Your Gethsemane Experience can Lead to a Resurrection

 I just finished re-reading the book of John this morning, and I began picturing the closing chapters describing the Gethsemane experience of Jesus, agonizing in the dark aloneness before His Father, feeling the weight of the sins of the world descending on Him and causing Jesus to feel the separation from His Father. This was followed by the betrayal of a friend, and the abandonment of others who said they would never forsake Him, a one-sided trial, physical abuse and suffering and finally a crucifixion and death.   

And for the disciples, all hope was totally smashed and they spent the darkest, loneliest, most fearful weekend of their lives.  They questioned all that they learned and been through over the past 3 and a half years.  They wondered if it were all for nothing.  They forgot that just hours before, Jesus had told them plainly that He must suffer and die (read John ch 13-17)  And as they grieved, the oppressor of humanity came and peddled despair to add insult to injury.  Nothing had gone the way that they had hoped or planned.  But they had forgotten something.  God wasn’t following their plan. He was fulfilling His!  And His plans always turn out better than ours.

At the tomb, Sunday morning, a dejected Mary arrives to find it empty.  She makes assumptions and then  Runs back to Jerusalem and tells the disciples that Jesus’ body had been taken.  Peter and John run to the tomb and find the grave clothes and wonder what in the world had happened.  And though that dawn had split time in two, it had yet to dawn on them.  They left dejected as Mary finally got back.  

Let’s pick up the story in John 20.  John 20:11    Mary was standing outside the tomb crying, and as she wept, she stooped and looked in. ¹² She saw two white-robed angels, one sitting at the head and the other at the foot of the place where the body of Jesus had been lying. ¹³  “Dear woman, why are you crying?” the angels asked her. 

 “Because they have taken away my Lord,” she replied, “and I don’t know where they have put him.”

14   She turned to leave and saw someone standing there. It was Jesus, but she didn’t recognize him. ¹⁵ “Dear woman, why are you crying?” Jesus asked her. “Who are you looking for?” 

 She thought he was the gardener. “Sir,” she said, “if you have taken him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will go and get him.”

16   “Mary!” Jesus said. 

She turned to him and cried out, “Rabboni!” (which is Hebrew for “Teacher”).

17    “Don’t cling to me,” Jesus said, “for I haven’t yet ascended to the Father. But go find my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”

18    Mary Magdalene found the disciples and told them, “I have seen the Lord!” Then she gave them his message.

Later, Jesus Himself appeared among them, and at the risk of sounding cliché, the light finally dawned.  And new hope sprang to life. And they found, in Christ, all they had ever hoped for and more was resurrected within them.

Which leads me to this.  ALL of us will have our Gethsemane experiences.  We will feel separated from God.  We will feel the tempter and oppressor of our souls breathing his ugly, dark breath down our necks as he seeks to peddle despair to our discouraged hearts and snuff out any flicker of hope that may be seeking to rise.  He will have friends betray us, people abandon us, others judge us unfairly and then heap abuse on us in many various forms.

And he will seek to have you, in the midst of your distress,  pursue a course that would have you terminate your existence. And many do, as they often opt for a permanent solution to a temporary problem, and the enemy sweeps them into eternity.  But here is where Jesus’ death and resurrection made it possible for you and I to flip the script.

If you and I can only see it differently, we would see that in our darkest moments, we don’t have to give in to the temptation to end our existence, or our marriage, or whatever the temptation to give up on is, or even to lose hope.  But we can, like Jesus, pray for either the temptation to leave (let this cup pass from me) or for God to give us the strength to bear up under it.  (But not my will, YOUR will, Father) 

In either case, it leads to a death. But not a final one.  It actually becomes a death that leads to resurrection.  Paul called it “the death to self”(Gal 2:19) and even said, “I die every day!” (1 Cor 15:31). And this dying to self allows for a new resurrection.

You lay down all of the abuses, the judgments, the abandonment, the betrayal and look to Christ for restoration.  You choose to give up yourself and your will,  in deference to the Father’s will for your life, recognizing that HIS plan is always better than yours, and HE will remake things for you.

This winter, I have personally gone through what Mother Teresa, when speaking of her experience with God over the course of almost 50 years,  termed her “dark night of the soul”.  I have been beset by trauma’s in my youth perpetrated against me, stupid choices made in trying to work my own way out of difficulties, temptations from things that I thought were long since buried, discouragement in my work, depression and darkness and hopeless feelings and a desire to cash in 40 years of ministry.  And where I found hope was recognizing that I was in my own Gethsemane experience.  It was all dark around me…and the tempter of souls was screaming a thousand lies into my head…and he almost won.  I almost cashed it in and walked away from ministry and from God.   But I continued to hold on to my devotional habit and I forced myself to continue to go into the Word each day…though the rest of my day was often beset with darkness and depression.  

Where I found renewed hope was back in Gethsemane, the cross and the resurrection.  It is a metaphor for so much of what we experience.   We experience the darkness…sometimes the death of dreams or hopes…but God is a God of resurrections.  And He is restoring me daily.  I had to die to a few things in the darkness…with self being the one that I, like Paul, am having to relearn to die to daily.   And in the resurrections is where new hope is found.

Don’t run from your Gethsemane experience.  Stay there and ask God for the strength to endure it and then to rise once again to walk in the newness of life.

Elijah the Superprophet Needed a Vacation

So I'm reading the story of Elijah, the wonder prophet. That guy was amazing. Calling down fire on captains and their men for disrespecting him (I can think of a few church members:), telling the king it wouldn't rain again until he told him it would, challenging 450 prophets of a false god. Having them all killed. Praying for rain, then running in front of horses to lead them safely down the mountain. Then he falls asleep under a juniper tree...in the rain, only to be awakened by a messenger from the queen. Bottom line: you are so dead, dude!

What did the super prophet do? Freaked and ran. Which is a lot like me. Not the super prophet part...but the freaking and running part. It seems when we come to the end of our physical strength, often our spiritual resolve goes with it. In short, physical exhaustion leads to spiritual burnout. They are directly linked somehow. I don't know how, but I do know that when I am most tired, I am also most spiritually vulnerable. 

What about you? Are you getting enough rest? Or are you running on empty and finding that your spiritual resolve and strength are also gone? Think about that.  Answer honestly.

Can you imagine the people of Israel the next morning after Elijah's big showdown on Mt. Carmel? They probably looked for the prophet, but couldn't find him. They didn't know that he had received a death threat during the night and in his exhaustion had high-tailed it out of town. Just the day before, they had been on their faces declaring, "The Lord, He is God." And now, with no prophet of God in sight, they had no idea what they should do, so they did what they always did. Went and sacrificed to Baal. What a waste. 

There is something to be said for faithfulness even in the midst of discouragement. Had Elijah remained, God could have wrought a signal victory against Baal worship in Israel. But Elijah didn't stay. And the faith advantage was lost. Perhaps we fold too easily in times of discouragement. Perhaps if we hold on, God can use us to "change the culture". But often, we come to the end of our strength and we lose heart. And we run.

Here's the cool thing. God didn't dog Elijah for his failure. Instead, God gave Elijah a vacation. And fed him. Perhaps God expects more failure out of us than we do. 

Elijah ran. And ran. And finally, when he felt he had put enough distance between he and Jezebel, he collapsed. This same guy is the one whom God had hidden for 3 and a half years, though Ahab had searched all of Israel as well as all the surrounding countryside. It is much easier to trust God when you have it all together and you are feeling good. But much harder when you are exhausted and broken. 

That's where we find Elijah. Exhausted and broken. And the cool thing is, rather than slip a lightning bolt to land just behind him to motivate him, God does something cooler. He loves him. He sends an angel to fix a meal and then gently awaken him. Elijah sits up, eats and then goes back to sleep. Me? I would have freaked that there was another being sitting there with me. But scripture doesn't give any reference to that. It only says he ate and went back to sleep. 

Sometimes, what we need to rejuvenate us is rest. Sleep. A break from media. A quiet place in the middle of nature where we can simply ponder life and then go back to sleep.

Have you thought of taking a personal spiritual retreat? It doesn't have to be for 2 or 3 days, but maybe just an afternoon of solitude and stillness. Don't wait until it is too late. When the pressure is rising and the stress levels are increasing, schedule a half day retreat...or a full day...or better yet, 2 or 3 days away where it is just you, God and the quiet. Rest helped Elijah the super prophet...it might just help you.