Blog 35:
Well, it’s almost Holy Week again and I am excited. For me, it is easier to focus on the spiritual aspect of Easter than it is for Christmas. The Christmas season is inundated with so many layers of gifts and music and everything else that the message of Christ’s coming can be drowned out. I know that at Easter there are the eggs and bunnies and the like, but I never find myself having to search for the spiritual importance of Christ’s resurrection. It is ever present in my mind in the weeks and days leading up to Easter. Maybe in part it is because Easter is my spiritual birthday but there is no other day more meaningful to me.
To prepare for the Good Friday event that our church will be hosting this year I have been reading and re-reading the scriptures documenting the final days of Christ’s life. Something that has stood out to me this year is the foresight Jesus had in facilitating His own betrayal. There is so much that is underlying the final betrayal in the Garden of Gethsemane by Judas. One of the most prominent thoughts about the Garden of Gethsemane is that it would a place of solitude and that Jesus and the disciples would have been the only people there the night of His betrayal. I think much of this reasoning comes from texts like Luke 22:4-6 which reads,
4 And Judas went to the chief priests and the officers of the temple guard and discussed with them how he might betray Jesus. 5 They were delighted and agreed to give him money. 6 He consented, and watched for an opportunity to hand Jesus over to them when no crowd was present.
So, the Garden must have been secluded, right? Out of the public eye? My wife, Teri, and I had the privilege a few years back to go on a tour of the Holy Land and our guide pointed out that during Passover, the Mount of Olives would have been packed with people camping out for the celebration. This would not have been a secretive journey…Jesus and His disciples would have been making their way through clumps of people and campfires on the hillside overlooking the city.
This explains what I always thought was a strange way for Judas to identify Jesus for the soldiers. I used to picture this as an isolated event happening in the Garden and all Judas would have needed to do is point and say, “That’s the guy!” What Scripture records for us is an up-close and personal betrayal with a kiss. It makes sense that Judas would have to make his accusation more intimately if there is a whole hillside of other witnesses camping out as well. The Apostle John records the location in this way
18 When he had finished praying, Jesus left with his disciples and crossed the Kidron Valley. On the other side there was a garden, and he and his disciples went into it. 2 Now Judas, who betrayed him, knew the place, because Jesus had often met there with his disciples. 3 So Judas came to the garden, guiding a detachment of soldiers and some officials from the chief priests and the Pharisees. They were carrying torches, lanterns and weapons.
This is the part that always gets to me…Judas knew because Jesus had often been there before. Jesus knew that by regularly coming here with His disciples over His three year ministry that it would culminate in this. John continues in verse 4 with,
4 Jesus knowing all that was going to happen to Him…
Jesus knew three years earlier, the first time He set foot in this garden with His disciples, that He would be betrayed here. You would think His response with that knowledge would be to avoid the place. A person trying to avoid a prophesied death is a common theme in history and literature. We have the record of the great prayer of anguish Jesus prays here on the night of His betrayal, but I don’t think it is hard to believe there was a measure of anguish every time He came here knowing what He knew. Yet we see Jesus calmly walking toward it…repeatedly.
It’s almost as if He was saying, “Remember this place, Judas. I have important work to do here.” Jesus knew His work had to be accomplished at Passover. He knew that this location would be harder to get to because of the crowds at Passover. He wanted it so ingrained in Judas’s brain where Gethsemane was that there could be no reason for not finding it. We can read of the purposeful, intentional steps that Jesus took to ensure the Father’s will was accomplished.
The question I find myself asking this Holy Week is, “Am I taking purposeful, intentional steps in my life to ensure the Father’s will is accomplished.” Are there things I am supposed to be doing now that will bring forth fruitful (but maybe painful and costly) ministry in the future? I can promise that Jesus is as committed to seeing the Father’s will accomplished in your life and my life as He was about seeing it fulfilled in His own. Look at the His commitment to seeing the Father’s will accomplished through the Apostles Peter and Paul. That commitment came at an additional cost to Jesus but He paid it gladly.
I pray that you would remember that Jesus has gone to great lengths in your relationship with Him so that you will know exactly where to find Him. No matter how dark, or crowded, or confusing the path to the Gethsemane is, you can be sure He is there waiting for you; waiting with an embrace of love, not a betrayer’s kiss. Blessings to you all, and He is risen!