A Place called Gethsemane

The account of the Garden of Gethsemane is something we might hear each year during Holy Week since it is one of the Passion of Christ passages. This Lenten season I’d like to revisit it anew. 

Christ here is troubled, distressed and sorrowful to the point of death. He asks the disciples to keep watch with him, translated, “stay awake.” Knowing that the crucifixion is ahead, Christ prays to God asking, “if it is possible, to let this cup pass.” This request is made three times with Christ returning to sleeping disciples each time.

The word used for "cup" in these passages goes back to accounts in the Old Testament where cups of God’s wrath, anger, and justice is spoken of. In Jeremiah 49 it talks about having to drink of something that’s not our fault, sometimes just the result of another’s sin, or just of life. It foreshadowed then the idea of the perfect Messiah who knew no sin being bruised for our iniquities and drinking a cup he didn’t deserve.

When I first studied this passage I was taken aback by the feelings of loneliness even abandonment when the disciples don’t stay awake for him. It got me to wonder about the emotions of the divine. We hear of God’s wrath and his jealousy but was it not in creation that God created humans in God’s image - emotions and all - to commune with God. One of the most wrenching verses of the Bible for me in the whole of Passion Week is when God, who cannot bear to see the sin placed upon him, turns away from Jesus. Due to this Christ cries out, “My God, my God why have you forsaken me.” 

So here in the garden you have Christ asking the men who have been closest to him to be with him and to stay awake with him as the dreaded hour arrives, but as a preview of coming attractions the disciples keep falling asleep. Luke’s account has the disciples “sleeping for sorrow.” So was it just merely physical fatigue their eyes were heavy with or was the heaviness coming from the emotion that Jesus was going to leave them, not just in the garden but forever?

We now know that it wasn’t forever. Christ rose from the dead – He lives! Resurrection is what we celebrate at Easter, but before that we need to go through, Good Friday which commemorates his death on the cross.

You see there are times when we all re-visit our own Garden of Gethsemane when we come to God in pain. When life hands us cups of sorrow, loss, and challenges - we find ourselves in some need, some situation, or some challenge we never thought would come our way.  It’s where we feel like we’d rather sweat literal drops of blood than to drink the cup we’ve been handed. We want it removed, and we want God to save us from it. Yet the only way to get the cup to pass, is to drink it. Sometimes God sends angels in the form of friends and family who sit beside and minister to us in our pain. The harsh reality, however, is that only we alone can drink that cup of pain. 

It is in these times that we re-visit the Garden of Gethsemane feeling distressed and deeply troubled with our souls sometimes sorrowful to the point of death. We may fall flat on our face or to the ground or kneel to beg, negotiate, or try to cajole God to remove the cup of pain. No matter what our approach, Christ who drank the cup before us is with us in our pain and loneliness, since Christ has been there.

In the book, Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert is trying to explain to her Italian friend what the idiom, “I’ve been there” means when used to comfort someone. Her friend was confused – asking, “Is sorrow a place?”

I could tell that Italian friend that it is truly a place. A place called Gethsemane. A place we may have to revisit off and on in our lives, but never alone. Christ will keep watch with us and give us the strength to drink whatever cup may come our way.