Sleeping from Sorrow

The occurrences in the Garden of Gethsemane on the Mount of Olives are familiar. The scene has been portrayed in movies, explained from pulpits, and rendered in paintings. It is Jesus’ time. His hour had come upon Him. The purpose for Him clothing Himself in humanity and coming to live among His people was about to unfold. While Jesus knew the glorious outcome of His mission, He also knew the gory details of what He would have to go through to "get through". It would not be pleasant at all. In fact, it would be unbearable, but He chose to come this far.

Jesus took His disciples, and from the account in Luke Chapter 22, He withdrew from them a stone’s throw, and began the agonizing discussion with His Father. So fervent was His prayer, so intense was the encounter, that "his sweat became like drops of blood falling to the ground". We can not even imagine. He rises from His prayer, comes to His disciples, and finds them ...sleeping. What? How can they be sleeping when the intense battle is beginning to rage for their Master? This is a little reminiscent of the twelve and Jesus being in their boat in the middle of a storm, when Jesus is asleep in the back of the boat. The disciples are bailing for all they are worth, they wake Jesus and get on His case about sleeping in the storm. "Don’t you care that we are perishing?" is their pointed question. Could Jesus now ask the same?

But, then again, who can blame these mere mortals for getting tired. I myself get pretty sleepy around 9 o’clock. Let’s look a little closer at the text in verse 45. The Word says:

Hmm. SLEEPING from SORROW. Sleeping from sorrow, not from sleepiness or weariness, but from sorrow. What is making them so sorrowful? Do they even have a clue as to the agony that Jesus is going through? If we back up a little in Chapter 22, we get a glimpse of what might be involved in the sorrow.

Jesus had celebrated the Passover with them, a reminder in itself of their ancestors’ bitter slavery. Then He talks to them about His body being broken and His blood being spilled, and doing things in remembrance of Him (Is He leaving them?). Jesus tells them of His being betrayed. He tells Peter that Satan is going to sift him like wheat and predicts that Peter will himself deny Jesus three times before morning (what an accusation). Jesus reminds them of a time when they went out without a purse or a bag and lacked nothing, but now says that they had better be prepared to take their purse and bag, as well as a sword, and if they don’t have one--get one. He tells them that He will be classified as a criminal. All of this could understandably make them pretty sorrowful. It is depressing just writing it down.

I wonder if that is where Christianity and some of us who are Christians are today. Does Jesus find us sleeping from sorrow? Satan and the world make us sorrowful. It is genuine sorrow about the state of the country, the world, atrocities that are happening, injustices being carried out, ungodliness, and in short- SIN. Sin is a sorrowful thing. We get sorrowful about it all, and we go to sleep. one of the first noticeable signs of depression is the patient’s desire to sleep- all the time. The depression is so overwhelming that they desire to escape it by sleeping. So many times it is not the situations or circumstances we are faced with that are major problems for us, but rather our response to them. Sorrow is a legitimate feeling toward sin, but as Christians we can not respond to sorrow by giving up and going to sleep.

We have all seen the movies where someone gets a blow to the head, or someone gets caught in freezing water or a snowstorm, and the person is slipping off to sleep or unconsciousness. Those rescuing the person keep talking to the person, slapping his cheeks gently, or doing whatever they can to keep the person from the dangerous temptation to sleep and loose consciousness.

If we look at verse 46 of chapter 22, Jesus gives two things that we can do to avoid the temptation to sleep in these perilous times. First, He tells the disciples to rise. It is much more difficult to sleep on your feet than lying down. We must stand on our feet in the Lord’s strength for battle in these trying times. Fight the urge to lie down and give up or in-RISE. The second thing the Lord instructed the disciples to do was to pray. But there is so much to pray about- so much to be sorrowful about. God says that we are to pray without ceasing. There is so much to pray about, so we should be doing alot of praying. It is our only hope, and defense against the temptation to chuck it all and go to sleep.

Jesus said to His disciples that His "hour had come". Our hour is coming, too. It is upon us. What will we do? Will we RISE and PRAY... or will we be sleeping?