THE GARDEN OF GETHSEMANE

Text: Matthew 26:30-46

I. GETHSEMANE WAS A GARDEN OF OLIVE TREES (Matt 26:36; Mark 14:32; John 18:1,26)

A. The name “Gethsemane” means “olive press.”

B. Four important gardens in the Bible:

1. Eden (Genesis 2:8-10, 15-16; 3:1-3, 8-10, 23-24)

2. Gethsemane (Matt 26:36; Mark 14:32; John 18:1,26)

3. Tomb where Jesus was buried (John 19:41; 20:15)

4. Paradise (Luke 22:43 with Revelation 2:7. cf. 2 Corinthians 12:4)

The Garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus agonized in prayer on the night before His crucifixion (Matt.26:36–46). The roots of these giant olive trees may date from the time of Christ or before. (Nelson’s New Illustrated Bible)

II. KEEP WATCH…AT GETHSEMANE THE END TIMES JUDGMENT FOR SIN WAS AT HAND (Matthew 26:38,40,44)

A. Jesus repeatedly taught that this was the night prophecies would be fulfilled (26:24,31); that the one who dipped his hand with Jesus in the bowl would betray Him (26:23); the night Peter would deny Jesus three times (26:34); when all the disciples would fall away because of Jesus (26:31).

B. Just as the disciples were to keep watch in the Garden of Gethsemane as the eschatological hour of judgment was at hand, so too we are to keep watch (Matthew 24:42-43; 25:13). Watching, as we learned in Matthew 24-25 means:

1. living a life of faithful obedience to Jesus with the knowledge that He will one day return and call us to account.

2. living presently in light of future accountability.

3. “being on guard against deception and being faithful in times of testing” (Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels).

C. From Gethsemane to the cross, Jesus drinks from the cup that is signified by the Lord’s Supper. What Jesus did in memorial in the upper room was now being made reality as Jesus is on His way to the cross.

III. THE GRIEF OF JESUS AT GETHSEMANE

Question 37 of the Heidelberg Catechism

What dost thou understand by the words, “He suffered”?

That he, all the time that he lived on earth, but especially at the end of his life, sustained in body and soul, the wrath of God against the sins of all mankind: that so by his passion, as the only propitiatory sacrifice, he might redeem our body and soul from everlasting damnation, and obtain for us the favour of God, righteousness and eternal life.

A. “My soul is deeply grieved, to the point of death” (v.38).

B. “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will” (v.39).

C. “My Father, if this cannot pass away unless I drink it, Your will be done” (v.42).

D. “His sweat became like drops of blood, falling down upon the ground” (Luke 22:44).

E. The enemies of Christianity have contemptuously ridiculed Jesus’ seeming weakness and cowardliness in the Garden of Gethsemane.

F. The distress and grief of Jesus at Gethsemane was our Lord’s knowledge that He was going to stand before the Father’s judgment for sin. For the first time ever, the Holy Son who always did the will of the Father would be separated from His Father by sin.

Did you know?

The word “sleep” is used frequently for the death of Christians in the New Testament. But “sleep” is never used with reference to the death of Jesus!

1. Jesus was going to drink from the cup of God’s wrath (Matthew 26:39; cf. Psalm 11:6; 75:8,9; Isaiah 51:17, 19, 22; Jer.25:15–16; 49:12; 51:57; Ezek.23:31–34).

2. While Jesus never sinned in His flesh, He was going to receive the punishment for sin in His flesh (1 Peter 2:24).

And certainly he underwent death, not merely that he might depart from earth to heaven, but rather that, by taking upon himself the curse to which we were liable, he might deliver us from it. He had no horror at death, therefore, simply as a passage out of the world, but because he had before his eyes the dreadful tribunal of God, and the Judge himself armed with inconceivable vengeance; and because our sins, the load of which was laid upon him, pressed him down with their enormous weight. There is no reason to wonder, therefore, if the dreadful abyss of destruction tormented him grievously with fear and anguish (John Calvin, J. The Harmony of the Gospels: Calvin's Commentary on Matthew, Mark, and Luke).

In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (1 John 4:10)

Propitiation - The substitutionary suffering of Christ upon the cross which satisfied the wrath of God and His justice. Propitiation is a turning away of divine wrath.

QUESTIONS FOR SABBATH DISCUSSION & MEDITATION

Pray that God would enable you and give you the desire to take a biblical truth from today’s sermon and order your life around it.

How might Jesus’ disciples have learned about Jesus’ prayer to write about it since they were sleeping?

What are some similarities between the prayer of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane and the prayer Jesus taught His disciples in Matthew 6 (The Lord’s Prayer)?

What were the four gardens mentioned in the sermon and how are they related?

The Garden of Gethsemane was a place Jesus often went, presumably to pray and meditate (John 18:2). Do you have a place like this in your life?

Is Jesus’ distress at Gethsemane merely a fear of death by crucifixion?

What was the cup Jesus prayed the Father would take away, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will.”

Those who call upon Jesus for the forgiveness of sins and devote their lives to taking up their cross are drinking at the Lord’s Supper the cup of blessing (1 Corinthians 10:15). What cup is a person drinking from who takes Jesus’ sacrifice lightly? (1 Cor 11:27–30)?

Why should the agony of Jesus at Gethsemane give non-Christians pause before they die?

What Psalms is Jesus drawing from when He says, “My soul is deeply grieved”?