Latest / Reformed Thinking / The Cup of Wrath and the Willing Son (Matthew 26:42-46)

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The Cup of Wrath and the Willing Son (Matthew 26:42-46) · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome to reformed thinking. Glad to be here for this one.
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Yeah, I mean, imagine facing an execution so horrifying that
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just the anticipation of it causes your blood vessels to
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burst. Right, making you literally
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sweat drops of blood into the dirt.
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Yeah, it's a staggering image. Now imagine that the physical
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execution itself is not actually what you're afraid of.
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Which? Completely flips our usual
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understanding on its head. It really does.
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So today we are looking at the Garden of Gethsemane,
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specifically Matthew chapter 26, verses 42 through 46.
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We are going to analyze a moment in history that, you know, it
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just completely defies comfortable modern category.
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It shatters them honestly. Yeah, we have a stack of
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incredibly rigorous theological research in front of us, and our
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mission for this deep dive is to unpack the sheer theological
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weight of Christ's obedience. We're looking at the crushing
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reality of divine wrath. Right.
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And what the sleeping disciples reveal about human nature.
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For you listening right now, whether you're driving to work
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or just doing chores around the house, I want to give you a
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quick heads up. This one is going to push some
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buttons. Oh, definitely.
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This discussion is going to challenge some very modern,
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comfortable assumptions about faith, about suffering, and, you
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know, human capability. We are asking you to look
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closely at the stark contrast between human frailty and divine
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resolve. OK, let's unpack this.
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We need to start with where this is happening, right?
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Because the location is not a coincidence.
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No, not at all. To really grasp what is
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happening in Matthew 26, we have to situate ourselves
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geographically and historically. The setting matters.
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It provides the necessary context for everything that
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follows. So we are late on a Thursday
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evening. Jesus and his disciples have
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finished the Passover meal, they've instituted the Lord's
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Supper, and they walk out of the city limits of Jerusalem.
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Heading east, right? Right.
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They cross the Kidron Valley and arrive at a place on the western
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slope of the Mount of Olives called Gethsemane.
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And that name has a very specific meaning.
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It does. Gethsemane is an Aramaic word
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GAT shame in him. Which literally translates to
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Olive press. Olive Press.
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I mean that is such a striking image right from the jump.
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It really sets the tone. You think about an olive press
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in the ancient world. You have these massive,
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incredibly heavy stone wheels that are rolled over the olives
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to crush them to extract the oil.
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Right, it is a violent, heavy grinding process.
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Just a brutal amount of weight. And just as that tremendous
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physical pressure extracts oil from the olives, we are looking
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at a scene where the crushing spiritual pressure of
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anticipating imputed human sin is extracting literal drops of
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blood from the Savior. It is a physical manifestation
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of a spiritual crushing. It's intense.
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And that physical manifestation? It points to a larger historical
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and prophetic reality too. The geography ties into the
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entire biblical narrative in a way that is just hard to ignore.
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Like with the Mount of Olives itself.
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Yeah, the Mount of Olives is heavily associated with divine
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revelation, with mourning, and with final judgement.
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You look at Zechariah Chapter 14 for example.
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Right, the psychological fulfillment.
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Yes, the prophecy points to the Lord's feet standing on the
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Mount of Olives in the final Judgement and the establishment
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of His Kingdom. So it's not just a random
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garden. Not at all.
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Jesus entering this specific garden on this specific mountain
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is steeped in prophetic expectation.
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Furthermore, the act of crossing the Kidron Valley to get there
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offers a, well, a breathtaking historical parallel.
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I actually want to talk about that Kidron Valley crossing
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because hundreds of years earlier another king of Israel
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crossed that exact same valley in weeping and sorrow.
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We were talking about King David, right?
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Precisely in Second Samuel chapter 15, King David flees
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Jerusalem across the Kidron Valley.
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Running for his life. He is weeping as he goes because
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his own son, Absalom has usurped the throne and betrayed him.
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So David is experiencing the bitter sting of familial
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betrayal retreating up the Mount of Olives.
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And now, centuries later, we see Jesus, the true and greater Son
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of David, crossing that same valley.
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It's an incredible parallel. He is weaving in sorrow over a
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betrayal from within his own inner circle from Judas.
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The historical parallel paints a picture of a rejected king.
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But with a huge difference, right?
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Right. Jesus is a king who is stepping
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purposefully into his rejection. He's not fleeing like David was.
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And we also have to factor in the time of year.
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Passover. It is Passover.
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For centuries, the Jewish people had slaughtered innocent lambs
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to temporarily cover their sins, looking back to the deliverance
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from Egypt. Right, all those shadows.
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This night marks the definitive transition from the Old
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Covenant, with all its shadows and repeated animal sacrifices,
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to the New Covenant reality. You know, I often try to put
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myself in the shoes of the original Jewish Christian
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audience reading Matthew's Gospel for the first.
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Time. It would have hit them so hard.
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Think about their daily lives. They grew up with the temple
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system. They smelled the sacrifices
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burning on the altar every single day.
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The scent of roasted meat and incense was the aroma of their
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religion. Exactly.
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Well, yeah, they knew that thousands of lambs were being
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slaughtered in the temple precincts during Passover to.
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The point where historical records suggest the blood would
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literally drain out of the Temple Mount and flow down into
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the Kidron Valley. Which means Jesus and his
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disciples might have literally snapped over the blood of the
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typical Passover lambs as they crossed the valley to reach the
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garden. Oh wow, yeah, physically
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stepping over the old sacrifices to become the new one.
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And reading this account, the early Church realizes that the
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entire temple system, the priesthood, the daily shedding
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of animal blood, all of it was becoming completely obsolete in
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that very moment. Because the true Lamb of God was
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preparing Himself for the final, once for all sacrifice.
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The transition happening in this garden changes the entire fabric
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of human history. The Old Covenant administration
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is fading away right before their eyes, and the New Covenant
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is being sealed in the blood of the Incarnate Son.
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The sheer weight of that is just staggering.
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Jesus was born under the Law to redeem those under the law, and
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here we see him preparing to fulfill all righteousness and
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bear the curse of that very law. Functioning as the sole mediator
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between God and man, right? This is a covenantal shift of
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cosmic proportions. And, you know, understanding
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this intense spiritual pressure in the olive Press of Gethsemane
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requires us to look closer at what specific cup Jesus was
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asking to pass from him. OK, let's talk about the cup.
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Jesus falls on his face and prays, asking if this cup might
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pass from him. Using the Greek word paetorian.
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Paetorian, right? I think people often assume this
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is just a poetic way of saying he was afraid of dying.
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That's the common modern assumption.
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They picture Jesus looking forward to the next morning,
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visualizing the Catanine tales, the thorns, the nails and the
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physical agony of Roman crucifixion.
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And they think he's calling that physical torture, the cup.
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But based on the research we have, that interpretation
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completely misses the mark. It really does breakdown that
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word for us. The word Putorian carries
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massive prophetic weight in the Old Testament.
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If you look at standard ancient Near Eastern literature, a cup
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might just mean a drinking vessel, or perhaps someone's
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allotted portion in life, whether good or bad.
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But in the prophetic vocabulary to the Hebrew Scriptures, the
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cup specifically symbolizes the unmixed, terrifying wrath of
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Yahweh poured out upon the wicked.
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Right. You see this in the prophets.
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Isaiah chapter 51 speaks of drinking the cup of his wrath,
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the bull of staggering. Yes.
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Or Jeremiah chapter 25, where God commands the prophet to take
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from my hand this cup of the wine of wrath, and make all the
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nations to whom I send you drink it.
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The cup is God's active, retributive judgment against
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sin. It is a symbol of divine fury.
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So it's not the Romans he's terrified of.
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That is the crucial distinction we must make.
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Jesus is not shuddering because he is afraid of physical pain or
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public execution, right? He is shuddering because he, the
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sinless, spotless Lamb who knew no thin, is about to become sin.
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He's facing God. Yes, He is preparing to absorb
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the localized infinite fury of eternal hell upon the Cross.
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He is anticipating the absolute horror of bearing the imputation
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of our vile sins and enduring the forsakeness of the Father.
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It's an objective wrath bearing transaction.
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That's exactly. I hear what you were saying
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about the cup, but I am struggling with this comparison
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and I know listeners will bring this objection up.
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Let's hear it. We have thousands of historical
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accounts of early Christians being tortured and executed in
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horrific ways. You read about the early church
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fathers like Polycarp being burned at the stake.
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You read about believers being thrown to lions in the Roman
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Colosseum. And the historical record shows
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they often face those deaths with hymns on their lips and
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smiles on their faces. They did.
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They were joyful. They were brave.
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So if Jesus is just facing a physical execution, why is the
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literal Son of God sweating blood in terror?
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It's a massive contrast. Why does he seem far more
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terrified than his own followers did just a few decades later?
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That seems backwards to me. That specific question
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completely demolishes what theologians call the moral
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influence theory of the atonement.
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Oh, I heard of that. Yeah, the moral influence theory
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claims that Christ died simply to show us an example of God's
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love or to inspire us to live better lives.
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Like he was just a good teacher, showing solidarity.
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Right, it suggests there was no actual wrath appease, just a
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demonstration of solidarity with human suffering.
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But if that theory is true, his reaction in Gethsemane makes
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absolutely no sense. Because he looks terrified of
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just physical death. Right.
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If he's just an example of love, his agony looks like cowardice
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compared to the martyrs you mentioned.
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The reason those martyrs could face the flames with joy is
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because Jesus drank the cup of wrath in their place.
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They were experiencing the presence and comfort of God in
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their physical death. God was with them in the fire.
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Precisely. Jesus, on the other hand, was
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facing the terrifying withdrawal of God's comforting presence and
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the active outpouring of God's holy hatred against sin.
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He agonized because he was facing actual, objective,
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retributive divine wrath. Yes.
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Oh wow. So the cup isn't the physical
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cross. It is a metaphor for God's act
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of judgment. That distinction changes
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everything about how we view the crucifixion.
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He was not just dying a martyr's death, He was taking a damnation
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that belonged to us. The Romans provided the wood and
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the nails, but God the Father provided the cup.
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Well said. This shifts our focus from the
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horrifying nature of the cup to to Christ's response to it.
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In verse 42, we see this incredible moment of decision.
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Jesus prays. If this cannot pass unless I
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drink it, your will be done. That prayer forms the
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theological center of this entire passage.
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The Greek noun used for will here is the oma.
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Dilemma. It does not refer to a mere wish
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or a contingent desire of the Father that might change based
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on circumstances. So it's not like God is just
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hoping things work out. Right, in this context, it
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signifies the absolute, sovereign and eternal decree of
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God. Jesus is not showing passive
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resignation. He isn't saying, well I guess I
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have no choice, so let's just get this over with.
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He's not a victim of circumstance.
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He is actively, commandingly endorsing the eternal decree of
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the Father. Hold on, we need to clarify some
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terminology here. When we talk about Christ's
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obedience, theologians often split it into two categories,
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active obedience and passive obedience.
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That's right, both are on full display in this garden.
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Can you give us a plain English explanation of what those two
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terms actually mean? Because it sounds like passive
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obedience means he just sat there and let things happen to
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him, which we just established isn't true.
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I can certainly clarify that the terms can be confusing to modern
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ears. Active obedience refers to
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Christ's perfect, flawless submission to the law of God and
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the will of the Father throughout his entire earthly
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life. Culminating in this garden, yes.
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He actively wills to accomplish the decree of redemption.
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He perfectly loves God and perfectly loves his neighbor.
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Every second of his life. He fulfills the righteous
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requirements that we have utterly violated.
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So that's active. What about passive?
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Passive obedience does not mean he was a helpless victim.
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The word passive here comes from the Latin word passio, which
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means to suffer. Oh, like a passion of the
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Christ. Right.
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So his passive obedience refers to his willingness to suffer the
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penalty for our transgressions, allowing himself to be betrayed,
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beaten and crucified. That makes so much more sense.
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By saying your will be done, He is perfectly executing both.
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He has lived the perfect life we fail to live and He is stepping
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forward to die the agonizing death we deserve to die.
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He is affirming the eternal covenant made within the Trinity
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before time began to secure the salvation of His people.
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You know, I love to draw a sharp contrast here between two
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different gardens in human history.
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Eden and Gethsemane. Right.
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Think about Eden. In the Garden of Eden, the first
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Adam was surrounded by absolute paradise.
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He had abundant life, perfect communion with God, a beautiful
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world, and No Fear of death. He had everything.
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Yet in the middle of that pristine paradise, he chose
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rebellion against God's will, and that choice brought thorns,
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the curse, and death upon all of humanity.
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It was a catastrophic failure. Now look at Gethsemane.
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Here we have the last Adam, Jesus Christ.
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He is surrounded by the darkness of night, the impending reality
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of physical torture, and the spiritual horror of divine
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wrath. He is facing the metaphorical
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thorns of the curse in the form of a literal crown of thorns.
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Yeah. Yet in the middle of that
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terrifying darkness, He chooses perfect submission.
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He says your will be done, and that choice secures eternal life
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and perfect righteousness for His people.
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The. Parallel highlights the core
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mechanics of salvation. Where the first Adam failed and
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plunged humanity into ruin, the last Adam succeeds and secures
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redemption. It's.
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Beautiful. It illustrates the concept of
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federal headship. A federal head is a
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representative who acts on behalf of a group.
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Adam acted on behalf of humanity, and his failure was
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imputed to us. Christ acts on behalf of His
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people, and His perfect obedience is imputed to them.
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So what does this all mean? When you look at this through
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the lens of how we understand salvation today, it completely
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upends the idea that God is just waiting around for us to choose
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Him. He does.
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I want to make sure we nail this down.
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How does Christ's active endorsement of the Father's
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decree confront modern ideas about how people get saved?
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Well, it means we have to reject any theology that makes
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salvation dependent on human choices or human willpower.
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Like Arminianism, right? The sources we were studying
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explicitly state that this passage refutes Armenian
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theology. Arminianism posits a synergistic
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salvation. Synergistic, meaning working
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together. Yes, it teaches that God and man
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cooperate in salvation, making God's decree somehow contingent
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or dependent on human response. It suggests God casts a vote,
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Satan casts a vote, and the human casts the deciding vote.
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But Gethsemane reveals a monarchistic triumph.
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Modernism means one worker. Christ alone treads the
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winepress. He's the only one doing the
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work. The eternal Decree is not
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waiting around to see what humans will do.
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It is firmly and resolutely executed by the solitary
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Mediator. Jesus secures the salvation of
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his sheep completely apart from any human assistance or
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cooperation. So Jesus has just actively
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accepted this unimaginable cosmic weight.
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He agrees to drink the cup of wrath alone.
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He finishes this agonizing prayer, endorsing the eternal
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decree, and he turns back to his closest.
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He goes back to the disciples. He is looking for some shred of
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human support, or at least some intercession.
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And what does he find? Verse 43 states he found the
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disciples sleeping, for their eyes were heavy.
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The specific language Matthew uses here is incredibly precise.
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The Greek word for heavy is Berbera minoy.
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A Burr Minoy. It is a perfect passive
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participle, which is a grammatical construction that
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denotes A settled, continuous state of being completely
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overburdened and heavily weighed down by an external force.
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So they weren't just a little sleepy.
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No, this is not just a case of them staying up past their
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bedtime or needing a cup of coffee.
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They are profoundly paralyzed by lethargy.
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It's a spiritual weight. Yes, a passive voice indicates
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they were completely mastered by their weakness.
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Their flesh was entirely dominant over their spiritual
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resolve. It is such a vivid illustration
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of the doctrine of total depravity.
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We need to be clear about what that means.
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Total depravity does not mean humans are as evil as they could
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possibly be at every moment. Right, it's not absolute
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depravity. It means that every part of the
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human constitution, the mind, the will, the emotions, the
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physical body is corrupted and weighed down by sin.
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It taints everything. We look at Peter, James, and
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John. These are the inner circle.
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These are the men who saw the Mount of Transfiguration.
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These are the most prominent leaders of the early church.
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And at the absolute climax of human history, they could not
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stay awake for one single hour to pray with their Savior.
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It shatters any illusion we might harbor about inherent
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human goodness or spiritual fortitude.
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He just failed completely. Even the regenerate man.
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Even the chosen apostles, when left to their own strength
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without the sustaining sovereign grace of God, will inevitably
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fall into sin and spiritual slumber.
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It destroys the illusions of moralism.
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You cannot look at the slumbering disciples and walk
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away thinking humanity has the power to save itself or
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contribute to its own redemption.
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If you have ever promised yourself you're going to wake up
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early to pray or read and hit the snooze button three times
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instead, you are looking in the mirror at Peter, James and John
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right here. That's a very humbling thought.
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The sheer irony in this text is painful to read.
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Think about the timeline. Just a few hours prior to this,
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they were all sitting in the upper room.
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Jesus tells them they will all fall away and Peter famously
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puffs out his chest and says, even if I must die with you, I
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will not deny you. And all the other disciples said
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the exact same thing. They made these massive boasts
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about their own willpower, their own loyalty, their own inherent
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courage. Yet here, in the quiet of the
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garden, before a single Roman soldier has even shown up, their
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immediate failure exposes the absolute emptiness of those
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boasts. This raises an important
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question regarding how we view human capability.
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Go ahead. We love to trust our own habits,
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our own intellect, our own emotional zeal.
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We make promises to God when we are comfortable sitting in a
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church Pew or Bible study. And we think our sheer willpower
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will carry us through temptation.
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But it never does. Left to our own strength,
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without sustaining divine grace, we are completely unresponsive.
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The narrative tells us that our strengths is dust.
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The disciples needed a savior to die for them before they could
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ever become faithful witnesses. If the pillars of the early
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church collapse this quickly under the weight of temptation,
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we must abandoned any lingering reliance upon our own moral
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superiority. It really forces you to cast
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yourself entirely on the grace of God.
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So while the disciples collapse under physical and spiritual
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lethargy, Christ withdraws again, modeling a completely
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different kind of perseverance. He goes back to pray.
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Verse 44 details that Jesus left them and prayed 1/3 time saying
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the same words. I want to pause on that
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repetition. Why does Matthew make a point to
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tell us Jesus said the same words again?
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The Greek phrase here is ton O ton logon ipun Palin, which
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translates to saying the same word or matter again.
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So he's not coming up with a new prayer.
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Right. Jesus is returning to the Father
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with the exact same rational petition rooted in the divine
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decree. He is engaged in sustained
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supplication. It's focused.
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This repetition proves that His submission is deliberate, it is
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repeated and it is entirely settled.
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It is not a fleeting moment of emotional enthusiasm.
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He is abiding under the Father's will until the very hour comes.
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We need to make a sharp distinction here because modern
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readers might see Jesus repeating a prayer and assume
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this is a template for mindless chanting.
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Which it is not. Right.
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In Matthew chapter 6, Jesus actually warns against Pagan
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vain repetitions. He uses the Greek word
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batalarisate, which means babbling.
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Babbling. Yes.
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How is Christ's repetition in Gethsemane different from the
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babbling he condemned earlier in his ministry?
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It is critical to differentiate Christ's earnest, agonizing
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repetition in Gethsemane from Pagan babbling.
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Pagan prayer operated on the assumption that the gods were
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capricious, distracted, or unwilling to help.
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So they thought they had to be loud.
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Therefore, pagans believed they had to annoy the gods into
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action or manipulate them through the sheer volume and
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repetition of their words. They used mindless mantras.
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And we see that today, too. Modern evangelical trends,
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heavily influenced by Eastern mysticism and contemplative
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spirituality, sometimes falsely use passages like this to
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promote things like centering prayer.
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Right. They advocate for emptying the
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mind, repeating a single syllable, or bypassing the
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intellect to achieve some sort of mystical trance.
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I see this all the time. People think true spiritual
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death comes from shutting off your brain and justice feeling
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the vibrations of the universe. Which is completely unbiblical.
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But true biblical prayer is the exact opposite of that mystical
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emptiness. True prayer engages the
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intellect. It aligns the human will with
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the known, objective truth of God's Word.
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Yes, Jesus is not trying to bypass his mind.
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He is bringing the heaviest, most agonizing burdens directly
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to the Father while consciously bowing to a sovereign plan He
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fully understands. True prayer does not try to
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manipulate God or demand ease. It does not try to alter the
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eternal decree. It lays the deepest anguish
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before the Father and still submits.
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Here's where it gets really interesting.
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Jesus did not seek new extra biblical revelations or mystical
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voices in the garden. He relied upon the truth of the
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Father's plan. He knew the word.
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This forcefully rejects the idea that prayer is a technique to
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bend heaven to earth. Instead, biblical prayer is the
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means by which God bends the human heart to His will.
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God bends the human heart to His will.
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That clarifies the entire purpose of supplication.
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It completely shifts our perspective.
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We pray not to inform God of things He doesn't know, but to
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align our desires with His ordained plan.
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And once that matter is entirely settled in prayer, we see a
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massive pivot in the narrative. A.
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Huge change in tone. Verses 45 and 46 feature a sharp
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change in action. Jesus comes back to the
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disciples for the final time. He announces the hour is at
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hand, and then he commands them rise.
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Let us be going. Let's talk about the weight of
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that word hour. The Greek word is hora.
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In the Gospel of Matthew and throughout the New Testament,
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this word is used in a highly specialized eschatological
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sense. It's not just a time on the
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clock. No, it does not mean a 60 minute
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increment. It is the divinely appointed
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epic of redemptive climax. Earlier in his ministry, Jesus
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evaded capture and the text says he slipped away because his hour
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had not yet come. He was invincible until the
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appointed time. No, the clock strikes.
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It is the specific hour determined before the foundation
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of the world. In the Council of God, Jesus is
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announcing that history operates precisely on God's predetermined
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timetable. Within that announcement, he
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says the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners.
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The Greek verb is paradidoti, which means is hand it over.
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Hand it over. There is a dual reality
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happening in that single verb, and I want to ask about this
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because it trips people up. How can God use wicked actions
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like Judas betraying his friend without God himself being the
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author of wickedness? The passive verb paradidoti
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holds a massive theological truth regarding concurrent
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agency. Concurrent agency.
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Right on. A human level Judas Iscariot is
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the culpable, morally responsible agent of betrayal.
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Judas is acting wickedly out of his own sinful desires.
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He wants the money. He loves money, he rejects
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Christ, and he chooses to hand him over to the authorities.
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God does not force Judas to sin against His will.
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But God is still sovereign. Right on the divine level behind
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Judas is treachery. God the Father is the ultimate
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actor, delivering the Son over for our salvation.
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We see this explicitly in Romans chapter 8 verse 32 where it says
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God spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all.
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Using the same Greek root. The same root is used.
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Human evil is real and culpable, but divine sovereignty is also
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real, wise and saving. Yeah, those hand seizing Jesus
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are wicked, but they cannot overthrow God's plan.
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In fact, they are unwittingly executing it.
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It reminds me of an author writing a historical novel.
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The villain in the story acts out of his own malice, but the
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author ordained that action to move the plot toward a
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victorious conclusion. That's a helpful analogy.
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Which brings us to the majesty of the command Jesus gives.
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Next, he says agumin, which translates to let us be going.
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I love the imagery here. It's.
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Very proactive. Jesus is not hiding in the
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shadows among the olive trees. He is not cowering in fear,
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waiting to be ambushed by the temple guards.
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He does not act as a helpless victim of circumstance.
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Having settled the matter in prayer, he stands up with
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absolute sovereign authority. He is the sovereign Lord,
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commanding the timeline of his own execution, marching
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deliberately toward the betrayer.
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The syntax of the Greek text violently shifts here from the
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sorrow of the prayer to the commanding presence of the king.
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He tells the slumbering disciples to rise, not to flee
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into the night, but to step forward and face the appointed
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events. He's taking charge.
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It highlights the completely voluntary nature of his
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sacrifice. As Jesus states in the Gospel of
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John, no one takes his life from him, but he lays it down of his
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own accord. He moves toward Judas because he
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is moving toward the cross. When he moves toward the cross,
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because he is actively executing the Father's saving will, he is
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the willing sacrifice. The contrast is just stunning,
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the flawless active obedience of the Son walking toward the cross
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juxtaposed against the moral failure of the disciples.
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It's night and day. Now, after establishing this
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massive theological weight of the text, we need to steer the
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conversation toward how these truths confront modern church
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practices today. This is not just ancient
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history. This text has severe
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implications for errors we see right now.
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We definitely need to address this.
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The research we are reviewing applies the reality of
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Gethsemane directly against the prosperity gospel.
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The prosperity gospel is one of the most pervasive false
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teachings of our day. It preaches a theology of glory.
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A. Theology of glory.
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It claims that God always desires health, wealth, success
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and comfort for the believer. It treats faith as a mechanism
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to force God to grant our worldly desires it.
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Turns God into a genie. It tells people that if they
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just have enough faith, they will never face sickness or
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financial ruin. But the Garden of Gethsemane
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completely obliterates that entire framework.
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It really does. You look at Jesus, the perfect
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Son of God. He possessed perfect faith.
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He had unbroken communion with the Father.
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He prayed more fervently than any human being ever has.
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Most faithful prayer ever uttered.
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And yet, what was the answer to his prayer?
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The answer was the Cross, the Father's sovereign will for his
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perfect, beloved Son was infinite, suffering, physical
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torture, and the pouring out of wrath.
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If perfect faith resulted in the cross for Jesus, how can modern
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preachers guarantee a private jet or perfect health for us?
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If we connect this to the bigger picture, If the master was
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called to suffer according to the sovereign decree, how can
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the servant expect a life of pampered luxury?
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It just doesn't align with scripture.
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The prosperity gospel despises suffering and ignores the cross,
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but true faith does not demand that God change our
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circumstances to suit our comforts.
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True faith cries, your will be done.
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Even when that specific will leads directly through the
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valley of the shadow of death, Gethsemane proves that suffering
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is not necessarily a sign of a lack of faith or a sign of God's
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displeasure. Sometimes it is the exact center
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of God's holy will. I want to push back on another
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area of modern church practice. Not every church preaches a
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prosperity gospel, but many fall into seeker sensitive
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pragmatism. Right, the desire to be
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culturally relevant. How does this text challenge
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churches that deliberately dilute their preaching to avoid
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offending the culture? They want to make the message
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palatable to unregenerate men, so they skip over the parts
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about wrath and sin. We see that Christ did not seek
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an alternative path to bypass the offense of the cross.
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He drank the cup. He faced the full, unvarnished
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horror of God's holiness, a man's sin head on.
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He did not soften the reality of the cup of wrath.
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Therefore, modern pastors and churches must not alter the
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message to entertain unregenerate men.
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Because the message is offensive to the flesh.
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The cross tells humanity that they are so wicked and God's
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justice is so absolute that the only way to save them was for
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God the Father to crush his own Son.
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That is offensive to human pride.
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It's completely crushing to human pride.
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Pastors must not soften the reality of God's holy wrath
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against sin or the absolute necessity of repentance.
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A church that hides the offense of the cross is a church that
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has lost the gospel entirely. You cannot preach a saving
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Christ without preaching the horrifying wrath he endured to
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secure that salvation. It's impossible.
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It demands that we preach the full counsel of God, regardless
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of whether it empties the pews of people who just want a
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motivational speech. The gravity of this passage
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leaves absolutely no room for human boasting, for seekers
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sensitive pragmatism, or for liberal theological
29:33
reconstructions. It demands orthodox fidelity and
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total reliance upon the finished work of Christ.
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It tells us we bring nothing to our salvation except the sin
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that made it necessary. And it calls true believers to a
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life of profound well, of intense, grateful obedience.
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Because of what he went through. When we look at those slumbering
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disciples, we have to admit how often we're just like them.
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We grow spiritually lethargic. We neglect fervent prayer.
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We succumb to the weakness of our flesh.
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The sight of Christ praying in blood, sweating agony while his
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friends slept, should Pierce our consciences and drive us to
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repentance. We cannot stand in our own
30:10
strength. We must cast ourselves daily
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upon the sustaining grace of the Holy Spirit.
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To summarize what we have covered, this deep dive reveals
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a stark, uncompromising contrast.
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On one hand, we see the flawless active obedience of the willing
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Son actively endorsing the eternal decree to drink the cup
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of divine wrath. And on the other hand.
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We see the pitiful, slumbering impotence of sinful flesh in the
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disciples, proving that salvation must be entirely a
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work of divine grace. Christ alone stepped forward to
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tread the winepress of Dodd's wrath.
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He did this not because he was forced by circumstances, but in
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perfect, voluntary submission to the Father, thereby securing an
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infallible, unbreakable redemption for His people.
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For you listening, we want to bring this back to your
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attention. Just the staggering reality of
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what Jesus accomplished. He drank the cup of God's wrath
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to the bottom, leaving not a single drop for his people.
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Not one drop. Because of this perfect
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substitution, if you are in Christ, you have absolute
31:08
assurance there is no condemnation left for you to
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face. The justice of God has been
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fully satisfied. As we wrap up this deep dive, we
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want to leave you with a final thought to Mull over.
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Consider the hardest trial or sorrow you are facing in your
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life right now. The pain that keeps you awake at
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night. The diagnosis you did not want
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to hear. Think about that carefully.
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What if that specific hardship is not a sign of God's absence,
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but the very cup He has wisely and lovingly ordained for your
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sanctification? What if God is using that exact
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trial to ask you to echo the Savior, to look into the
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darkness of your own garden and say Father, your will be done?