Saturday, May 18, 2024

PT-2 "Sorrow" (Matt. 26:36-38)

 

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 5/18/2024 9:43 AM

 

My Worship Time                                                                                        Focus:  PT-2 “Sorrow”

 

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                    Reference:  Matt. 26:36-38

 

            Message of the verses:  36 Then Jesus came with them to a place called Gethsemane, and said to His disciples, "Sit here while I go over there and pray." 37 And He took with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be grieved and distressed. 38 Then He said to them, "My soul is deeply grieved, to the point of death; remain here and keep watch with Me.’”

 

            At the end of the last SD I was talking about Peter, James, and John who were the leaders of the Apostles, as they were the inner circle to whom Jesus gave special attention throughout His ministry.  And Now I want to move on to what MacArthur writes after this section that I ended with yesterday.

 

            “It was surely for that reason that the Lord took those three with Him to pray.  He wanted to teach them further about facing strong temptation with confidence in God rather than in themselves.  In light of their self-declared dependability (v. 35), the disciples needed to learn the humility and poverty of spirit that is necessary before God can effectively use His people (see Matt. 5:3).  He wanted Peter, James, and John to be convinced and convicted of their foolish smugness and feelings of invincibility.  And He wanted them, in turn, to teach their fellow disciples that lesson.” 

 

            As I continue to look at these verses, verses that I have read over many times in the last 50 years of being a born-again believer in Jesus Christ I am learning new things from them.  One may wonder why Jesus took these three disciples with Him during this most critical part of His ministry on planet earth.  One may think that He needed someone to bring comfort to Him, but these three would not be able to do that in the selfish shape that they were in.  MacArthur writes “He took them along for their benefit, not His.”  That statement truly fits the character of our Lord who even in His great time of need He was looking out to teach these apostles of His.

 

            He goes on to write “His purpose also was to teach that, as important and helpful as the fellowship and support of other believers can be, there are times when one’s only help is direct communion with God in prayer.  He wanted to show them vividly that, in His humanness, even the divine Son of God needed the sustenance of His heavenly Father.

 

            “Fallen, sinful humanity refuses to acknowledge its weakness, but the unfallen, sinless Son of Man well knew His human weakness.  When He became flesh and dwelt among men as a man, He accepted the weaknesses that are common to all humanity.  He experienced the weakness of hunger, thirst, pain, and temptation.  Now He was about to experience the supreme human weakness: death.”

 

            I continue looking from MacArthur’s commentary as what he is writing is somewhat new to me, and therefore I want to have him express his learning’s to me and to those who read this SD.

 

            “In acknowledging His human weakness and His consequent need for His heavenly Father’s presence and strength, Jesus did what the disciples saw no need for doing.  It was because He looked to His Father that He endured and passed every temptation, including sin-bearing and death—the severest test of all.  Every moment of Jesus’ life, from His first cry as an infant to His last cry from the cross, was lived in total submission to His heavenly Father.  And through that sinless submission during His humanity He became a high priest who can fully ‘sympathize with our weakness,…one who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin’(Heb. 4:15).”

 

            We will continue to look at this section in our SD for tomorrow, and I must say that truly has been a learning session for me.

 

5/18/2024 10:15 AM

No comments:

Post a Comment