My soul is exceeding sorrowful

Gethsemane means ‘place of olive presses’. Here, as Calvary loomed, the Lord Jesus felt extreme pressure, His soul being ‘exceeding sorrowful unto death’, v. 34. This pressure was so intense that ‘there appeared an angel unto him from heaven, strengthening him. And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground’, Luke 22. 43, 44. Knowing every detail of His imminent sufferings only enhanced the heaviness of the Saviour’s heart. But even at this difficult time His submission to the Father’s will was unblemished, ‘Abba, Father, all things are possible unto thee; take away this cup from me: nevertheless not what I will, but what thou wilt’, Mark 14. 36.

He endured without human companionship. While He took Peter, James, and John further than the other disciples, alone ‘he went forward a little’ to pray. Three times over He returned to find the disciples sleeping, vv. 37, 40, 41, and despite their earlier protestations. He knew they would all forsake Him and flee. In fact, when the critical moment arrived it was He who allowed their escape, John 18. 8.

No detail of what took place at Gethsemane was incidental. His abandonment by the disciples fulfilled the prophecy, ‘I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered’, Mark 14. 27; Zech. 13. 7. The Lord Jesus was withdrawn from the disciples ‘about a stone’s cast’, Luke 22. 41, the distance of a man condemned under the law of Moses. The betrayal by Judas had also been predicted, Mark 14. 21; Ps. 41. 9, and it took place at exactly the right time according to God’s foreordained timetable. It was just as Judas entered the Garden that Christ said, ‘The hour is come; behold, the Son of man is betrayed into the hands of sinners’, Mark 14. 41. By securing the safety of His disciples the Lord Jesus fulfilled His own saying ‘of them which thou gavest me have I lost none’, John 18. 9.

Christ displayed inimitable majesty. The great multitude that came to arrest Him, armed ‘with swords and staves’, Mark 14. 43, were utterly feeble before His powerful word, see John 18. 6.