Matthew 26, Mark 14

Can you imagine Jesus on the night he was betrayed?  He was God, but he was also fully human…a human who knew the precise details of his upcoming torture and death.  Dying on the cross was brutal.  I can’t imagine the dread that must have snaked its way through his gut as the hour of his betrayal grew closer and closer.

There are things that we also must face that we don’t want to.  Every ounce of our humanity may scream out NO when we hear the Lord whisper where he wants us to go.  Yet Jesus’ response in the face of such wretched grief is one that we can follow.

First, he kept his friends nearby as he prayed.  Then, he prayed some more, and then a little more.  Finally, he accepted the Lord’s will.

I don’t think it was easy for him just because he was also God.  Otherwise he would not have been in such agony as recorded here in Mark:

³⁵ Going a little farther, he fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him.³⁶ “Abba,^[f] Father,” he said, “everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.”

Yet not what I will, but what you will.

What a difference my life would be if I truly took that verse to be my anthem and my song!