A relentless witness

Mark 14:36 finds Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane on the night that he was betrayed. He’s troubled and sorrowful, and asks his closest friends to stay with him while he prays. As he prays Jesus calls God, “Abba” an intimate term for father. He prays to “Papa” in the garden, as his friends fall asleep around him, unable to keep watch for even an hour.

He prays with the full knowledge of what God is capable of, maybe remembering Abraham and Isaac, and that last second sacrificial substitution. He might have thought back to creation as he prayed. To when he himself, the Word become flesh who was God, and was with God, and by whom all things were created, personally divided dark from light. This same Jesus, knew that he was about to suffer and die on this ball of dirt that he had spoken into being.

The audacity of such a death is only surpassed by his willingness to enter into it. He’s fully capable of escaping the pain, but he has so much love for us that he wouldn’t cheat even a little bit. He refused to be partially human, to avoid the pain of experiencing humanity.

It can be easy to dismiss the death of Jesus as the act of a far-off or unfeeling God, but scripture tells us that in his rescue mission to save us, Jesus truly became like us. Jesus’ love for us is all the more terrible and wonderful because he knew what he was getting into and still chose to save us.

Reflect today on the places in your life that seem foreign to God. Ask for an understanding of how Jesus could truly know your frustrations, your pain, and your experiences.


Mark 14:62