Sermon Cloud

Luke 22:39-46 – “Agony and Abandonment”

Rev. Darin M. Stone

Harbor Presbyterian Church, Carlsbad

Sunday, March 1, 2009

I want to invite you to take your Bibles in hand and turn with me to Luke 22.  We’re specifically going to explore verses 39-46 together this morning, but if you have a Bible, you might want to keep it open because we’re going to make some illusions to verses 24-35 as well. 

If you’re from what we would call a higher church background; something like Lutheran, or Episcopalian, or Roman Catholic – maybe even some Presbyterian churches – you might be familiar with a day in the church calendar known as Maundy Thursday.  The California Evangelical church culture is tends not to focus much on this particular day, but Maundy Thursday is the day before Good Friday and it commemorates the event that we saw last week, where Jesus instituted what we now call “The Lord’s Supper.”  Maundy Thursday is a dark day.  It’s a solemn day.  It’s not yet Easter Sunday.  If you were at a church service on this day, you wouldn’t sing cheerful, jovial music.  You would be singing songs in a minor key; songs that were much more somber.  It’s a day in holy where we see Jesus with his disciples at the Passover meal breaking bread and drinking wine, and Jesus is saying things like, “This is my body which is broken for you...and this is my cup that is poured out for you.”  And he’s pointing to the fact that he is the perfect, spotless, Passover lamb that was about to be given and poured out for the sake of his people; that his people’s redemption was about to take place, but it was going to come at the cost of his own life. 

This is where we find ourselves in the passage.  It’s late on Thursday night, after the Passover meal, just before Jesus is about to be betrayed and arrested.  So let’s turn our attention to this passage now in Luke 22:39-46.

39 And he came out and went, as was his custom, to the Mount of Olives, and the disciples followed him. 40 And when he came to the place, he said to them, “Pray that you may not enter into temptation.” 41 And he withdrew from them about a stone's throw, and knelt down and prayed, 42 saying, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” 43 And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him. 44 And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground. 45 And when he rose from prayer, he came to the disciples and found them sleeping for sorrow, 46 and he said to them, “Why are you sleeping? Rise and pray that you may not enter into temptation.”

One of the things I’ve discovered as a pastor is that there are two topics that can make people feel extremely uncomfortable and guilty.  One topic is evangelism and the other topic is prayer.  Start talking about those things and people start to squirm.  I don’t know anybody who is satisfied with their prayer life.  And yet when you look at Jesus’ life, you discover that prayer was just part and parcel of who he was.  Prayer was his mother tongue.  At every crisis of his ministry, he was in prayer.  He prayed before he chose the twelve disciples.  After he fed the five-thousand he went up the mountain to pray alone.  He taught the disciples how to pray.  In John 17, we see what we know as “The High Priestly Prayer,” where Jesus prays for us, that we would live in unity and that our lives would bear witness to him.  And even when he was on the cross, dying for our sins, he prays to his Father saying, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

And you know, the more I have explored this, the more it seems to me that the best way you can really catch a glimpse of Jesus’ raw humanity is to zero in on his prayers.  That’s where we see the things that are closest to his heart.  They show that he was a real person, with real emotions and desires. 

That’s certainly true with the prayer we see in this passage, but there’s something about what Jesus is praying here that’s a bit unsettling, don’t you think?  This isn’t the way we’re used to seeing Jesus.  We know about Jesus going to the cross.  We know about him dying, and about the horrific experience that was, but if he really is God, why would he agonize over it to such a degree that he either literally or figuratively sweats drops of blood?  If Jesus was in fact God in the flesh; and if he knew the final outcome, then how do you reconcile that with the fact that Jesus seems to be literally falling apart here?  There’s something about it seems to be beneath his dignity.

But what I think is important for us to remember is that one of the great pointers to Jesus’ sufficiency to save his people from our guilt is the fact that our guilt had to become his.  And it was agonizing because there’s nothing more disturbing than a guilty conscience; like when you do something that not only causes discomfort to someone and brings you negative consequences, but when you realize that what you did was wrong.  All of our attempts to deny, excuse, redefine, run from, ignore, deny, lie about, cover up, justify, blame, drown, or pay for things that we do that are wrong just deceive us into thinking that our sin is being dealt with.  But those things never actually deal with the guilt.

A few weeks ago I was headed out to meet my cousin and her fiancé at Chili’s over in Encinitas for dinner.  I was running a little bit late (I know...shocking!) so I was trying to hoof it down there.  So I’m getting ready to turn left from Olivenhein onto El Camino Real and the light turns yellow.  So I punch it.  And just as I’m about to get into the intersection, the light turns red.  Well, the problem with that intersection is that it has one of those red light cameras.  So I run the red light and it’s like the Paparazzi were out there taking pictures of me.  It was like flash photography everywhere.  So sure enough, a couple of weeks later, I get a letter in the mail and there’s a picture of my face looking like this, running the red light.  And I start thinking how I can weasel my way out of it, but there’s just no way.  And even if I could, that doesn’t change the fact that I’m guilty. 

But you see, what Jesus does for us in the gospel is that he takes my face on the ticket and he glues a picture of his face over it.  We’re caught totally red handed and there is a price that we’re liable for.  And the price is enduring God’s justice, his unmitigated wrath, and the pains of death, and the punishments of hell.  But in the gospel, Jesus absorbs that penalty for his people.  It’s what’s so totally counterintuitive.  You won’t find that in any religion or philosophy or worldview anywhere.

And folks, that’s why Jesus is in such agony here.  He knows what he’s about to face.  Jesus isn’t agonizing primarily over the pain of physical death.  That isn’t the primary reason why he’s in such anguish.  He’s agonizing because he knows that the hour has come for him to have the guilt of all his people throughout the history of the world concentrated in him.  And that’s why Jesus is praying that if there is any possible way, that his Father would, “remove this cup.”  Paul touched on this last week, so I don’t need to rehash it, but the “cup” is the image of God’s wrath.  The Psalms, and Isaiah, and Jeremiah, and some of the other prophets speak of this.  It’s a picture of the justice that a just and merciful God pours out upon rebellion and indifference toward him. 

Now I recognize that a lot of people have a problem with this.  A lot of people don’t like the whole idea that God would actually challenge people’s lifestyles and most deep-seated beliefs to such a degree that he condemns people for it.  It’s another sermon for another day to plumb the depths of that objection, but all I would simply say in response is that part of what makes God good is that he doesn’t allow injustice to go unpunished.  I mean, even the most relativistic among us know that there are certain behaviors (which are born out of the ways that we define ourselves and make sense of our lives and the world we live in) that should not be tolerated.  And it’s not simply because they rub against our personal preferences, but because they are wrong. 

I don’t think any of us is particularly excited in living in a society where police cars scrap the “to protect and serve” motto and replace it with “tolerance.”  And I have no interest in wasting my time on a god, or cosmic force, or whatever you want to call it, that’s so limp wristed that it has no intention of dealing with things that are certifiably wrong, all in the name of “tolerance.”  Part of what makes Christianity so appealing is that all of the injustice we see on the news and experience in our lives will actually be dealt with by God.  The reason why we have a problem with God’s justice is because we don’t want him to deal with us as we deserve.

So before we start looking at all the bad guys out there and how God’s going to get them someday, we have to take inventory of our own rebellious and apathetic hearts toward God and allow him to scrutinize us through the grid of his perfection.  It’s not just the murderer and the thief that deserves God’s justice.  It’s the person who gossips sometimes, who snaps at their kids and their spouse.  It’s the person whose a snob and looks down on other people for not meeting your standards.  It’s those kinds of socially acceptable things that God holds us accountable for.  And it deserves his white hot justice.

Now that’s a totally hopeless situation.  But see, what makes the gospel so riveting is that the Father metes out his justice against his people not on them, but upon his Son.  Everybody that looks to Jesus has the confidence that God has not simply swept our sins under the rug but that he’s actually executed his justice upon us by executing upon the one who represents us to the Father.  And lest you think that that is just a form of “divine child abuse,” you have to remember this minor detail; that Jesus is God!  He says, “I and the Father are one.”  So God’s justice is not like a parent forgiving the disobedience of somebody else’s kid by going out and spanking his own child.  This is the God who both determines the punishment takes it upon himself.  He is the One who passes judgment receives it. 

You know, I can’t tell you what a privilege it is for me to be a pastor in this church.  I sometimes can’t believe that they actually pay me to do this!  I’ve had the honor of being able to be in your homes, or have you over to ours, or sit across the table with you at lunch and to hear about your joys and your sorrows, and to pray with and for you with regard to those things.  And I know that for many of you, these are painful days.  Some of you feel like things are so bad in your life that all of your efforts to the contrary are like polishing the brass on the Titanic. 

But I want to tell you, Christian, that it is a precious and beautiful thing that Jesus experienced this agony for you.  Because the sufferings he endured on the cross for your own rebellion, your own sin, for the ways you have suffered at the hands of other people, is what enables you to lay hold of the promise that we have in Revelation 21; that one day “he will wipe away every tear from your eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall their be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore,” because the work of Jesus will cause all those things to pass away.

And you say, “Well that’s nice, but a lot of good that does me now.”  Listen.  You’re right.  You may live to be as old as dust and things might just get progressively worse for you.  I don’t know.  And I cannot even scratch the surface of all the complexities that you’re going through.  But what I do know is that when you start reading the ways in which you have offended God, and caused pain to others, and bought sorrow upon your own soul – when you start reading those things through what Jesus has accomplished for you and the blessings he has applied to you in the gospel – you’ll start living with a much greater sense of freedom. 

Does that make sense?  You’ll be a lot more secure and content.  You’ll stop seeing yourself as an innocent victim of unfortunate circumstances, or a bad upbringing, or whatever else, and you’ll start being thankful.  You’ll stop nit-picking at your spouse and kids and you’ll start appreciating them and actually really loving them.  You’ll be seeking ways to live at peace with them because as Paul says, Jesus has “broken down the dividing wall of hostility and established peace.”  You’ll stop with the “woe is me” thing and you’ll start looking at painful circumstances in the eye and say, “God, don’t let me waste this.  Take my pain and suffering and start making me much less at home with my circumstances and much more at home with you.  Make yourself, and what you have done for me, and your own brilliance the source of my joy.” 

And folks, I want to encourage you not to pass over that as pie-in-the-sky nonsense that the preacher is just supposed to say, but it’s not actually realistic.  Start taking time every day to soak in the reality that Christ bore an agony that you deserved and has provided a peace for you that only he could supply.  And see if how you view how you have sinned and been sinned against doesn’t start to change.

Luke wants us to see Jesus’ agony here.  But here’s another thing I think he wants us to see as well.  He wants us to see that the agony Jesus suffered for the sake of his people was suffered alone.  You know, there’s this incredible doctrine in Christian theology known as perichoresis or circumincessio.  It’s the reality that before the creation of the world – throughout eternity past – the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, were in face-to-face, knowing and being known, relationship with one another, without any of the hindrances of sin and brokenness.  It’s a reflection of the oneness that exists between the Father and the Son that we see in places like John 14 and 17.  God didn’t need to create people in order to get his relational fix.  He was perfectly happy from a relational point of view before he ever created people.  But the fact that it is part of God’s very nature to be in relationship is the basis upon which we speak of a personal relationship with God and why we so highly emphasize living our lives in community with one another.  It’s one of the ways we reflect the image of God in us.  Islam doesn’t have in mind the idea of a personal relationship with God.  Modern Judaism doesn’t really either.  It is uniquely Christian because we understand that one of the characteristics of God is that he is fundamentally relational.

And we see this in the humanity of Jesus; that Jesus, in his human nature, needed his closest friends with him in his hour of despair.  From the other gospel accounts, we know that it was Peter, James, and John that were with him.  These guys were Jesus’ inner circle of friends.  They were actually the most faithful of Jesus’ disciples.  And Jesus has them come with him to this garden in Gethsemane to be with him while he prays.  Jesus actually instructs them to pray for themselves, that they would not enter temptation, but instead of doing that they end up falling asleep.  Have you ever done that?  Have you said in some of your more sanctimonious moments, “I think I’m going to lie down a minute and pray,” and then ten minutes later, you’re comatose?  I’ve done that a good number of times.

I think there’s a sense in which we can understand why Peter, James, and John were conked out here.  This was a tough week for them.  It was emotionally draining.  It was late at night too and they were probably just exhausted.  They fall asleep and Jesus is alone in his darkest hour.

You know, its one thing to suffer.  It’s another to suffer alone.  I don’t know if it’s the whole misery loves company thing, but those of us who are being washed down the river in this economic crisis have at least one token of comfort, and it’s that everyone else’s going through it too.  But if you’re going through some type of suffering and you’re either sworn to secrecy about it or can’t find anyone who can identify with you, you know how doubly painful that kind of suffering is.

But Jesus suffers alone.  No one helps him.  No one helps bear his burden.  But here’s the thing.  No one can.  He was the only one who could bear the curse for sin.  He was the only who could meet the demands of the law reconcile us to the Father.  That’s why we’ll sing in our closing hymn that “he who washed us with his blood has secured our way to God.”  Because only he could do it.  This is just a foretaste of the isolation and abandonment he will face on the cross.

This whole scene is such a colorful reminder of our own inability.  Because, you have to realize that these guys were actually the most faithful of Jesus’ disciples.  If anyone had anything within themselves that could recommend them to God, it would have been Peter, James, and John.  They all lived faithful lives, and in fact it was Peter’s confession that Jesus is the messiah and that he is God in the flesh that the whole church is built upon.  And yet even they fail Jesus. 

And we see in the other gospel accounts of this story is that Jesus says, “the spirit is willing (referring to our own desires; even the desire of God’s people to worship God), but the flesh is weak.”  In other words, our human limitations that aren’t even necessarily sinful show forth our disengaged worship.  The disciples fall asleep because they’re wiped out!  They’re exhausted.  There’s nothing wrong with being tired.  But it does show you your constant need to be resting upon Christ alone and not your own physical, emotional, intellectual, spiritual energies to allow you to stand confidently before God.  Because what he requires of you, you can’t do.  Only Jesus can and has done it, which is why we need to stop looking within ourselves and begin to rest in Jesus’ work for us.

But another reminder that Jesus spells out for us here is that each one of us undergoes a constant barrage of temptation.  And we are wise to have our knees on the ground and our hearts and mind fixated on Christ if we are to stand against it.  (John Owen quote)  That’s why he wants the disciples to pray, so that they will not enter temptation.  Now what kind of temptation is Jesus talking about here?

It seems like it’s the temptation to build an identity apart from Christ.  Because sandwiched between the passage we looked at last week and this one, we see that the disciples are bickering amongst themselves as to which one of them was the greatest!  Then we see Peter saying, “Oh yes Jesus.  I’ll go to prison and I’ll even die for you.”  And then less than 24 hours later, he denies even knowing Jesus!  Why does he do that?  Because of fear.  Because he worried that if he identified himself with Jesus then he might be going off to the cross too. 

When I was growing up, we used to have barbecues a lot during the summer time.  So one night, my dad is out there and he’s grilling away.  Well, he goes inside to grab something real fast and so I stay with the burgers.  And I start flipping.  And the more I start flipping, the more grease goes down in to the barbecue.  I mean flames are shooting up and smoke is billowing out of the back yard.  And before long, we just about had a nuclear meltdown back there.  So when he comes back outside, I’m standing there and I said, “Dad, I think I might need a little help here.”  And by the time it’s all said and done and we get the burgers off the grill, and by that time, we probably smelled like we had been cleaning the chimney.  It’s kind of like, “Here are the burgers mom!  I hope you like ‘em well done!”

But isn’t that just so characteristic of the way we live our lives?  We start living our lives as if God has run inside and is checked out of the whole scene, so we begin to define ourselves apart from him.  And we start living life according to our own wisdom and out of our own resources.  We start doing as we please, flipping the burgers because it’s pleasurable with little or no consideration of how our Father would have us do it.  And as a result, our lives become indistinguishable from the world.  We sacrifice for others as little as the world, and accept injustice as readily as the world, and we covet things as greedily as the world, and our affections are aroused by items of triviality as enthusiastically as the world, and the next thing we know, we have a self-inflicted inferno going on in our lives and only then do we call out to God for help.

See, if the people in Jesus’ inner circle, who were with him all the time, could give into the temptation to let themselves, or their fears, or their personal comfort, or their reputations become the source of their self-definition, what’s to make you think that those same temptations not creep into our own lives as well? 

That’s why Jesus calls the disciples to pray.  Because Jesus knew, in a very personal way, that the disciples’ temptation to abandon him was going to be profoundly strong.  You know, there’s a connection between cultivating intimacy with God and prayer.  Look, there’s a difference between a person who has sucked middle-upper class, suburban, family values out of the straw, and a person who is characterized by Christ-like holiness.  And I would suggest to you that there’s a connection between holiness and prayer, at least when we’re praying for something more substantive than simply having a pleasant, trouble-free day.

But why don’t we pray?  The reason why we don’t pray is because of unbelief.  Because if we really believed that God attends to our prayers and has the power to answer them – if we really believed Jesus when he said “ask and you shall receive” – then we would pray more fervently, more confidently, more often, with more expectation.  And I would simply point out that there is a direct correlation between prayerlessness and self-reliance.  When Jesus instructs the disciples to pray so that they would not enter into and succumb to temptation what he was saying was that it is God, working through the means of your prayer, that you need to be petitioning and setting your gaze upon.  

Folks, it would be easy for me to guilt you into having a more vibrant prayer life.  And perhaps that’s just exactly what I did!  But let me just point out the final thing that I think Luke wants us to see here, which I think speaks volumes to us about the disposition we should have not only with regard to prayer, but with regard to every sphere of our lives.  The final thing that I think Luke wants us to see here is that Jesus embraced his agony and abandonment willingly. 

Notice that Jesus says, “God please remove this cup.  Please find some other way to appease your justice instead of pouring it out on me!  But whatever happens, may it be your will that’s done.” 

Hopefully that reminds you of the Lord’s Prayer, right?  The prayer that Jesus taught his disciples to pray, “Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”  That’s one of the great things about Jesus; that he doesn’t ask us to do things that he doesn’t do himself.  He’s saying, “There a part of me that wants this cup to be removed.  But ultimately, I desire to do whatever you will.”  Listen to me.  Part of him would have given anything not to have had to travel down that road to the cross.  But what makes the gospel so precious is that when Jesus said, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me,” the Father said “No!”  Jesus gets a “no” from his Father so that we could get a “yes” from him.  Isn’t that amazing? 

And yet we see Jesus here praying the hardest prayer a person could every pray – “Thy will be done” – in the midst of the most excruciating circumstance anyone has ever faced.  Because what this is for Jesus is a test.  Jesus is being tested here.  He’s in a garden. 

Do you remember another time in the Bible where we saw a test in a garden?  It happens in the Garden of Eden and it’s Adam who is tested.  Adam knew God’s will.  He knew that if he disobeyed God’s will that he would suffer and die and yet he did it anyway.  And because Adam represents us, we’ve been paying for it ever since.  But now we see Jesus in the garden and he’s being tested.  And instead of calling his Father’s will into question – instead of calling his Father’s goodness into question – his will and the Father’s will become indistinguishable.  In the Garden of Eden it is the guilty party offending the innocent one.  In the Garden of Gethsemane, it’s the innocent party preparing to suffer God’s righteous indignation for the sake of the guilty.  

One last thing and I’ll be done.  I might have been the single worst Hebrew student ever to graduate from Reformed Theological Seminary.  To me, Hebrew looked like a chicken stepped in some mud and ran across a piece of paper.  But I remember learning something in Hebrew that was absolutely riveting for me.  We were reading Exodus 34 and in verse six Moses writes that “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty...”  And what we discovered was that the text doesn’t literally say “slow to anger.”  What it says in the Hebrew is that God is “long in the nostrils” and it’s translated “slow to anger” because no English speaker would know what “long in then nostrils” means.  But Hebrew readers would have known that “long in the nostrils” means that God is slow to anger.  He is patient, and loving, and compassionate.

Have you ever had anyone flare their nostrils at you, giving you that disgusted, hateful look like you’re a stench to them?  Any counselor or therapist will tell you that if one spouse conveys that body language to the other, then the marriage is almost certainly over.  It’s the face that one person makes when he or she has been wildly offended and believes that the real or perceived offending party deserves an intense retribution.

Folks, the promise that you have in Jesus is that your Heavenly Father is long in the nostrils – that he is “slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness” toward you.  But he will by no means clear the guilty.  He punishes the guilty by flaring his nostrils at his Son.  His anger – which is not an erratic temper tantrum, but a just and measured rejoinder to a people who have thumbed their nose at God – doesn’t get directed toward us.  It’s directed toward his Son.  And Jesus drank the cup and embraced the Father’s wrath so that he could embrace us! 

That is your only hope in life and in death.  And as Jesus’ work for you in the gospel becomes the source of your self-definition, what a profoundly confident life you can lead!  What freedom to pray, “Thy will be done,” and know that God is orchestrating all things for your good!  Do you believe that?  If not, that’s an invitation.  Let’s pray.