lord Jesus Christ was called
upon to endure for the salvation of our souls who trust in him
and lean upon the power of his blood to cleanse us. The soul
suffering of Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane brings us to the
limit of human understanding, and it exceeds all earthbound
explanation. I've got a limited goal today
in these thoughts that I've prepared for us. It's a limited goal. because I know that I can't explain
what happened in Gethsemane. So my goal, my hope, is only
that we might grasp a little bit better, a little bit more,
the nature and the effect of this event. This hour and time
in Gethsemane is unique in the history of the world. and it
is particular to the experience of the Lord Jesus Christ. And
while it's not the fullness of all that the Saviour endured
for our redemption, it's described in the Gospels and from the lips
of the Lord himself, in words and in language that is used
nowhere else in Scripture. Here we find phrases that are
unmatched in the life of Christ. Phrases such as him being sore
amazed. in his mind, in his spirit, in
his comprehension. Christ being sore amazed. Just pause on that for a moment
and think about that. This is the Son of God, this
is the God-man that we are speaking about. And he is sore amazed. He is sorrowful. and very heavy. His soul is exceeding sorrowful
unto death. He being in an agony, praying
more earnestly than he had ever prayed before. And we wonder on this cold night
at him sweating, And then we learn that the sweat that emanated,
that came from his skin was, as it
were, great drops of blood falling down to the ground. And there
the Lord lies prostate. There the Lord is on the ground. and whatever else our Saviour
endured when his body was pierced on the cross and in those hours
of darkness in which he hung there on the cross, here in this
moment in the garden his spirit was crushed beyond measure. An infinite judgment enters into
a perfect soul. The sword of divine justice piercing
Christ's heart and so exceptional is this hour that we're told
that an angel appeared to him from heaven strengthening him. I mentioned in yesterday's little
introduction that this was a support, this angel coming and strengthening
the Lord was a support unheard of anywhere else in the Lord's
ministry. But I want to show you one other
place where something similar did occur. and which perhaps
might give us just another insight into the trials that the Lord
was experiencing here. And if you have to go back with
me for some time, and to, well, I'm not asking you to turn to
it, but it's Matthew chapter four that I'm thinking about.
And that incident in Matthew chapter four, it's right at the
beginning of the Lord's ministry, and it is at the end of a period
of famine. 40 days and 40 nights when the
Lord fasted in the wilderness. He was taken by the Holy Spirit
out into the wilderness. And there, at the end of 40 days
and 40 nights, we are told that he was tempted of the devil. And Matthew tells us, he tells
us this, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain. and showeth him all the kingdoms
of the world, and the glory of them, and saith unto him, All
these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship
me. Now that was quite an offer.
He showed him the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them,
and saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou
wilt fall down and worship me. Let me suggest to you that that
is not very far distant, not far removed from what Christ's
disciples were expecting and anticipating and hoping for.
They conceived in their minds, even now, In the Garden of Gethsemane,
these men continued to carry this idea that the Lord was about
to establish a natural, physical kingdom here upon earth. And
that's exactly what the devil, what Satan had offered the Lord
Jesus Christ those years ago when the Lord was beginning his
ministry. He said, this is what I'll give you. This is what I
will give you if you will bend the knee to me. And then at the
end of that little time, that period of temptation, these words
are used by Matthew. He says, then saith, no, I'm
sorry. It's here. Then the devil leaveth
him. And behold, angels came and ministered
unto him. And that's the point. The Lord
had said to Satan, it is written, thou shalt worship the Lord thy
God, and him only shalt thou serve. And then the devil left
the Lord. And when the devil left the Lord,
angels came and ministered unto him. So here's the point I'm
making. At the end of Satan's assault
on the weakened saviour, during that time of his temptation,
40 days, 40 nights in the wilderness, messengers from heaven revived
and ministered to the Lord. And Luke tells us in the parallel
passage to that, that Satan departed from him for a season, only for
a time. So that is suggestive that there
was another time when Satan assaulted Christ with the same temptation. And I'm going to suggest to you
that perhaps Gethsemane was that time. There was that moment in
the supreme sorrow and suffering of the Lord. Satan offered him
the same offer. A way out of pain and suffering
and yet the possession of the kingdoms of this world. It was then that the angel came
and supported him. And perhaps what we see in this
angel coming and strengthening the Lord in the midst of his
suffering here in the garden is the end of the Lord's suffering
where the angel comes and ministers to him at the withdrawing of
Satan as it was during the time of his temptations in the wilderness. The word Gethsemane, that is
the name of the garden in which the Lord here suffered, seems
to be a reference to a place where olives were crushed to
produce olive oil. And of course, this was the Mount
of Olives. It was characterised by the olive
trees that were at least on part of the mountain. And here it
seems as if this Garden of Gethsemane was a place where the olives
would be collected, brought there, There was an olive press and
the olives would be crushed and the olive oil produced. And that,
if that is indeed the case, is a fitting picture that has been
used. We'll see it in our hymn at the
end of the service as well. It's a fitting picture of the
bruising and the crushing of the Lord's soul to atone for
our sin. And I don't want to take anything
away from the three hours that the Lord spent on the cross,
but I don't equally want us to pass by this time in Gethsemane
when the Lord endured the suffering that he did. We're told in scripture
that in the Garden of Eden, Satan ruined our Adam nature. And here,
in the Garden of Gethsemane, the Lord Jesus Christ began to
deliver us from Satan's grip. In the time that I've got left
to me today, I want to just mention two standout things from this
short passage before us that perhaps will be useful to us
and just to draw attention to them, to perhaps even repeat
them again a little bit in our hearing. It's the thing, first
of all, about the sleeping disciples, and then secondly, the words
of the Lord's Prayer concerning the removal of the cup of suffering,
the passing of the hour. So, first of all, just to dwell
on these disciples, I don't believe that the disciples slept during
the whole of the time of this trial of the Saviour. they seem
to have been sufficiently aware of at least some of the movements
and actions of the Lord, and some of the things that Jesus
said in his prayer. So the very fact that we have
got the account of these things, of what the Lord did, would suggest
to me that the disciples were to some extent aware of what
was happening around about them, at least for some of the time. Indeed, that appears to have
been the particular reason why the Lord took these three men,
Peter, James, and John, with him. They were to be the witnesses
of the Lord's suffering. They were to testify of the things
that they had seen and heard. John it is that tells us that,
that, that which we have seen and heard declare we unto you. Nevertheless, three times in
the space of an hour, these men, Peter, James and John, fall into
a deep sleep. And it's my feeling that this
was no natural sleep. It's not that they were simply
tired, but rather it was another aspect of the dealings of Satan
with these men. And it was intended to aggravate
the Lord's sense of isolation. The Lord asked Peter and James
and John to watch with me and pray lest ye fall into temptation. So that the watching was their
task. Remember again what John said,
that we are here to declare to you the things that we have seen
and heard. So that observation, that witnessing,
that watching was the task that the Lord was giving to his disciples,
that they would be witnesses of what he was enduring, that
they in turn might take that testimony, that witness, and
take it to his church and his people in the preaching of the
gospel to tell and to show what the Lord Jesus Christ had accomplished. So that he says to them, watch
with me, and then he says, and pray, lest ye fall into temptation. That prayer was to stop them
from falling asleep. That was the temptation that
they were about to endure. And we discover the Lord saying
a little bit later, the spirit was willing, but the flesh was
weak. And it was that satanic temptation,
it was that devilish attack on their flesh, which brought them
so immediately into the depths of their slumber. And that's
a reminder, surely, of how weak our flesh is. It really doesn't
matter the beauty or the holiness or
the spirituality of the moments that we can spend together with
the Lord. The next moment, this flesh can
succumb to the weakness, and to the temptations of Satan. How weak is our flesh, how easy
it gives way to weariness and to slumber. Weariness in well-doing, weariness
in prayer, weariness in worship, concentration in spiritual things. We're given insights and we discover
that our minds are flying away in all directions and we cannot
concentrate on the things that we would like to dwell upon. The spirit's willing but the
flesh is weak. How hopeless is any spiritual
work that relies on man? Let me say it this way. How hopeless
in my soul is any spiritual work that relies on me? that relies
on me in the least in my flesh to contribute anything to its
accomplishment. Satan can have me sleeping just
like that. And my prayer is to be that I
don't fall into temptation. but that I watch with the Lord,
that I watch what He is doing, that I watch what He has done,
that I watch and consider His ways and His works and I hear
His words, and yet Satan so easily distracts me. The disciples sleep on this night. is first a picture of our state
of spiritual death until the Holy Ghost comes with quickening
power. But it is also a picture of our
dullness and our lethargy in the flesh. and the hurdle and
the barrier that must be overcome in our flesh for there to be
any spiritual growth and understanding and insight. It's a gift of God,
it's a gift of faith and anything that we have of a spiritual nature
must be granted to us and gifted to us by our God. So it was that
the Saviour would receive no easing of His burden with the
support of his disciples. There would be no mitigation
of the sorrow, even by way of moral support from these disciples
interceding on his behalf in prayer. His closest friends there
on that night that he had shared so much with and the intensity
of their relationship for so long, even that fell away. And when the Lord faced his own
temptation and Satan's assault on him, when he faced the horror
of becoming sin and bearing sin's punishment in his own body, he
faced it alone. And if we're right about the
angel coming, it came when Satan left him after he'd endured all
those trials. And the whole incident of the
sleeping disciples in the garden is again a lesson to the Lord's
disciples and a lesson to us. There's nothing in us, in our
flesh, to be relied upon when it comes to spiritual need and
to our spiritual fight. The Lord alone would fight this
battle for us in Gethsemane and on the cross. And the Lord alone
would carry this load of pain and suffering. In this way, our
Saviour fulfilled the words of the prophet. I have trodden the
winepress alone, and of the people there was none with me. And I
looked, and there was none to help. and I wondered that there
was none to uphold. Therefore mine own arm brought
salvation unto me, and my fury it upheld me. Well, so much for the Lord's
sleeping disciples. Let me also just draw some attention
to the words of the Lord's prayers. And these words are familiar
to us. If it be possible, let this cup pass from me. The Lord
is here speaking to his father and these words are repeated
in the different gospels. The son speaks to his father
and he asks, oh my father, this is the Matthew account, he says,
oh my father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless,
not as I will, but as thou wilt. O my father, if this cup may
not pass away from me, except I drink it, thy will be done. And then on Mark, we read the
verse earlier, Abba, Father, all things are possible unto
thee. Take away this cup from me, nevertheless
not what I will, but what thou wilt. And then in Luke, the verse
says, Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me, nevertheless
not my will, but thine be done. And this was the phrase, this
was the, the prayer that the Lord uttered on this occasion.
And I've heard these words described as an example of unanswered prayer,
as though the son was asking something of the father, which
was then declined and denied to him. And that that something
that the son requested was an alternative to his suffering
and death. As if Christ was recoiling from
the prospect of being made sin, abhorring the judgment of God
and the suffering that he must endure in his human nature. and seeking a way out of that
suffering and death if another method of redemption could be
found that was acceptable to God with whom all things are possible. And I must confess that that
explanation of these verses has always left me cold and seems
really quite contrary to every other statement throughout the
Lord's life. Now I know that I've been building
up to this point that this hour was unique in the Lord's life
but nevertheless as we've often seen in these studies of Mark
The Lord has been pressing towards this point enthusiastically,
desiring that this time should come upon him for the sake of
the love of the people for whom he was going to suffer. The other thing about this interpretation
is that it implies that there is a difference between the will
of the Father and the will of the Son. The son willed one thing,
but he was prepared not to insist upon it, but to
go with the will of the father. And that raises more questions
than it answers, I think. And I don't want to speak with
absolute certainty on this, but I'm going to give you another
interpretation of these verses. And I am going to do it with
a sense of that awe and reverence that we enter upon this incident. But I believe that there's another
way of looking at this prayer, which gives more honour to the
Lord and maintains a consistency between the wills of the Father
and the Son. May I suggest that in these words
what we are listening to is not the saviour looking for a way
out of his suffering, but rather the Saviour declaring his complete
and full commitment to our salvation, no matter what the cost might
be. And that's going to be the point
of this little explanation. It's not that the Lord Jesus
was asking for a way to sidestep his suffering. as if his drinking
the cup of suffering, or Isaiah calls it the cup of trembling,
or the cup of God's fury, might be changed for some other method. Rather, I believe that he was
expressing a willingness to endure to the fullest degree and the
furthest extent whatever God's justice demands. wherever God's
justice demanded, even if it meant Christ suffering everlastingly. Now, stay with me here because
it's a little bit complicated. But here's the point. Jesus was
about to suffer the eternal punishment due to his elect. Sinning against
an infinite God demands and incurs an everlasting separation, an
everlasting judgment. That is the nature of hell. It
is going to be an everlasting judgment. It is what happens
in hell. It is what faces the reprobate. It's what faces you and me if
we are not in Christ. When God, when the Lord Jesus
Christ says, depart from me, that departing is an eternal
separation. And Jesus was about to be separated
from and forsaken by his father. On the cross he says about God
forsaking him. That in itself is a mystery beyond
our comprehension. That forsaking of the son by
the father. And now, in this prayer, what
the Lord is declaring is, if it's possible for that eternity
of suffering, for that infinite justice of God to be satisfied
without Christ dying eternally, everlastingly, without Him suffering
forever and ever and ever, as hell will be an eternal suffering,
Then he says, let this cup pass from me. That was the prayer. He's saying, If it can't pass
from me, I'm willing to suffer everlastingly for the sake of
my people. I'm willing to suffer whatever
it takes, even if it means my eternal separation from the Father,
as long as my people are delivered, as long as my suffering answers
the debt of sin and guilt to deliver my elect. But here we see the beauty of
the eternal nature of the sun joined together with the human
nature of the sun. Because Christ was able in his
two-fold nature to suffer an eternal suffering in the space
of this small window, this small duration. Having drunk the cup
to the dregs and having endured the full wrath of God to the
full, God's justice was satisfied and the cup did indeed pass. when the wrath of God was propitiated
and the ransom price was paid and justice was fulfilled. Now I'm not going to insist upon
it that that's the proper interpretation but I find that interpretation
much more God honouring and suggestive of the Saviour's love. It's to the eternal praise and
mercy of our God that it was possible for the cup to pass
and for Christ's suffering to cease. And it confirms that the
holiness of God against our sin is honoured and his law is satisfied. It shows us that the sacrifice
of Christ was acceptable and sufficient to meet the need of
our case. The fact that the cup of suffering
was completely drained and passed from Christ, that the job was
finished on the cross, speaks to the fact that his sacrifice
was acceptable and sufficient. And our calling by the Holy Spirit
is founded upon Christ's successful finished work. That's why we
can have assurance, that's why we can have confidence that we
have peace with God, because the Lord Jesus Christ drank that
cup to the full. and it passed from him. The suffering
of the God-man opens at Gethsemane. It culminates on the cross during
those three hours of darkness. But this hour, it was deeply
important in its message. And let me just conclude by saying
this, that the message of Gethsemane is important to two distinct
groups. First of all, it's important
to the believer because it shows what it costs the Savior to deliver
our soul from eternal punishment. And second, it is important to
the unbeliever Because what ultimately must be the everlasting horror
of every sinner who dies outside of Christ? Sins unpardoned, soul
uncleansed, spirit damned to everlasting separation. The whole
weight and pressure of iniquity bearing down on his soul personally. Robert Hawker says on this point,
if Christ was brought into such an agony while bearing only the
transgressions of others, what must be the terrors of those
who bear their own? What a terrible place hell will
be. Gethsemane proves that. May the
Lord bless these thoughts to us today. Amen.