Seeking for the helm of the Lord,
I direct your prayer for attention to the Gospel according to John
chapter 18 and part of verse 2. The latter part of verse 2,
John chapter 18. For Jesus oft times resorted
thither with his disciples. John 18, the last part of verse
2. The place that the Lord Jesus
Christ often turned to or resorted to was the Garden of Gethsemane. Over the brook Hedron, we read
in verse 1, where was a garden, into the which he entered and
his disciples. Most solemnly, Judas also, he
knew the place. There's one thing to know the
place where the Lord Jesus Christ goes and to actually go there. Another thing to actually have
that fellowship and communion with him. We know our Lord loved
Mary and Martha and their brother Lazarus, but we know that when
the Lord was in their house, that Martha was so busy with
her serving that she had no time to sit and hear the word of the
Lord. We can have those outward places,
but yet though we are there, we do not have that sweet fellowship
with the Lord. But I believe for the Lord and
for all of the disciples except Judas, this place was a very
special place for them. And one of the best evidences,
I believe, of being a child of God is that while we are here
below, that we have those times of fellowship with the Lord,
that we delight in being with the Lord, having that quality
time with Him, communion, that we actually delight in Him and
in His Holy Word, that we enjoy that time that we can walk with
Him by faith. Truly, we would be deceiving
ourselves if we were thinking, well, we shall get to heaven
at last. When we die, we shall go to heaven. It will all be well, it will
all be right. But while we are here below,
we have no desire to spend time with the Lord, to be in His Word,
to be in prayer, to be with His people. We think that we can
have our fill of this world and have the love of the world in
our heart and no room for the Saviour at all, and yet hope
at last to be with Him forever and ever and ever. What would
we think of a couple that was supposedly courting and they
were going to get married and a marriage date had been set,
but they never had any time together? And they never wanted to get
together. There was never a desire of the
bride to be with the bridegroom to come. We would say, well,
how is that going to change instantly the moment you've tied the knot
and the moment you've got married? We read in the Psalms that he
shall give grace and glory. The two go together. God's people
are a prepared people for a prepared place. And that preparation brings
them to love the Lord and to view him as precious here unto
you which believe he is precious. So it's a very important thing
that we look at such a word as this. And I know we haven't got
a literal Gethsemane. We haven't got a literal garden
like this. Our Lord is ascended up into
heaven. He is with the Father. He will come again with power
and great glory. But He is promised by His Spirit
and by grace to be with us even unto the end of the world. Lo,
I am with you even unto the end of the world. And so though we
may not have the literal place and the situation, yet it should
be our desire to have the equivalent of this. Well, Gethsemane, why
was it that the Lord so love Gethsemane? Why was it that he
kept going there and to want to be in that place? Well, unlike
ourselves, we do not know what shall happen in any one place. We do not know the future, only
as it's unfolded before us. But the Lord, he did know. And
he did know that that place was the appointed place. where the
sins of all his people should be laid upon him. And it was
that place from which he was to be taken to the judgment hall
and then to the crucifixion. John, in his gospel, he doesn't
describe as vividly or as minute particulars as Luke does as to
what happened there in the garden. In Luke chapter 22, we have in
verse 39, equivalent to the words of our text, and he came out
and went as he was wont. So instead of the words of our
text that Jesus oft times resorted thither with his disciples, here
it is, he went out as he was wont, meaning the same thing.
It was a custom to do, it was a regular thing for him to do,
to the Mount of Olives, and his disciples also followed him. But this time was to be a different
time, and when they came to that place, we read, he said unto
them, pray that ye enter not into temptation, And he was withdrawn
from them about a stone's cast, and kneeled down and prayed,
saying, Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me, nevertheless
not my will, but thine, be done. And there appeared an angel unto
him from heaven, strengthening him. And being in an agony, he
prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was as it were great drops
of blood, falling down to the ground. This was where was laid
on him the iniquity of us all. That which we read of in Isaiah
53. He had laid on him the iniquity
of us all. He shall bear their iniquities. And if something was, if a weight
was laid on us, something that was so heavy, That would press
us down. That would bow us down. We would
respond. We would show to those round
about us what a weight we were carrying and what a burden it
was. And it can't be more in a clear
way in this what the Lord was enduring in the Garden of Gethsemane. You couldn't see a physical weight,
a physical burden, but it laid upon His Holy Soul. standing
as a substitute, standing as one in the place of another,
so that he should then go to judgment. And though Pilate must
say, I find no fault in this man, he could not see the sins
of all of his people. Outwardly, our Lord was completely
pure himself, but the sins laid upon him what he was carrying
caused him to be silent, to not open his mouth. He knew for whom
he was to stand and for whom he was to suffer. And so it is
an important part on the garden there that we clearly see Isaiah
53 being fulfilled. And if you and I know our own
sin, if we are burdened of one sin, if past offences paint our
eyes, we'll understand a little bit of what the Lord suffered
here. Yes, sufferings before ever Pilate
or Herod or his men mocked him, or ever the nails were pushed
through his hands and his feet, or ever the crown of thorns was
placed on his head, or ever the scourge ripped his back. These
things he felt because of sin. And God's dear people will know
as well what it is to have sin, to be made exceeding sinful and
an evil thing, especially when we see by faith that these sins
were not our Lord's but our own. He had laid on Him, and we see
this iniquity. You know, if we saw a person
suffering and we were told the reason they were suffering was
for us, wouldn't we feel it? If we were. guilty of something,
and another person, someone that we loved, was to say, look, spare
you, I will stand in your place, I will suffer. If those sufferings
were terrible sufferings, long drawn out sufferings, how would
you view it? Seeing them, looking on them,
suffering in that way. And it is important to see what
our Lord endured in this way, because the identifying between
our Lord and his people is bound up really in his name. His name
shall be called Jesus, for he shall save his people from their
sins. So the Lord knowing this, knowing
the importance, and remember these very disciples that were
here, that we'll be witnesses to this, it was their sins laid
on him too, as well as yours and mine, if we truly believe
in his name. The Lord says, I lay down my
life for the sheep. My sheep hear my voice and they
follow me. The sheep are known in that way. But what is on my spirit this
evening? The sheep are known in this,
that they will also have a place where they resort, where they
go with their Lord, to spend with Him here below. And I want to put it to us, and
I include myself in this, in four questions. Four questions. The first is
this. Do we have time for the Lord? When our Lord often resorted
here in this Garden of Gethsemane, they made time for that. We read
of the ministry of our Lord the healing of many, the raising
of some from the dead, the preaching of the gospel. But here is a
time that he had away from that with his disciples and his disciples
away from their fishing, away from all busyness and them and
the Lord. So Do we have time for the Lord? If we were to be given a piece
of paper and asked to write on it, how many minutes a day did
we actually spend in the equivalent to this Gethsemane with the Lord? What would we put in that? How would we break it up as to
time alone or time with others? Leaving off, especially if we
are in the ministry, the preparations for the services of the Lord's
House, if we are ahead of the house, leaving
off, it may be. The worship in the family, I'll
come to that a bit later. But how would we break up the
time that we actually had with the Lord? Now I'm not suggesting
in any way that the time is a way of measuring definitively, the quality time
that we actually have with the Lord. You know, Martha might
have said, well, I've had the Lord in the house for two hours. But Martha, how much time have
you actually spent sitting at his feet hearing his word? You know, as a child, I spent
many, many Lord stays in the house of God. But in unregeneracy,
I never heard anything, not to profit at all. We can be spending
time, but not really spending time. And so, time is not a definitive
thing on itself. But even if we were to leave
that out, even if we were not even to Think about whether that
was really quality time or not. Just on the time, do we actually
plan and make time for the Lord? Or are we so busy and so many
things in this life that the Lord is always last? and the
time is fleeting and our mind on other things. Do you know
what it is? You might be talking to somebody
and as you're talking to them at first you might have got their
attention and eye contact and then you realise that as you're
talking to them they're not quite with you and their eyes are going
across the room and they're obviously thinking about someone else that
they want to talk to and you know that you haven't got their
attention. It's a horrible feeling to suddenly
realise that. But what would the Lord discern
and see in us in our time and our devotions? And so what a
question. Do we have time for the Lord? Do we have these Gethsemane times where is a place where he often
turned to, resorted thither, clear definitive times that could
be charted as it were, not just left haphazard. but actually
made time for. So that is the first question
for me and for you. Remember the word says,
that they that seek me early shall find me. And that applies to early in
life as a child, a young person. And it also applies to early
in the day, and how I have proved that if we delay however short
really a time of coming before the Lord at the beginning of
the day, that is never quality time. The best is the fast, and
we suffer when we don't observe that. I speak from painful experience
myself. So the first question, do we
have time for the Lord? The second is this, do we have
a place? A place like Gethsemane. It is very clear here, Jesus
oft times resorted thither, and there is a place. There's many
other places too, we read of him at the lakeside, in the boats
and in the wilderness and on the mountains, but here is this
place and this place is a special place. What would our place be? Our Lord spoke of when coming
before him in prayer and The time with the Lord is prayer
time, time in the Word of God, meditating upon the Word, thinking
upon these things, feeding upon the Word of God, communion with
the Lord in prayer as one talking with his friend. And our Lord said, that time
we go into our closet and we close the door. And that is where
we have with our Heavenly Father. Do we have a closet? Do we have
a study? Or a bedroom that we can use
for ourselves for devotions at set times in the day? Or thinking
of Gethsemane, Gethsemane was a garden. Do we have a garden? A spot in the garden, a garden
bench, a secluded place that we can go? Or do we have a place in the woods
where we can go for a walk and have a time where we sit perhaps
over a little stream? a little bridge over a stream
and sit and read our Bible and have time in prayer there. But
do we have a place like Gethsemane? The Lord was very popular in
his ministry. Crowds followed and went with
him. And one time he read that there
was no time not even to eat. but they had time to make sure
this place was a well-known and frequent place. Do we have such
a place? And if we're in a family, do
we respect the need of a wife, a husband, a child, that they
also have such a place and such a time so that those times are
not interrupted. The children are taken out of
the way if they are young children and the mother has a time where
the father is looking after the children so that she can have
that quality time. Do we have a place? Do we have
a time? The third is this. Do we have
a place where we have fellowship with the Lord and his people? With this Garden of Gethsemane,
the Lord was there, not just with one of his dear disciples,
but with all his disciples. and there was that fellowship
one with another. By this shall all men know that
ye are my disciples, indeed, in that ye love one another.
And we know that we are passed from death unto life because
we love the brethren. There's that desiring to be with
the people of God. The disciples, when they are
persecuted, Being let go, they went to their own company. We mentioned Naomi this morning. Naomi, when she was bereaved
of her husband in the land of Moab, she remembered and she'd
heard that the Lord had visited her people in giving them bread,
and her desire was to return and to go back again unto her
own land. a seeking after her own people. And Ruth, who was
a Moabiteess, heard his eye with Naomi because she loved her and
loved her God. She said, thy people be my people,
thy God my God, where thou dwellest will I dwell, and where thou
diest will I die, and there will I be buried. she claimed to her. And so, do we have a place where
we have fellowship with the Lord and his people? Remember, these are things that
are set before us in the Word of a characteristic of where
God's grace is and work is in the heart. It will bring one
to want time with the Lord, to have a place with the Lord, and
have time and place with his people as well. To have that
of which John speaks of in his epistles, the first epistle of
John, we read that in chapter 1 and verse 3, that which we
have seen and heard declare we unto you that ye also may have
fellowship with us and truly our fellowship is with the Father
and with his Son, Jesus Christ. And these things write we unto
you that your joy may be full and the desire of our Lord we
read in the prayer there in John 17. Father I will that they also
whom thou has given me be with me where I am that they may behold
my glory and those that he desires that for they desire to be with
him while he is here below and in this gospel day desire to
be walking where the Lord is and by faith and prayer and in
his word and with his people. So what do we have as a place
to fellowship with the Lord and his people? Our homes. Do we have family worship? Might be a strange thing, you
might say, well, surely we do. And yet sometimes I'm very, very
surprised to find that there are many families, many that
are even in our churches that do not have a time of family
worship, a time when they gather around the word of God, a time
when they come before the Lord in prayer, or where the children
are instructed in the things of the Lord, where they can speak
together with the parents of the things of God. Do we have
family worship? What about brethren's homes?
Those are sacred times where we can have that fellowship with
dear brethren. I know I value the times when
I preach away and stay in the homes of several of the brethren. And they can be very sacred times
where we can have that fellowship one with another and love one
to another in each other's homes. We think of mealtimes, what are
they like? Do we ask the blessing? upon
the food and do we be mindful of that? That those times when
our bodies are being satisfied that we think of this spiritual
food as well and ask the Lord's blessing to be upon that. What about the Lord's house? Where we are tonight? the gathering
of the people together. Forsake not the assembling of
yourselves together as the manner of some is, so much the more
as you see the day approaching. It's a great privilege to be
able to gather and join together in the house of God. It's one
of the very things that we have felt so much during this time
of lockdowns and the pandemic is that it's come between. And
though we can worship in the Lord's house, we cannot linger,
we cannot speak one to another, we cannot have time apart from
the worship time together. And may we soon be able to return
to those times when we have that time together and fellowship.
We're very thankful for the facility through the internet, through
Zoom, where we can actually hear one another in prayer and speak
one to another and sometimes see each other in this way and
that we can join together. And of course we stream the services
here, try to make it as much light we are gathering together
for those that are fearful and afraid of gathering. But do we have then a place,
a spiritual home a spiritual home, a place where we can say,
they're my best friends, my kindred well, their God, my saviour reigns. The house of God. So that is our third question. Do we have such a place where
we have fellowship with the Lord and with his dear people? And then lastly, do we have and
do we look for every opportunity of being with the Lord? We have lawful callings, we have
things that we do in a day, but does that mean that the Lord
is excluded. It's a blessed thing if he's
never far from our thoughts, our meditation, always mindful
of his eye upon us, his presence with us, though I'm with you
all the way. What about our workplace? Those
that have regular employment, is their time there? or having
spent many years in regular employment, I know that there certainly is. And those times used in the lunch
hour or breaks where the Word of God can be read, or those
times when things have happened so unexpectedly, and one has
so wanted to have time to go before the Lord We've used the
toilet facilities in that to find a way away from the rest
of the workplace just for a few moments to pour out our heart
before the Lord. Remember Mrs. Hawkins, the widow of the pastor
at Watersham, that she said to us once, that she said that she
often in her working life used to do that, those times that
visit the water closet, that she would use those times of
being away for also a time before she returned to have a short
prayer before the Lord. As she put it, dedicate herself
unto the Lord. We get so immersed in the world,
so filled with it, it's good to remind ourselves whose we
are and whom we serve, and to come apart just for a few moments,
just to remember that. I often think of that word in
Peter, that we are to be ready to give an answer to everyone
that asketh us, the reason, the hope that is within us. But the
first thing is to sanctify the Lord in your hearts. First there
is a, and you know the question might have been in a very frivolous
way or a provoking way, and we have to stand back just a bit
and just think, now this, I'm speaking, Concerning my Lord,
I'm speaking of things that are very precious to me. Let me not
drink into the spirit of those who are perhaps asking, but I'm
going to give a sober and humble answer to this question. There are times like that, that
we need to look for that opportunity. I know it might be like Nehemiah
with the cup bearer, and the king asked him for what You know,
you're sorrowful, what is the reason? And for what dost thou
ask? And he says, I prayed unto the
God of heaven. Standing in front of the world,
and I've known what it is, standing in front of students and teaching
in a workplace and the prayers that have been going up to God
even while engaged in that work. And we are mindful that the Lord
is everywhere. What about the journeys that
we do? How many of us in the ministry,
some audibly, have gone on their journeys and they've been crying
and praying to the Lord as we've been driving along. Now we've
got a service before us. We've got two hours in the car.
How do we use that time? Is that a time also that we can
have with the Lord? And so, how do we answer these questions? How close is our walk with the
Lord? How much do we resemble having
a place that is anything like Gethsemane? And if we were to
lay claim that we had a place, would the Lord know of that place? I remember when the Lord called
me by grace and I had nine years in one home. And I think by the
time I left that home, I could probably name to you, blessings
and visits of the Lord in nearly every room of that home. And that's a sacred thing, when
you realise that the Lord is there. And those times, one of
the hymn writers says, does thou mind the spot and place where
Jesus did thee meet? And those will make those places
very special places. Sometimes we had one just recently
reading in our family reading. And I said to my dear one, you
know, this chapter brings back so many memories. And some of
them, it wasn't the actual perhaps the verse, but the verse that
was read brought me back to a place Yeah, looking over the harbour
at Mornington over in Australia as I was exercising on the ministry
and reading through that passage and then one's comments on it. And those parts of the word they
bring to remembrance where the Lord has spoken them to us and
what they mean to us. And it involves not just the
word or the exercise or the blessing, but a place and a time and a
year. And I've no doubt with Gethsemane
here, there were many memories and many things that had happened
here. But the disciples, as they record
this now, they see why the Lord liked that spot. They see what
happened there. and just a step between that
place and the judgment and the cross and the redemption of their
souls. So may we have a place that can
be said Jesus oft times resorted thither with his disciples. And I believe if we can say that,
if we have such places, then we know that we are his disciples
indeed, followers of him, and enjoying his presence here below. Our desire will be to be with
him forever. The apostle says that for me
to live is Christ. Can we say that? For me to live
is Christ, who die is gain, absent from the body, present with the
Lord. What is the Lord to us? How precious
is he? You know, if you're honest, if
I'm honest, we get into low places and we're ashamed, ashamed. And
you may have thought, as you've heard the word this evening,
what a poor failure I am. How unlike the people of God. May the Lord use the word and
encourage us and revive us and loose us from the hold of this
world and grant us that help. As we may groan and cry to the
Lord, Lord do revive me, renew in me a right spirit and the
love and communion and fellowship and may be As we've spoken, your
mind has gone back and you say, I'm not what I once was. And
I can say, well, that is so with myself as well. We need such
exhortations, but we need such encouragements too. In this garden
of Gethsemane, the disciples at this time, they could not
watch with the Lord even one hour. They were so sleepy in
that garden. And the Lord had to come and
he had to wake them. He knoweth our frame, he remembereth
that we are but dust. And may the Lord be pleased to
renew in us those sweet fellowship times and times of union with
him and with his people and give us this witness and token that
we are a prepared people for a prepared place. The Lord has
granted us a place here, as close to heaven, we might say, as one
could come, as a walk by faith. And that is the token that we
shall be with him forever in heaven. May the Lord bless this
word, for Jesus of times resorted thither with his disciples. Amen.