Mt_Dev_26:36-46

On the King's Errand

Devotional Reflections on Matthew's Gospel

The Man Who Did Not Fall in the Garden: Mt.26:36 – 46

^26:36 Then Jesus came with them to a place called Gethsemane, and said to his disciples, ‘Sit here while I go over there and pray.’ ³⁷ And he took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be grieved and distressed. ³⁸ Then he said to them, ‘My soul is deeply grieved, to the point of death; remain here and keep watch with me.’ ³⁹ And he went a little beyond them, and fell on his face and prayed, saying, ‘My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not as I will, but as you will.’ ⁴⁰ And he came to the disciples and found them sleeping, and said to Peter, ‘So, you men could not keep watch with me for one hour? ⁴¹ Keep watching and praying that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.’ ⁴² He went away again a second time and prayed, saying, ‘My Father, if this cannot pass away unless I drink it, Your will be done.’ ⁴³ Again he came and found them sleeping, for their eyes were heavy. ⁴⁴ And he left them again, and went away and prayed a third time, saying the same thing once more. ⁴⁵ Then he came to the disciples and said to them, ‘Are you still sleeping and resting? Behold, the hour is at hand and the Son of Man is being betrayed into the hands of sinners. ⁴⁶ Get up, let us be going; behold, the one who betrays me is at hand!’

What happened to Jesus in this garden?

Jesus knew that the disciples were going to betray and desert him, despite their boasts. He must have felt utterly alone. He was going to endure one of the most humiliating and painful forms of death humanity has ever invented. The most painful form of Roman punishment was probably being chopped up and fried in burning oil. But crucifixion took a close second.

However, many people have died painful deaths. It’s not just the circumstances of death that matter here. He was about to experience something inexplicable.

He was the one man, living in pure dependence on the Father, going to crucify the thing in us that should not be there. He refers to the spirit being willing, but the flesh being weak (Mt.26:41). That referred to his followers, yes. But it also referred to himself. And his flesh isn’t just weak; it is quite opposed to where Jesus is taking it. I suppose his humanity was squirming, writhing, trying to get away. But Jesus’ love for the Father and for us held him there. After all those long years of cleansing and purifying the humanity he had taken on, Jesus was going to pin his humanity to the cross and kill it there. He was going to finish pouring the full wrath of God onto his own humanity.

This truth might be a little hard to understand, so I’ll compare it to a story. In the Harry Potter story, we learn over the course of the seven books that Harry has a piece of the Dark Lord Voldemort’s soul in him. Voldemort had already tried to put his soul into objects because he wanted to be immortal. So when Voldemort cast a killing curse on Harry when Harry was a baby, the protection on Harry made the curse rebound on the Dark Lord. But a piece of his soul broke off and attached itself to Harry. So Harry needed to kill that piece of the Dark Lord’s soul. But the only way to do that, he learns, is to die. So in book seven, Harry goes out to meet the Dark Lord and be killed. He must kill that piece of the Dark Lord’s soul.

‘His job was to walk calmly into Death’s welcoming arms. Along the way, he was to dispose of Voldemort’s remaining links to life, so that when at last he flung himself across Voldemort’s path, and did not raise a wand to defend himself, the end would be clean, and the job that ought to have been done in Godric’s Hollow would be finished: Neither would live, neither could survive. He felt his heart pounding fiercely in his chest. How strange that in his dread of death, it pumped all the harder, valiantly keeping him alive. But it would have to stop, and soon. Its beats were numbered. How many would there be time for, as he rose and walked through the castle for the last time, out into the grounds and into the forest? Terror washed over him as he lay on the floor, with that funeral drum pounding inside him. Would it hurt to die? All those times he had thought that it was about to happen and escaped, he had never really thought of the thing itself: His will to live had always been so much stronger than his fear of death. Yet it did not occur to him now to try to escape, to outrun Voldemort. It was over, he knew it, and all that was left was the thing itself: dying.

‘Slowly, very slowly, he sat up, and as he did so he felt more alive and more aware of his own living body than ever before. Why had he never appreciated what a miracle he was, brain and nerve and bounding heart? It would all be gone…or at least, he would be gone from it. His breath came slow and deep, and his mouth and throat were completely dry, but so were his eyes…

‘He stood up. His heart was leaping against his ribs like a frantic bird. Perhaps it knew it had little time left, perhaps it was determined to fulfill a lifetime’s beats before the end. He did not look back as he closed the office door…

‘He could no longer control his own trembling. It was not, after all, so easy to die. Every second he breathed, the smell of the grass, the cool air on his face, was so precious: To think that people had years and years, time to waste, so much time it dragged, and he was clinging to each second. At the same time he thought that he would not be able to go on, and knew that he must.’ (selected from J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, p.691 – 698).

That’s a lot like Jesus’ going through the Garden of Gethsemane to his death on the cross. Jesus had to kill something in himself – the ‘old self’ or the ‘body of sin’ (Rom.6:6). This is the selfish thing infecting your very being, a foreign corruption from humanity’s fall, grown there by your choices. Jesus needed to kill that thing. Humanity fell in ideal conditions in the original garden. But Jesus endured the greatest temptation under extreme internal and external pressure, starting in another garden. The undoing of sin was at hand.

But in his most terrifying moment, Jesus wanted his followers around him. He did not go alone. He wanted to share his grief with them, so they might also share his strength. When we struggle with moving forward in God's call, remember Jesus' struggle, and his victory. He will give you strength.

The Kingdom Movement

A Literary & Pastoral Study Guide to the Gospel of Matthew

On the King's Errand

Devotional Reflections on Matthew's Gospel