Luke 22:39-45 - Homilies By W. Clarkson

Gethsemane.

As we enter "the place which is called Gethsemane, " we pass into the "holy place," the nearest of all to "the holy of holies"—that is, to Calvary itself. Thither our Lord went on this most memorable evening; and "his disciples followed him"—the eleven who remained faithful to him. But even of these only three were counted worthy to attend him into the secret place of prayer and struggle, and to witness his agony. Such sorrow as he was then to know seeks the secret place and chooses only the very closest and dearest friendship for its ministry. Then fell upon our Divine Lord a sorrow and a temptation; an agitation and agony of soul for which our language has no name, our heart no room, our life no experience. We ask—What was that intolerable and overwhelming anguish, which the Savior asked might pass from him, and which had so marvellous and so terribly significant an effect on his bodily nature ( Luke 22:42-44 )? Our completest answer leaves much to be said, much to be explained.

1 . We barely touch the outer line of the whole circle of truth when we speak of the apprehension of coming torture and death as events in the natural, physical sphere. It is an irreverent and wholly unworthy conception that what many men—many who have not even been good men—have faced without flinching, our Lord and Master shrank from with an overmastering dread.

2 . We come nearer to the center of the truth when we think that the whole shadow of the cross, with its spiritual darkness and desolation, then began to rest upon him … Something of that shadow had been darkening his path before ( Mark 10:38 ; Luke 12:50 ; John 12:27 ). And this shadow darkened and deepened as he drew near to the dread hour itself. At this point the cross immediately confronted him in all its awful severity, and he knew that this was the time when he must finally resolve to endure everything or to retrace his steps. This, then, was the critical hour; then was "the crisis of the world." Great and terrible was the temptation to decline the fearful future now at hand; it was a temptation he struggled against with a spiritual violence that showed itself in the drops of blood; it was a temptation he only overcame by tearful supplications to the Eternal Father for his prevailing succor ( Hebrews 5:7 ).

3 . But we miss our true mark if we do not include the thought that he was then bearing something of the burden of human sin. Whatever was intended by " bearing our sins in his own body," by " making his soul an offering for sin," and by expressions similar to these, we believe that Jesus Christ was then in the very act of fulfilling these predictions when he thus strove and suffered in the garden. As we look upon him there we see "the Lamb of God taking away the sin of the world." The scene may teach us very varied lessons and affect us in many ways; but it is certainly well fitted to be—

I. AN ATTRACTION TO SOULS STILL DISTANT FROM THE SAVIOUR . It says, "Behold how he loved you!"

II. AN INVITATION TO PRAYER FOR FAITHFULNESS IN THE HOUR OF TRIAL . Both before and after, the Master exhorted his disciples to pray that "they entered not into temptation'' ( Luke 22:40 , Luke 22:46 ). He himself triumphed through the strong efficacy of prayer ( Luke 22:41 ). Prayer, appropriate at all times, is urgently needed as we enter the shadow of temptation; but it is positively indispensable when the greater trials of our life assail us.

III. A SUMMONS TO STRENUOUS AND UNFALTERING PERSEVERANCE . Christian pilgrim, Christian workman, do you weary of your way or of your work? Does the one seem long and thorny, or the other tedious and unsuccessful? Do you think you must sleep as the disciples did, or that you must put down the cup as their Master did not? Do you talk about giving up the journey, about retiring from the field? Consider him who went quite through the work the Father game him to do, who strove and suffered to the very last; consider him, the agonizing but undaunted, the suffering but resolving Savior; consider him, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.

"Go, labor on, spend and be spent,

Thy joy to do the Father's will;

It is the way the Master went,

Should not the servant tread it still?"

C.

Luke 22:42 (latter part)

Self-surrender.

"Not my will, but thine, be done." These words are suggestive as well as expressive. They suggest to us—

I. THE ESSENTIAL NATURE OF SIN . Where shall we find the root of sin? Its manifold fruits we see around us in all forms of irreligion, of vice, of violence. But in what shall we find its root? In the preference of our own will to the will of God. If we trace human wrong-doing and wrong-being to its ultimate point, we arrived that conclusion. It is because men are not willing to be what God created them to be, not willing to do what he desires them to do; it is because they want to pursue those lines of thought and of action which he has forbidden, and to find their pleasure and their portion in things which he has disallowed,—that they err from the strait path and begin the course which ends in condemnation and in death. The essence of all sin is in this assertion of our will against the will of God. We fail to recognize the foundation truth that we are his; that by every sacred tie that can bind one being to another we are bound, and we belong to him from whom we came and in whom we live, and move, and have our being. We assume to be the masters of our own lives and fortunes, the directors of our own selves, of our own will; we say, "My will, not thine, be done." Thus are we radically wrong; and being radically wrong, the issues of our hearts are evil. From this fountain of error and of evil the streams of sin are flowing; to that we trace their origin.

II. THE HOUR AND ACT OF SPIRITUAL SURRENDER . When does the human spirit return to God, and by what act? That hour and that act, we reply, are not found at the time of any intellectual apprehension of the truth. A man may understand but little of Christian doctrine, and yet may be within the kingdom of heaven; or, on the other hand, he may know much, and yet remain outside that kingdom. Nor at the time of keen sensibility ; for it is possible to be moved to deep and to fervent feeling, and yet to withhold the heart and life from the Supreme. Nor at the time of association with the visible Church of Christ. It is the hour at which and the act by which the soul cordially surrenders itself to God. When, in recognition of the paramount claims of God the Divine Father, the gracious Savior of mankind, we yield ourselves to God, that for all the future he may lead and guide us, may employ us in his holy service; when we have it in our heart to say, "Henceforth thy will, not ours, be done;"—then do we return unto the Lord our God, and then does he count us among the number of his own.

III. THE HIGHEST ATTAINMENT OF CHRISTIAN ENDEAVOUR . When do we reach our highest point? Not when we have fought our fiercest battle, or have done our most fruitful work, or have gained our clearest and brightest vision of Divine truth; but when we have reached the point in which we can most cheerfully and most habitually say, after Christ our Lord, "Not my will, but thine, be done;" when under serious discouragement or even sad defeat, when after exhausting pain or before terrible suffering, when under heavy loss or in long-continued loneliness, or in prospect of early death, we are perfectly willing that God should do with us as his own wisdom and love direct.—C.