We can never fully comprehend Christ’s agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, but at least we don’t have to misunderstand it. It is the agony of God and man in one Person, coming face to face with sin. We cannot learn about Gethsemane through personal experience. Gethsemane and Calvary represent something totally unique— they are the gateway into life for us.

It was not death on the cross that Jesus agonized over in Gethsemane. In fact, He stated very emphatically that He came with the purpose of dying. His concern here was that He might not get through this struggle as the Son of Man. He was confident of getting through it as the Son of God— Satan could not touch Him there. But Satan’s assault was that our Lord would come through for us on His own solely as the Son of Man. If Jesus had done that, He could not have been our Savior (see Hebrews 9:11-15). Read the record of His agony in Gethsemane in light of His earlier wilderness temptation— “. . . the devil . . . departed from Him until an opportune time” (Luke 4:13). In Gethsemane, Satan came back and was overthrown again. Satan’s final assault against our Lord as the Son of Man was in Gethsemane.

The agony in Gethsemane was the agony of the Son of God in fulfilling His destiny as the Savior of the world. The veil is pulled back here to reveal all that it cost Him to make it possible for us to become sons of God. His agony was the basis for the simplicity of our salvation. The Cross of Christ was a triumph for the Son of Man. It was not only a sign that our Lord had triumphed, but that He had triumphed to save the human race. Because of what the Son of Man went through, every human being has been provided with a way of access into the very presence of God.

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April 5, 2011

Journal Entry for Today

Lord, like many others, I suspect, I take my “spiritual temperature” based on my feelings. If I “feel” close to You then I am close to You. If I “feel” sanctified then I think that perhaps I am sanctified.  If I “feel” a warm glow and am emotionally drawn to call on you, with tears in my eyes and your name on my lips, I “feel” like I am connected. But as I think about my emotional swings, and my capacity to misinterpret and misunderstand, it occurs to me that I should not be so daring as to leave my sense of connection to my emotions or feelings.

And God says…”On the boat, the disciples cried out during the storm on the boat. Were they in any more or less peril as they cried out? When Peter denied Christ out of his fear, was Christ any less the Messiah? When Mary and Martha cried out to Jesus that their brother would have lived if Jesus had been there…..did their brother come alive anyway, in spite of their feelings? You trust your fickle, undependable and chaotic feelings to gauge my whereabouts in your life, over My word. How do you “feel” about my promise to never leave you or forsake you; or the promise that nothing can separate you from MY love? What part of my promise to meet all your needs is untrue or conditional on your goodness? “

“Be in the word, recall and write my promises on your heart, and find Me there, not in your feelings.”