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I remember a few years ago, a friend called me. Their spouse had been put in jail. They thought that they had taken care of some minor traffic incident, but they had not. The next time they got in contact with law enforcement, this was on the record and this person was arrested. When I got the call, they were distraught. It was totally unexpected. Now, their spouse was locked up in jail.
That’s scary. To be taken against your will and arrested is very hard. This is what Jesus experienced. We now turn in this sermon series to consider the suffering of our Savior on our behalf. We should remember two things here. First, how great his suffering was. Second, that it was all done out of love for the human race, to bring us back to God so that we could be freed from suffering and given eternal life.
In this passage, we will consider three things here: the prelude to the arrest, the arrest, and the loneliness of the arrest.
The Prelude to the Arrest
After the celebration of the Passover, the disciples and Jesus went to a place they had gone often. They went to the Mount of Olives to pray.
When Jesus arrived, He told His disciples to pray. He had a concern for them. He said, you should pray so that you may not fall into temptation. They were about to enter into a great trial, and they needed help to be delivered from this trial. When we have a great trial, it is an important time for us to begin to pray.
After that, Jesus went off to pray by Himself. There, we have a record of what He prayed. He said, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done” (Luke 22:42). Alfred Edersheim writes in his amazing work, The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah:
We are here in the full view of the deepest mystery of our faith: the two Natures in One Person. . . . Was there, then, any thought or view of a ‘a possibility,’ that Christ’s work could be accomplished without that hour and Cup? Or did it only mark the utmost limit of His endurance and submission? We dare not answer; we only reverently follow what is recorded (846).
Wonder seems to be the best response here. It is an astonishing moment. It is the deepest wrestling of Jesus with the great suffering that He will undergo.