As we continue our series of message on The Power of Prayer, this week we come to the third in the series –
The Most Difficult Prayer. Next week will be our final message in
the series on prayer, but I am attaching a fifth message that speaks to one of
the most common prayers we offer, and that is the prayer asking for healing,
either for ourselves or on behalf of someone else. Very early in my tenure here I offered a message titled The Power of Healing, and I will reprise
that message two weeks from today.
Though it is not specifically about prayer, it offers what I hope is
some helpful information about the way that God works in the process of
healing. As we pray so often for
healing, often enlisting many others to join us in prayer, we are often left
with questions about the way in which God answers those prayers. I will add that the message is not at
all based on science or medicine, but upon my experiences and observations from
three-plus decades of pastoral ministry.
Think for a moment of the most difficult situation you have faced in
life. What are the feelings that
come to mind? Perhaps you
experienced a sense of dread so deep that you felt it in the pit of your
stomach. Perhaps you found
yourself walking very slowly towards a difficult appointment, your steps slowed
the closer you came to your destination, and the weight of the situation was
felt on your shoulders and evident in your demeanor.
We do not have to travel far down the road of life before we come to
a point of great distress because of a challenge we face. Sometimes it’s a challenge that becomes
a defining moment in our life. How
we face that challenge will shape and mold the remainder of our life, and we
understand the great significance of the moment, a moment that can affect our
life direction for many years to come.
Keep that moment in mind as we read our Scripture text for this
morning, which is a well-known passage, usually associated with Holy Week, but
contains one of the most important prayers ever offered. It is interesting the way that the
ministry of Jesus is bookended by the choice of following God’s will. In Matthew chapter 4 we read of the
temptations of Jesus, when he went into the wilderness after his baptism and
faced three temptations, all of which shared the commonality of seeking to draw
him away from the will of God. At
the end of his ministry, in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus again faced the
same choice – his will or God’s.
Matthew 26:36-42 –
36 Then Jesus went with his disciples to a
place called Gethsemane, and he said to them, “Sit here while I go over there
and pray.”
37 He took Peter and the two sons of
Zebedee along with him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled.
38 Then he said to them, “My soul is overwhelmed
with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.”
39 Going a little farther, he fell with his
face to the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be
taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.”
40 Then he returned to his disciples and
found them sleeping. “Couldn’t you men keep watch with me for one hour?” he
asked Peter.
41 “Watch and pray so that you will not
fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
42 He went away a second time and prayed,
“My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink
it, may your will be done.”
I have organized this morning’s message under three words – fear, mystery, and assurance.
1. Fear.
Courage,
it has been said, is not the absence of
fear, but the ability to overcome it.
I think that is partially true, but I would rephrase it to say that it
is the triumph of conviction. Conviction is a true source of courage,
and it was conviction that empowered Jesus through this moment in the Garden
and conviction that empowered him to greet head on those who came to arrest
him. It was conviction that
empowered Jesus to endure the trials before Herod and Pilate, it was conviction
that empowered Jesus to endure the crown of thorns, to endure the scourging, to
endure the mocking and humiliation, and to endure the suffering of the
cross. It was a conviction that
the will of God was the right way, the just way, the only way, in spite of the
difficulty and in spite of the suffering it would bring.
Everyone has their Gethsemane moment – it is a moment of temptation,
of trial, of doubt, of challenge, and of the question – whose will to be done? It is not easy to say not my will, but yours be done. It is not easy to move beyond what we
think best for our lives and to accept what God knows is best for our lives,
but it is the best path forward.
I think the reason we don’t always pray the way Jesus prayed is
because we pray the kind of prayers that a friend of mine describes as being outcome specific. When you pray
for God’s will, it isn’t outcome specific. You have to put your faith in
God that the outcome God chooses is the best outcome (because it’s God’s
outcome) even if it isn’t necessarily what you wanted or envisioned.
Doing that requires giving up control and your will over to God and having
faith that God will direct the outcome, whatever that outcome might be (I very
much appreciate Jeff Shimizu sharing this with me). And giving up control is very difficult, isn’t it?
The reason we struggle with control is because of fear. Control, and all its attendant aspects
– such as the desire to control our surroundings or to control others – comes
from fear. To turn our destiny
over to God touches on our fear, and then triggers our desire to maintain
control, which compels us to offer prayers that are an extension of our desire
to control, as we tell God the outcome we would like to have. But praying for the will of God is not outcome specific beyond the willingness
to say to God that we will follow whatever his will happens to be.
2. Mystery.
After Mother Teresa passed away it was
discovered, through her diaries, that she harbored some doubts about
faith. The late Christopher
Hitchens – the well-known atheist – attacked her for this. Hitchens claimed Mother Teresa was a
fraud because of her doubts and criticized her in a most unpleasant manner. Besides asking the question of who in the world could accuse Mother Teresa
of being a fraud and who could attack
one who gave of herself with such love and selflessness, we would also ask what is wrong with doubt?
There is no shame in doubt.
It is a sign of a healthy faith, not a weak faith. If you have ever found yourself in a
moment of doubt, know this – it is not a reflection of a weak faith but a
strong faith, because it is a faith that is not afraid to ask questions.
Doubt comes to us all, at some point or another. Doubt can become our Garden moment,
when we become uncertain about the path forward and if we cannot acknowledge
the sometimes titanic battle of wills within our hearts, minds, and souls we
are not thinking very deeply about our faith.
Sometimes we wonder if we have the strength to go on, sometimes we
question whether or not we can do what God has called us to do, and sometimes
we find that we doubt the path that God has placed in front of us. The answer, we find, is in the actions
of Jesus. He knew the way forward
was difficult. He knew the way
forward was painful. But he also
knew the way forward was his path, and he accepted it.
As I have aged, I have arrived at the point where some questions no
longer concern me. Make no
mistake, I have a lot of questions,
but some of them don’t occupy my mind in the way they did when I was
younger. Like everyone else, I
have spent my share of time struggling with the question of why? I still wonder why some things happen. Why do good people suffer? Why does evil persist? But I don’t dwell on those questions to
the extent that I once did, and I don’t expect to have an answer to the why questions in this life. I trust that one day, in eternity, such
answers will be available, but until then I will be patient and learn to live
without the answers. It’s not that
I don’t care about those questions – I do, and I care about the struggles that
others have with those questions – but I am at a point in life where I am
willing, and able, to live with a greater degree of mystery.
3. Assurance.
It is difficult to read of the
agony of Jesus in the Garden. It
is difficult to think of Jesus struggling. It’s hard to see people in their moments of vulnerability,
and Jesus was very vulnerable in this moment. We prefer to think of Jesus as one who is so focused on his
mission that nothing will prevent him from its completion. But the prayer of Jesus shows a moment
of vulnerability, as he asks God to take
this cup from me. If possible, Jesus is asking of God, could there be another way to accomplish his
mission?
Jesus knew that crucifixion was
awaiting him. He knew what crucifixion
was like. The Romans used
crucifixion freely and brutally. I
will spare the details of that horrendous method of execution, but suffice it
to say the idea of crucifixion would be one of the most unsettling destinies
one could ever face. It looms so
large before Jesus that Luke says he prayed with a fervency and intensity that
his sweat fell to the ground as drops of blood.
That, my friends, is a struggle of
intense proportions.
And that is why Jesus took his
disciples with him to the Garden, and why he took Peter, James, and John with
him as he went further into the Garden.
Jesus wanted the support and encouragement of his friends. In our time of need, friends are one of
the greatest of God’s gifts. It is
hard to see the way in which Jesus was disappointed in Peter, James, and John,
as they were unable to stay awake.
Sometimes our friends fail us; sometimes we fail our friends. We must give grace to one another when
we fail. We do the best we can,
and sometimes our best falls short, and that is true of all of us.
And yet, in spite of what was ahead for Jesus, he makes the bold
declaration not my will, but yours be
done. It is no small
statement, considering what awaited Jesus. Jesus knew what was coming and never tried to escape it. He did not flee, but walked to those
who came to arrest him.
Not
my will, but yours be done, is a phrase that could be said in many
different ways. It could be said
in a manner that signified a resigned acceptance of one’s fate; not wanting to
accept it, but willing to do so because there is no other choice. One could also say the phrase in anger,
carrying a sense of rebellion for feeling pushed into accepting a difficult
fate. One could also say the
phrase in fear, accepting the path as one that might be necessary but also
feeling a terror in facing what was ahead. One could also say the words as a way of accepting the fate
of the cross, but not agreeing with such a path – it’s your will, but it’s certainly not mine. But Jesus did not utter those words in
any of those ways. In spite of the
horror of the cross, Jesus fully accepted it as the path that was ahead for
him, and he did it willingly.
I find it fascinating to think about how little, in one sense, Jesus
had. If you think, in particular,
about the final days of his life, much of what Jesus had was borrowed. He borrowed a colt on which he rode
into Jerusalem; he borrowed the upper room where he shared the Last Supper with
his disciples; he borrowed a garden, where he could go and pray; and, after the
crucifixion, he was laid in a borrowed tomb. Jesus had little in the way of tangibles, but he had so much
in the intangibles – such conviction, such faith, such grace! Jesus possessed an incredibly clear and
powerful sense of conviction of God’s will, and he maintained a tremendous
commitment to that will. We have
so many tangibles. We have so many
things. We have so much
stuff. We have so much
wealth. We have so many tangibles,
but what about the intangibles? We
have so much, while at the same time, so little.
During my sabbatical, as Tanya and I traveled, one of our favorite
places to visit was in Paris, where we spent time at Sainte-Chapelle, the chapel of the saints, near Notre Dame
Cathedral. The stained glass
windows in the building are about 90% original, dating back to the 13th
century. The most famous of the
windows is called the Rose Window.
From the outside, the windows appear drab and dirty, as they are covered
in the dirt, the grit, and the grime of the city and of history. They are so dark and dirty on the
outside that they look black and opaque.
From the outside, they are not at all impressive. Inside, however, is a different story.
From the inside, as you look through the window towards the light,
it is a piece of absolute beauty. The
colors from the glass spill onto the walls, the floor, and onto your body as
you stand and gaze at its beauty.
Obviously, to see the beauty, depends upon your perspective. From the outside, it is a reminder of
Paul’s words in I Corinthians 13:12, now we
see through a glass, darkly.
From one perspective it is a very dark glass, impenetrable in its
darkness, but from another perspective, it is a piece of amazing beauty.
In the Garden, as we peer into this most difficult of moments for Jesus,
it seemed anything but moment of beauty, and the cross would never look to be
anything of beauty, but from a different perspective, that of the empty tomb,
we see both the Garden moment and the cross as times of deep beauty, because
they demonstrate to us a love of deep and incredible beauty.
We all have our Garden moments, which are difficult to understand,
but know that further down life’s road you will be able to find the beauty, and
will know that God was with you, and that his will was accomplished. May
your will be done is no easy prayer to offer, but it is not only the most
difficult prayer, it is also the most powerful.
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