BACKGROUND:
This was the second time in the same evening that Jesus predicted the disciples’ denial and desertion, which probably explains their strong reaction . That the disciples would desert him means that they would take offense at him and turn away. Fearing what would befall Jesus, they would not want to experience the same treatment. Jesus would go to the cross totally alone.
The disciples’ desertion would also occur just as it had been predicted in Scripture, specifically Zechariah 13:7. In Zechariah, God commanded that the Shepherd be struck down. As a result, the sheep will be scattered. Without a shepherd and on their own, the sheep would go through a period of great trial and be refined. The refining process would strengthen them and create a new, faithful people for God. The disciples would be overwhelmed by what would happen to Jesus, but Jesus’ death would ultimately produce their salvation.
After his prediction of their desertion, Jesus then predicted their reunion after he would be raised from the dead. Jesus promised that he would go ahead of them into Galilee and meet them all there.
Peter, always ready to speak up at inopportune moments, declared that his allegiance to Jesus would prove to be much stronger than the others. Jesus explained, however, that instead of being the only loyal disciple, Peter would prove himself the least so. Not only would he desert Jesus, he would also deny him—not once, but three times. And this would happen in the space of the next few hours. Before the night was over, that is before the rooster crowed a second time, Peter would deny the Master to whom he claimed such loyalty. Only Mark recorded a second crowing of the rooster. If Peter was, in fact, Mark’s source for this Gospel, he certainly remembered this minor detail.
Apart from the Cross itself, the moments in Gethsemane were the most intense in Jesus’ life. He experienced the crushing weight of the task he was about to undertake. He witnessed the weakness that his disciples demonstrated by falling asleep. He saw the betrayer coming. And he sensed with anguish that the cup would not pass. He would drink it alone. The Cross did not catch Jesus by surprise. His self-sacrifice was deliberate, calculated, and undertaken with a great flow of human emotions that we can see in the garden.
After eating the meal, the disciples left Jerusalem and went out to Gethsemane. The garden was in the Kidron Valley just outside the eastern wall of Jerusalem and just below the Mount of Olives. Jesus told eight of the disciples to sit down while he went farther in to pray.
Plenty of drama surrounds Mark’s terse account. The elders of Jerusalem were plotting to kill Jesus and had already issued a warrant for his arrest. Jesus left Jerusalem under cover of darkness in order to pray. The disciples must also have been physically and emotionally exhausted from trying to comprehend what would transpire. Instead of watching, they gave in to their exhaustion and fell asleep.
Jesus went still farther into the garden to be alone with God. His agony was such that he threw himself on the ground before God in deep spiritual anguish, praying that if possible the awful hour awaiting him might pass him by—that his mission might be accomplished some other way. Hour figuratively refers to the entire event Jesus was facing. The “hour” and the “cup” were used synonymously. Yet Jesus humbly submitted to the Father’s will. Luke tells us that Jesus’ sweat resembled drops of blood. Jesus was in terrible agony, but he did not give up or give in. He went ahead with the mission for which he had come.
The words, everything is possible for you, indicate God’s omnipotence. He could accomplish anything. Jesus was affirming God’s sovereign control over the coming suffering. With the words, take this cup of suffering away from me, Jesus was referring to the agony, the separation from God, and the death he would have to endure in order to atone for the sins of the world. Jesus, as God’s Son, recoiled from sin, yet part of his task would be to take the sins of the whole world upon himself. This was a cup he truly hated to drink. The physical suffering would be horrible enough, but what God’s Son feared most was the cup of spiritual suffering—taking on sin and being separated from God. Yet Jesus reaffirmed his desire to do what God wanted by saying, “Yet I want your will, not mine.”
God did not take away the “cup,” for to judge the sins of the world was his will. Yet he did take away Jesus’ extreme fear and agitation. Jesus moved serenely through the next several hours, at peace with God, knowing that he was doing God’s will.
Jesus got up from his prayer to return to the three disciples. He had told them to stay and keep watch, but instead of showing support for Jesus by remaining awake with him and praying themselves for strength in the coming hours, they had fallen asleep. The hour was very late, perhaps after midnight.
Jesus went away to pray a third time, only to come back and find the disciples still asleep. The disciples had not taken the opportunity to pray, and there would be no more time to do so—the time had come. Thus Jesus did not again tell them to pray. Jesus had spent the last few hours dealing with the Father, wrestling with him, and humbly submitting to him. Now he was prepared to face his betrayer and the sinners who were coming to arrest him.
SO WHAT? (what will I do with what I have read today?)
There is one very important truth that we learn from Easter. If you understand this truth and put it into your life, your stress level will go down dramatically and your peace of mind will increase dramatically. Your worry and your frustration level will decrease dramatically and your ability to handle the problems and the difficulties in your life will increase dramatically, your ability to handle them.
What is that truth? Easter proves one vital thing. God is in control.
The Bible says this in Proverbs 16 “We may make our plans but God has the last word.” What happened in Jesus’ case was the religious leaders at that time said, “Let’s get rid of Jesus. He’s a big bother. We can silence Him by killing Him. It’s simple. We’ll get Him killed and that will be the end.” They didn’t realize that was fitting into God’s plan. Jesus Christ said, “I came to earth to die on the cross for the sins of people and then I’m going to raise back up three days later. So while they thought they had their little plans, really God was in control. He said, “It’s all fitting in exactly what I’ve planned to do.” It says “We may make our plans but God has the final word.”
You arrived at emotional maturity in your life at the moment you realized that most of your life is beyond your control. Have you figured that one out yet? Most of your life really is beyond your control. All of the major things of your life you had no control over at all. You didn’t choose when you were born. You didn’t choose where you were born. You didn’t chose who your parents would be. You didn’t chose how you were born. You didn’t chose your race. You didn’t choose the natural talents and abilities that God gave you. You had nothing to do with any of those things. They were beyond your control. And even today the major things in your life, you can control your reactions to things but you can’t control the events that happen to you.
For instance, you cannot change the past no matter how hard you try. You cannot predict the future, no matter how hard you try. You cannot make time slow down when you need 26 hours in a day instead of 24 because you have as much work to do. You could not raise your height by two inches, no matter how hard you try. You cannot force people to think and do what you want them to do. (Are any of you parents? You know this one’s true!) You cannot control the economy, which influences you. You cannot influence world events on the other side of the world, which do influence you. You cannot make people love you. And as some of you have learned painfully.
You cannot keep your parents or your loved ones from dying. Most of the things that really count in life are beyond your control. And because so much of your life you can’t manage, you cannot control, that causes STRESS. Stress is caused primarily by trying to control the uncontrollable, by trying to manage the unmanageable, by trying to make people do and see things my way, by trying to make things happen that I cannot control. And as any boss knows you can’t keep your employees doing all that you want them to do. And it causes stress. And when you’re stressed you start worrying. Worrying is a form of control. I think if I worry about my kids who are late at night, then maybe that gives me some control over it. It doesn’t.
While you cannot control so much of your life and the things that happen to you, you can control your response. On the other hand, God is in complete control. There’s nothing that God cannot control because He made it all. He is the absolute power. He can do anything He wants.
How does that help me? How is that a comfort to me that God is in control? How does that reduce my stress?
God says in the Bible that He wants to help you manage the things that are unmanageable in your life if you’ll trust Him, that He will help you control and deal with the issues that are out of your control, that He will give you His power – the same power that He demonstrated when He raised Himself from the dead 2000 years ago, He says He wants to help you with that same power. ”I’ll give you that power in your life to handle the things that you can’t seem to manage on your own.”
Ephesians says “God’s great power is available to help us who believe in Him. It is the same mighty power that raised Christ.” There’s a condition here. notice the phrase “available to help us”. It’s only available to those who believe. You’ve got to trust God. You’ve got to come to a point in your life and say, "I’ve been trying to make this relationship work. It’s not. I turn it over to You. … God, my finances are a mess, help me out with them.” Whatever you need God to help you with, you must trust Him with it. You must say, “I believe You’re going to help me. You’ve said You would.”
How do you know when you’re really trusting God to help you with a problem? How do you know when you’re really believing that He’s going to help? Simple. You stop worrying. Worry is a warning light. It’s like a bright red flashing light that says, “I’m trying to be God.” Every time I try to be God and try to figure everything out on my own, I start worrying and so do you.
On the other hand, when I start trusting God I stop having to try so hard. When I start praying, I stop panicking. When I start worshiping, I stop worrying. Those are the options. He says, “I want to help you but you’ve got to give it to Me.”
God says in the book of Isaiah, “Don’t worry because I am with you. Don’t be afraid. I will make you strong and I will help you and I will support you.” He’s got the power and He’s in control.
Let’s get personal: What’s out of control in your life? What is it that you say, “No matter how hard I try it’s not getting together? I want my career to go in this direction, but it’s not going that way. There are habits in my life that I want to break and I just can’t break them. There are good habits I want to develop, but I don’t seem to have the willpower to get it going.” What is it in your life that you’d like to change and you can’t? Even with my best efforts, it’s not working. Maybe it’s with your kids, your health, your finances. It could be in some other kind of relationship. What is it that you worry about the most? You say, “I’m trying to worry about this because I can’t make it work.”
Would you agree that God has resources that you don’t have? He says, “I’ll help you. I’ll be with you. I will strengthen you. I’ll give you the power… If you will trust Me.”
So whatever seems out of control, whatever seems unmanageable – your schedule, for instance – whatever seems to worry you the most, give it to God. While you may not be able to manage it, He can. God is in control.
What is that truth? Easter proves one vital thing. God is in control.
The Bible says this in Proverbs 16 “We may make our plans but God has the last word.” What happened in Jesus’ case was the religious leaders at that time said, “Let’s get rid of Jesus. He’s a big bother. We can silence Him by killing Him. It’s simple. We’ll get Him killed and that will be the end.” They didn’t realize that was fitting into God’s plan. Jesus Christ said, “I came to earth to die on the cross for the sins of people and then I’m going to raise back up three days later. So while they thought they had their little plans, really God was in control. He said, “It’s all fitting in exactly what I’ve planned to do.” It says “We may make our plans but God has the final word.”
You arrived at emotional maturity in your life at the moment you realized that most of your life is beyond your control. Have you figured that one out yet? Most of your life really is beyond your control. All of the major things of your life you had no control over at all. You didn’t choose when you were born. You didn’t choose where you were born. You didn’t chose who your parents would be. You didn’t chose how you were born. You didn’t chose your race. You didn’t choose the natural talents and abilities that God gave you. You had nothing to do with any of those things. They were beyond your control. And even today the major things in your life, you can control your reactions to things but you can’t control the events that happen to you.
For instance, you cannot change the past no matter how hard you try. You cannot predict the future, no matter how hard you try. You cannot make time slow down when you need 26 hours in a day instead of 24 because you have as much work to do. You could not raise your height by two inches, no matter how hard you try. You cannot force people to think and do what you want them to do. (Are any of you parents? You know this one’s true!) You cannot control the economy, which influences you. You cannot influence world events on the other side of the world, which do influence you. You cannot make people love you. And as some of you have learned painfully.
You cannot keep your parents or your loved ones from dying. Most of the things that really count in life are beyond your control. And because so much of your life you can’t manage, you cannot control, that causes STRESS. Stress is caused primarily by trying to control the uncontrollable, by trying to manage the unmanageable, by trying to make people do and see things my way, by trying to make things happen that I cannot control. And as any boss knows you can’t keep your employees doing all that you want them to do. And it causes stress. And when you’re stressed you start worrying. Worrying is a form of control. I think if I worry about my kids who are late at night, then maybe that gives me some control over it. It doesn’t.
While you cannot control so much of your life and the things that happen to you, you can control your response. On the other hand, God is in complete control. There’s nothing that God cannot control because He made it all. He is the absolute power. He can do anything He wants.
How does that help me? How is that a comfort to me that God is in control? How does that reduce my stress?
God says in the Bible that He wants to help you manage the things that are unmanageable in your life if you’ll trust Him, that He will help you control and deal with the issues that are out of your control, that He will give you His power – the same power that He demonstrated when He raised Himself from the dead 2000 years ago, He says He wants to help you with that same power. ”I’ll give you that power in your life to handle the things that you can’t seem to manage on your own.”
Ephesians says “God’s great power is available to help us who believe in Him. It is the same mighty power that raised Christ.” There’s a condition here. notice the phrase “available to help us”. It’s only available to those who believe. You’ve got to trust God. You’ve got to come to a point in your life and say, "I’ve been trying to make this relationship work. It’s not. I turn it over to You. … God, my finances are a mess, help me out with them.” Whatever you need God to help you with, you must trust Him with it. You must say, “I believe You’re going to help me. You’ve said You would.”
How do you know when you’re really trusting God to help you with a problem? How do you know when you’re really believing that He’s going to help? Simple. You stop worrying. Worry is a warning light. It’s like a bright red flashing light that says, “I’m trying to be God.” Every time I try to be God and try to figure everything out on my own, I start worrying and so do you.
On the other hand, when I start trusting God I stop having to try so hard. When I start praying, I stop panicking. When I start worshiping, I stop worrying. Those are the options. He says, “I want to help you but you’ve got to give it to Me.”
God says in the book of Isaiah, “Don’t worry because I am with you. Don’t be afraid. I will make you strong and I will help you and I will support you.” He’s got the power and He’s in control.
Let’s get personal: What’s out of control in your life? What is it that you say, “No matter how hard I try it’s not getting together? I want my career to go in this direction, but it’s not going that way. There are habits in my life that I want to break and I just can’t break them. There are good habits I want to develop, but I don’t seem to have the willpower to get it going.” What is it in your life that you’d like to change and you can’t? Even with my best efforts, it’s not working. Maybe it’s with your kids, your health, your finances. It could be in some other kind of relationship. What is it that you worry about the most? You say, “I’m trying to worry about this because I can’t make it work.”
Would you agree that God has resources that you don’t have? He says, “I’ll help you. I’ll be with you. I will strengthen you. I’ll give you the power… If you will trust Me.”
So whatever seems out of control, whatever seems unmanageable – your schedule, for instance – whatever seems to worry you the most, give it to God. While you may not be able to manage it, He can. God is in control.
I love you guys. Stay faithful. Stay the course.
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