Good morning. If you'd open your
Bibles with me in Matthew chapter 26. Matthew chapter 26. Before we begin, let's bow before
our Lord in prayer. Our Father, we're so thankful
to be able to come into your presence, to bow before your
throne of grace and have our praise, our petition, our thanksgiving
heard because of the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. And we
dare only come into your presence in him, in the beloved, pleading
his obedience as our only righteousness, pleading his blood as the only
way that our sin could be cleansed. And Father, how we thank you
because of your electing, adopting, mercy, grace to your people,
sinful men and women such as we are could come into your presence
calling the God of heaven and earth, our Father, our Father,
which art in heaven. Oh, we're so thankful. Thank
you for your mercy and your grace, your electing grace, your saving,
redeeming grace, your calling, your keeping, your glorifying
grace. Father, how we thank you. And Father, I pray this morning
that you would Enable us to have an hour of true worship that
you enable us to forget about ourselves our Desires the going-ons
of this life And father let us worship. Let us sit at the feet
of the Lord Jesus Christ and worship him Let us learn more
of him give us faith to believe him to trust him to rest in him
to cast our all upon him Well, we pray for ourselves. Father,
we especially pray for our children's classes, that you would bless
our children, bless our teachers, bless our children in this hour,
that you might use this time to plant the seeds of faith in
their hearts. Father, we also pray a blessing
for you everywhere where your gospel is being preached today.
Father, cause your word to run well in this dark, dark day. Father, give us a revival in
the land. Show us your glory. Call out
your people. Give us a time of refreshing
by your blessing the gospel everywhere that it's preached. And Father,
we pray for the sick and the hurting, those that need you
especially. We pray you'd undertake on their
behalf to comfort their hearts, to heal their bodies, to lead
and guide and give them a special portion of your presence. Comfort
their hearts with your presence until you see fit to bring them
out of the valley. And all these things we ask in
that name, which is above every name, the name of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Amen. I've titled our lesson this morning,
the Savior in Gethsemane. We're going to look this morning
at the last few moments that the Lord spent with his disciples
before he went to the cross to suffer and die for the sin of
his people. Now, these are the last moments he's gonna spend
with them before he goes to suffer. And the disciples spent some
of those moments asleep. They were in the presence of
the Savior, getting ready to offer himself for the sins of
his people, and they were sound asleep. Now, believe me, I'm
not being hard on them. I mean, they had to be physically
exhausted. It was nighttime. You know, our bodies need sleep.
I mean, it just gets to the point sometimes you can't stay awake.
You've got to have some sleep. I'm not being hard on them, but
there's a lesson I want to take to my soul from this. Here's
the lesson. I don't want to spend time alone
with the Lord. I don't want to spend time in
the, in the worship surface, spiritually asleep. I don't want
to do that. If I do, I can miss something
vital to my soul. And these last moments that the
Lord spent with his disciples before he suffers, they're recorded
here for our learning and for our benefit. And I pray we might
learn something of our Savior. There's some good things here
that will thrill our souls by enabling us to trust him more
fully. The first thing I see here is
this. The suffering and death of Christ is the one and only
way God's elect could be saved. Verse 36, Matthew chapter 26.
Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane. And
saith unto the disciples, sit ye here while I go yonder and
pray. And he took with him Peter and
the two sons of Zebedee and began to be sorrowful and very heavy.
Then saith he unto them, my soul is exceeding sorrowful, even
unto death. tarry ye here and watch with
me. And he went a little further and fell on his face and prayed,
saying, oh my father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from
me. Nevertheless, not as I will,
but as thou will. And he cometh unto the disciples
and findeth them asleep, and saith unto Peter, what, couldst
ye not watch with me one hour? Watch and pray that ye enter
not into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing,
but the flesh is weak. He went away again the second
time and prayed saying, Oh my father, if this cup may not pass
away from me except I drink it, thy will be done. And he came
and found them asleep again for their eyes were heavy and he
left them and went away again and prayed the third time saying
the same words. Now when the Lord prays this,
Oh my father, if it'd be possible, let this cup pass from me. He
wasn't trying to get out of going to the cross and suffering and
dying for his people. That's not why he prayed this
way. I mean, so many times the Lord has told us over and over
again, this is the reason he came incarnate to suffer and
die. So he wasn't trying to get out
of suffering and dying. It could be he prayed this way
so that we would know there's no other way. he could save his
people from their sins. Now, the Lord Jesus Christ is
the God-man. He's both God and man. He's 100%
God, and he's 100% man. I know the math of that does
not add up, but that's divine arithmetic. He's 100% man and
100% God. He is as much God as if he were
not man, and as much man as if he were not God. And what's causing
him so much anguish here, this anguish of his soul that caused
him to be sorrowful, exceeding sorrowful and heavy, was not
going to the cross, not dying on the cross. I mean, he could
endure those physical sufferings. Many people had to at that time,
didn't they? I mean, as horrible as that was,
people suffered that. What was troubling his soul so
much was this, being made sinned. for his people before he went
to the cross. The thought of the holy son of
God being made sin was so horrible to him. He thought just thinking
about it might kill my body. He thought I just might die forever
and get to the cross just with the sorrow of thinking about
being made sin. And the scripture says that's
what happened. He was made sin. Now I know there are times in
scripture that the scripture talks in type and picture, but
this is not one of them. When Christ was made sin, that
happened in reality. When he was made sin, he was
made guilty of the sin of his people, even though he never
committed a sin. He still, he was made sin. He
was made guilty of the sin of his people, but he never, he
never committed any sin, but that sin became his. so that
he felt the guilt of it. He felt the shame of it. He said,
I'm not able to look up. I'm not able even to look up
into the face of my father because of the shame of the sin that
was put upon him. And he suffered the full penalty
of that sin because that's what he deserved. That's what a guilty
man deserves. When he was made sin, he was
made guilty of that sin. And he thought, this is just
gonna crush my soul. It's just gonna make my body
die. You know, the physical suffering
wasn't what caused him such anguish of soul. It was the Holy Son
of God being made sin. You see, if Christ died for sin
that was not his, if he paid a debt, that debt never was made
his debt, you know, the Lord would have died like a hero,
wouldn't he? It'd have been like a soldier defending his country
The soldier didn't die because he did something wrong. I mean,
the soldier's innocent, but he died, you know, protecting his
country. He didn't deserve to, but he, you know, you know what
I'm saying. Well, Christ our Savior did die a hero's death.
I mean, who's more of a hero to God's people than the Savior?
I mean, he's our hero because he took our sin away. He took
the sin of his people away from them and he died to satisfy it. He died to satisfy God's justice
against that sin. He was made sin so that his father
would be just in putting him to death. And that's the worst
suffering, his soul suffering. That's what he's talking about
here. Now, this is what scripture says that we need to pray for
the faith to believe it, because we can't comprehend it. I mean,
we just, we cannot comprehend Christ being made sin. Our p-brains
just can't comprehend such a thing. But the scriptures give us enough
information to know why Christ was made sin. See, this is the
issue. Why did the father make him sin? Here's the answer. Because that's
the only way sin could be put away in justice. The only way
in justice. See, the father couldn't put
an innocent man to death on the curse tree because that would
be unjust. It would be unholy. God can't
do that. The father had to put a guilty man to death on the
cross. and he made him guilty. He was
guilty of no sin. He did no sin of his own. He
knew no sin, but he was made guilty of the sin of his people
and the father killed him for it in justice to satisfy his
holy justice. That's the only way God can put
away sin. It has to be in reality. It has
to be the sacrifice of Christ that included all of his suffering,
his physical suffering, his soul suffering, All of that was necessary. His suffering under death, all
of that was necessary because it's the only way God's justice
could be satisfied. It's the only way God's elect
could be saved. It's the only way God's elect could be cleansed
from their sin. Now, if there was another way
to do this, I mean the savior says if there's another way,
if it's possible, there's another way. If there was another way,
other than the suffering and death of his son, other than
the father making his beloved son sin, if there was another
way, you can rest assured of this, the father would have done
it. The father loves the son. I mean, you know that from just
a cursory reading of scripture, the father loves the son. If
there was any other way to put away sin, other than making his
son sin, and the father plunging the sword of justice into the
very soul of his own son. If there was another way, the
father would have spared his son all that suffering and all
that humiliation. But there's not another way.
There's not another way because God's holy. God cannot ignore
sin. God cannot just say, well, the
debt's paid, the debt's paid. We'll just mark it paid. It's
not paid, but we'll just mark it paid and we won't demand that
it be paid anymore. Now that's fancy accounting that
won't pass an audit. It's not holy. It's not right.
It's not true. God can't do something that's
not holy and true and just. Justice can't be satisfied by
God ignoring sin. And the father just couldn't
pretend. that the sin dad of his people belonged to Christ. The father couldn't say, well,
I know you're innocent. I know the debt doesn't belong to you,
but I'm gonna demand it of you anyway. The father can't pretend
that. That wouldn't be just and that
wouldn't be holy either, would it? If Christ did not truly take
the sin of his people away from them and put it away, make it
to not exist by washing it away with his precious blood, If he
didn't take the sin of his people away from them, then it's still
on us. It's got to be somewhere. It's got to either be on us or
on our substitute one or the other. And if he didn't take
it away, put it away by his precious blood, then it's still on us. And a holy God will demand our
damnation because it's just. So the savior wasn't trying to
get out of being this, this suffering and dying for his people. This
is what he's showing us how willing he was to drink that awful cup
of God's wrath dry. He said, if there's another way,
but if there's not, I'll drink it. And there wasn't another
way. He showed how willing he was to drink the awful cup of
God's wrath dry because he's the only one capable of drinking.
You and I couldn't even take a sip of that cup. He drank it
dry. He's the only one who could,
and he did it because that's the only way he could save his
sinful people, those people that he loved. It's the only way they
could be saved is by his suffering and dying as their substitute.
Well, here's the second thing. Now, the only way God's people
could be saved is by the crucifixion, the death of Christ. And here's
the people that Christ saved, a sinful people, a sinful people. The disciples who were there
with the Lord, they fell asleep. And they're just like you and
me, aren't they? I mean, we're not being judgmental against
these brethren. They're just like us. Here they were, they're
alone with the Lord. The Lord told them, I'm exceeding
sorrowful unto death. I mean, he told, I'm afraid this
thing's gonna kill me. They were alone. with the Lord. They had the opportunity to listen
in as the Savior prayed to his Father as the sacrifice for his
people. They're on the very precipice
of the hour of hours. I love to movies and books and
things about World War II. Those fellows on that evening,
a D-Day, they call that the hour of hours. Those boys didn't do
much sleeping that night. Getting ready to think about
what they were facing. This is the hour of hours. The greatest
hour in human history. These men were getting ready
to see God's greatest glory revealed to His creation. God's greatest
glory is that He would sacrifice His Son to save a sinful people
from their God's going to sacrifice his son to make it right for
him to justify sinners. God's greatest glory is getting
ready to be displayed. They're getting ready to see
every attribute of God more clearly displayed and more clearly glorified
all at one time than ever before in human history. They're getting
ready to see the wisdom of God on display. You know, Job asked,
how can it be? How can he that's born of a woman
be clean? How's that possible? Well, God
found a ransom. In his wisdom, he found he provided
the ransom that enabled him to be just and justifier. Nobody
else could ever come up with an answer to that question. God
did, in his wisdom. These men are getting ready to
see the holy justice of God. If you ever questioned that God's
holy, all you gotta do is look to the cross to find out he's
holy. God punished even his own son when sin was found on him.
God's holy, he's just. These men are getting ready to
see the power of the savior. By his one sacrifice for sin,
in those hours of suffering, he eternally put away the sin
of his people. He's pleased his father by the
power of his blood. These men are getting ready to
see God's glory and mercy and grace to sinners. God's mercy
and grace to sinners, like I said a few minutes ago, it would be
something if God just said, you know what? I'm going to forget
about your sin. That would be marvelous to us, wouldn't it?
But it's even more glorious. It's even more awe-inspiring.
For God to say, I'm going to remain just and put your sin
away by the sacrifice of my own son. I'm going to cause him unimaginable
suffering and make him die as your substitute to put away your
sin to make it right for me to be merciful and gracious to you.
These men are getting ready to see that on display. Here it
is. We've seen it in picture and
type and promise. Now the time has come, the sacrifice
is to be made. God's glory is gonna be revealed
to creation like it never was before or since. This moment
is it. I mean, this is it. This moment
is the moment all of eternity hangs on. This moment is the
subject of the whole Bible. This moment. They're on the precipice
of this hour. And what are these three beloved, highly respected,
blessed apostles doing? sound asleep. Sound like anybody else you know?
Does me. It does me. You know the fact
that the father punished his son in the way that he did tells
me there's no way you and I could save ourselves. There's no way. Look at the weakness of these
men. There's no way that we could save ourselves. The father would
be a monster if he slaughtered his son to make his people righteous. He made him to be sin for us
that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. If there was another
way for you and me to be righteous other than God sacrificing his
son, making him sin, making him suffer all the effects of that
sin. If there was any other way, if we could earn a righteousness
by our good works, if we could earn a righteousness by our obedience,
If we could earn a righteousness by our morality, if we could
learn our righteousness, earn our righteousness by our, you
know, good doctrine or, you know, just fill in the blank, whatever
it is you want to say you could do to earn a righteousness, if
we could earn a righteousness that way, God would have been
a monster in killing his son. Surely we can't hold out any
hope that there's something we could do to earn our own righteousness,
is there? We can't even stay awake. We can't earn a righteousness. So the only way we could be saved
is by the sacrifice of Christ. Christ, our savior, saved sinners
who could never save themselves, who could even contribute to
their own salvation. They know this. The only way
I could be made righteous is if Christ was made sin for me.
The only way I could be righteous is if he obeyed the law for me
as my representative. The only way I could live, the
only way God could not put me to death is if he put my substitute
to death. The only way I could live is
if Christ died for me. The only way the Father could
show mercy to me is if Christ satisfied justice for me by suffering
what I deserve. Christ's people, the people he
saved, are completely dependent on him to save them. He's got
to do all the saving. and then after the Lord saves
us. We're still so weak, aren't we? We know the Lord, we trust
the Lord, but our faith is so weak. Even after the Lord gives
us eternal life, spiritual life, this flesh is so weak. That's what actually, the weakness
of our flesh is what makes our flesh such a powerful enemy. It can't fulfill the law, but
keeps trying to. Keeps wanting to bring you under
captivity to the law. This weak flesh is a powerful
enemy. It's what keeps us from being
able to hear the gospel and worship our Lord like we really want
to. You know, all of us would like to be able to hear hours
and hours and hours and hours of good preaching with me. I
mean, I just, boy, if you could just hear good preaching, glorifying
Christ, preaching Christ, We like to hear hours and hours
and hours and hours of it. But now you're high knee and
your lower back can't take it. I mean, you just can't take it. We got to do this thing in shorter
intervals because of the weakness of our flesh. We like to just
hear message after message after message after message all in
a row. But you know what? If we did,
we'd forget most of it because we can't digest that much at
one time. we're going to get sleepy, aren't
we? We're going to miss parts of it. We can't take that much
all at one time because of the weakness of this flesh. The weakness
of this flesh makes it we just can't digest that much gospel,
that much truth, and that much Christ all at one time. If we try, we just can't digest
it. We're not taking it into our
souls and digesting it and remembering it. That's the weakness of our
flesh. So Christ saved a people. There are people who are completely
dependent on Christ to do all the saving. And they're completely
dependent on Christ to do everything that it takes to keep them saved
too. Christ our Savior saved a sinful people. And the third thing, such an
amazing thing. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
willing sacrifice for his people. He prayed here, oh my father,
if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless, not
as I will, but as thou will. He's willing. He said again,
oh my father, if this cup may not pass away from me except
I drink it, thy will be done. I'll drink it. Then, verse 45,
after he prayed the third time saying the same words, then cometh
he to his disciples and saith unto them, sleep on now. Take
your rest. Behold, the hour is at hand and
the son of man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let
us be going. Behold, he is at hand that doth
betray me." Now notice the tenderness here that the Savior has for
the weakness of his disciples. He asked them to stay awake and
pray. Can you watch and pray with me?
My soul's exceeding sorrowful in death. Watch and pray with
me. Watch and pray that you fall not in temptation. And they couldn't
do it. Their flesh is so weak and they're
so tired. Their eyes were heavy. They couldn't
stay. I mean, I'm sure they wanted
to, and they just fell asleep. After they did that, he willingly
suffered for them anyway. Christ our Savior willingly suffered
to save a weak, sinful people. He willingly submitted his Father's
will. He said, Father, not as I will,
but as thy will be done. If this cup cannot pass from
me except I drink it, thy will be done. I'll drink it dry. I'll
tip it up and drink the very bottom dregs of it dry. I'll
take all of your fury, all of your wrath, all of your justice
against the sin of my people. I'll do it willingly. And isn't
that what he did? Nobody took the Savior to the
cross against his will. He went willingly to the cross
because the cross is his will. It's his will all along. He prophesied
2,000 years for it, or yeah, 2,000 years for it to happen,
this is what's gonna, and then he did it. It's his will. That's
the only way those sinful, weak men weak in the flesh could possibly
have crucified the Lord of Glory is if he went willingly. Here
the disciples are asleep. It's nighttime. They're in the
garden of Gethsemane. The Savior knew the mob was coming
to get him. How easy would it have been to
run and hide in the dark? There were times they tried to
lay hands on him. He just walked right through
their midst and they couldn't lay their hands on him. How easy
would it have been for him to hide in the dark? Just leave the disciples
there. You know, there'll be like the
distraction and I'll run and hide. It'd have been so easy
for him to do, but he didn't run and hide. Not only did he
not run and hide, he woke the disciples up. So let's go meet
him. I'm going to go meet him. This thing is his will being
done. He knew that mob was coming.
And at first, I think this is very interesting. At first, he
tells his disciples. He's not being sarcastic or something
here when he tells them to sleep on. It's like he's telling his
disciples, all right, the mob's coming. You sleep on now, because
you're going to need your rest. The mob's coming, but you sleep
on. I'll protect you. I'll watch
over you. I'll protect you in this thing
while you sleep. Yeah, you're weak. You're weak
and if the spirit's willing, the flesh is weak. I'll protect
you in your weakness. I'll handle all of this for you. You just sleep on. He said it
in such pity for their weakness. He said it in such pity for our
weakness, didn't he? Our weakness. Isn't this just
exactly the thing the shepherd would say? You sleep on, I'll
protect you. I'll take care of this for you.
And I tell you that, the willingness of the Savior. The fact that
he would die for a sinful, sinful people. The fact that the only
way they could be saved is his sacrifice, and yet he sacrificed
himself for them willingly, lovingly, cheerfully, because he had a
joy in seeing those people redeemed. I tell you, that ought to move
our hearts, to trust our bodies and souls both to the Savior,
shouldn't it? It should move us, just take our rest. Take our
rest in Christ. Rest from the law. Rest from
fear. Rest from condemnation. And rest
in Christ. He's watching over us. He's already
put away the sin of His people. He's already taken care of our
sin problem. He's watching over us. He never slumbers nor sleeps. When we sleep, He never slumbers
nor sleeps. He never falls asleep on the
job. He's always watching over His people. What a shepherd we
have. He saved us when we were dead
in sin. He saved us when we were yet
his enemies. And he keeps watching over us.
And he keeps us even when we become spiritually drowsy in
his very presence. I don't know about you. I mean,
I do know about you. I don't know if you realize this or not,
but I know this about myself. That's the Savior I need. And
I tell you, if that doesn't move our heart to worship Him and
commit our all to Him, it's because God hadn't given us a new heart.
If God's given you a new heart, that'll cause your soul to be
thrilled and trust Him. All right, I hope God will bless
that to you.