Past Devotions

“Yet He [Jesus] Himself bore our sicknesses and He carried our pains, but we in turn regarded Him stricken, struck down by God and afflicted.”  [Isaiah 53:4 Christian Standard Bible]

That verse, of course, is part of the prophetic utterance of Isaiah regarding our Savior’s sufferings and cross.

“He carried our pains.” Other translations say that “He carried our sorrows.” Either way, our pain, our sorrows, were borne by our Savior.

As I read that phrase this morning, I was reminded of Matthew 11:28-30:  “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”  [NIV]

Jesus carried our pains and sorrows to the cross. That burden was so heavy, so devastating that the mere thought of what He would have to endure made Him think He might die from the sorrow alone.  Because He bore our burden, our sicknesses, our pains … because He was struck down and afflicted, He now offers us a yoke that is easy and a burden that is light.

What a trade!  I think I’ll spend today praising Him for taking my heavy burden.

I was reminded recently about the groups of people gathered around the cross. There were the ones who loved Jesus and stood weeping. Scripture tells us of John, the beloved disciple, Jesus’ mother, and a few other women who had gathered.

Then there were those who hated Jesus and who mocked and cursed, shouting hateful things to a man who had done nothing but good – just because He didn’t fit their idea of what the Messiah should be.

There was also a third group, the Romans Soldiers. For them, this was just a job to get finished, they couldn’t care less about the men on those crosses, they were just indifferent.

But as I thought about those groups, I heard the LORD say something that stopped me short.  He said, “don’t be so sure you would have been among the weepers.”

Those words pierced my soul. If I had been there, would my heart have been tender, or would it have been hardened or indifferent?

Of course, now my heart has been softened by God, and if I saw this happening today, I would weep. But I know that my heart was hard and desperately wicked before Christ changed me. I have come to accept that I just may have been among those who cursed.  That is an extremely humbling thought.   [Jeremiah 17:9]

Today I am so grateful for the salvation Christ purchased that gave me a new heart, soft and tender before God. I am so much more in love with my Savior than I have ever been. Today, I am stand among the weepers. Thank you, Lord.

Philippians 1:27: “Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.”

 “Whatever happens ….”  Paul wrote this from prison. He didn’t know if he was going to be set free or executed. He even debated a bit about which would be better, to go home to the LORD or to stay for the church here. He concluded that whatever happens, his readers should conduct themselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.

“Whatever happens ….” As a minister of the gospel of Christ, as a pastor of a church, someone whom God calls “servant,” I need to be constantly aware of how I handle the gospel of Christ.

I’ve just spent days in the Gospel accounts of Gethsemane studying the prayer of Jesus to His Father on the night of His betrayal. It was an intense, holy, prayer flowing deep from the heart of our LORD as He contemplated the enormity of what “being about His Father’s work” would encompass. As I seek God for the Resurrection Sunday message, I must make sure that what I speak honors that.

I wrestle with developing a message directed to visitors that won’t offend them but will invite them back … that’s what most of the offers from church resource groups have encouraged me to do. I do want visitors to feel welcomed and loved by us, but I struggle with forming messages for visitors rather than the people who have been faithful to God all year long.

“Whatever happens …” I must conduct myself on Resurrection Sunday (and every Sunday) in a manner worthy of Christ’s Good News (even if that means visitors don’t come back.)  We all must be faithful to honor the Gospel of Christ. Everything we do must be as worthy of Jesus’ sacrifice as we are able to make it so.

Luke 22:42:  “Father…not my will, but yours be done.”

We come to the final part of Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane.  Surrender.

Jesus had laid it all out before His Father in abject humility. He had suffered intensely as He considered what His Father was asking Him to do – drink the cup of wrath for the punishment of the sins of all the world. He knew His death would not be an easy, quiet, peaceful one.

His death would incorporate the rejection of His own people, the abandonment of those closest to Him, torture, the degradation of spittle and mockery. He would be crucified by Roman soldiers who cared nothing about Him – to them He was just a job to get done.

Then for hours He would hang naked, bleeding, fighting for air on a rough wooden cross. And before He would relinquish His life there, He would sense the mysterious, fearful, ugly separation from His Father.

In the Garden, before any of that took place, He surrendered His will and His life to the Father’s will.  “Not what I want,” He said to His Father, “but what You want.”

Perhaps that must be the final part in all our prayers.  Not what I want, LORD, but what You want.  Amen.

Luke 22:43-44: “An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him. And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.”

I cannot even imagine the intensity and mental pressure arising from my LORD’s struggle in Gethsemane. How tremendous was the weight of the sin and punishment in that cup of wrath that was set before Him that He sweated drops of blood? The agony of Christ simply poured out onto the ground. Jesus could not even have continued in His prayer if an angel from heaven had not been sent by His Father to strengthen Him.

As I read those two verses I am touched deep in my soul. Words cannot even describe how I feel. When I consider that my Savior, God’s Son, endured all this for me, I can barely breathe.

How often have my thoughts of the cross been simply routine. The story has become so familiar that I sometimes glibly recount it. It ceases to make me pause, gasp, and fall to my knees.

I know I am saved. I know I have been adopted into the Father’s house, a child of God. I know all my sins are forgiven. I know God has promised me good things. I know heaven is mine. I know … I know.  But do I really know what all this cost my LORD?

Father forgive me for taking Your Son’s sacrifice lightly. Forgive me for my complacency and disrespect. Help me to truly know the cost of my salvation. Amen.

“’Abba, Father,’ he said, ‘everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me.’” [Mark 14:36]

I am awestruck by the honesty of this prayer. Jesus knew what was ahead of Him. Like any man, the trials and torture and crucifixion would have been a fearful experience, but the part that seems to have troubled Him the most was that “cup” of God’s wrath. He would have to drain that “cup” to its bitter dregs, taking upon Himself the sins of the world in their most horrendous punishment … and in the process experiencing a separation from His Father. How that all transpired cannot even be understood by us, it is a mystery that we may never be able to unravel.

Knowing all this, Jesus was honest with His Father. “Father, You can do anything and everything, is there is any other way that salvation can be accomplished apart from my drinking this cup of degradation and wrath?”

The writer of Hebrews tells us to “fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” [12:2]

“…who for the joy set before him endured the cross.”  That joy was the open door of salvation He would accomplish for us. But understand, there was no joy that night in Gethsemane. This was an hour of darkness and agony. It was a time of honest intercession … “take this cup from me.”

Let’s be authentic in our approach to God and in our pleas. God is not impressed by our pretense that we have it all together, but He will respond to us in our honesty and in our desperation.

Jesus took His disciples with Him to Gethsemane that night.  He left most of them in one place and took the three closest to Him, Peter, James and John farther. Then He went a stone’s throw away from them. They could see He was in agony, down on His face in the dirt. They could hear His cries. Their contribution in all this, however, was to fall asleep. I can’t really blame them. They’d consumed a meal prior to going and it was nighttime after all.

Jesus came back and woke them and then returned to pray. He came back a second time, woke them again, and urged them to pray that they would not fall into temptation. Then Matthew tells us, “So he left them and went away once more and prayed the third time, saying the same thing.” [26:44]

Jesus persevered in prayer.  Three times He sought His Father. Three times He said the same thing. He wasn’t going to give up until the matter was settled one way or another.  He was determined to hear His Father’s response.

I often wonder how determined I am in prayer.  Do I pray until the matter is settled … until I hear God say yes, no, or not now? Or do I just tell God what I think He needs to hear and how I think He needs to act, and then disappear.

It was a year ago that I began to pray for the “Presence of Christ” to manifest in our church and our community. I am still praying. I intend to persevere in that plea for the “Presence” until God says, “Yes, I’m here now,” or until He tells me to stop. I must follow my LORD’s example and persevere, even to saying the same thing(!) each time.

“Even so, come LORD JESUS. Amen”

I have always been intrigued by Jesus prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane. There we see Him at His lowest moment. There we see Him seeking His Father, all too aware of what is just ahead for Him. And it is there we see His will set for the suffering He will face. When Jesus leaves the Garden, there is no wavering. Through each trial, through every torture, through the hours on the cross, Jesus is in control. He answers His accusers when He chooses to do so. He forgives. He takes care of His mother. And when “it is finished,” He relinquishes His Spirit to His Father. This all was settled in the Garden.

One of the most precious moments in Jesus’ prayer is found Mark 14:36:  “Abba, Father,” he said.

“Abba Father.”  Jesus’ prayer was a prayer grounded in relationship. He was His Father’s Son and that night in His deepest distress, He did what He always did, He went to His Father in prayer. This was not the first time. The Gospels are full of references to Jesus praying in the night or early morning hours. His relationship with His Father was strong and vital and consistent.

What the Son had in His relationship with the Father can be ours too. Because of His sacrifice, we have been granted adoption into the Father’s family. This is a binding pledge by the Father to His children, granting them the full rights of sonship.  We forfeited our right as God’s creation when mankind fell, but nothing can now take way our rights as sons and daughters to the Father’s love and protection.  Jesus’ cry is now our cry also.

“Abba Father, hear my cry.”

I am spending time in the Garden of Gethsemane with Jesus this week.  I want to learn from the way He prayed that night before His arrest.

Yesterday, I learned that His prayer was a solitary one. It was also a humble prayer.  After leaving His disciples, Matthew tells us, “He went a little farther and fell on His face and prayed.” [Matt 26:39 NKJV]

I’ve often seen that painting of Jesus praying in the Garden, hands folded sweetly, light pouring from the heavens, serenity on His face, kneeling by a rock.  Nice picture, but that’s not what I read in Scripture. There was nothing sweet nor serene about this prayer. His posture was one of abject humility. He literally “fell on His face” on the ground.

Jesus was in agony. He was sorrowful enough that He thought that sorrow alone might kill Him. He fell to the ground, face buried in the dirt.  Here was the Son of God coming to His Father in poverty of spirit. This was no “name it and claim it” attitude—even though no one had a greater right to such.

Sometimes all we can do is fall on our face before God. Sometimes all we should do is fall on our face before God!  But, whatever our physical posture, our heart’s posture must always be one of humility.  We are approaching the Great God, the Awesome God who dwells in unapproachable light.  [1 Timothy 6:16]

I want to spend some time in the Garden with Jesus … oh, not that proverbial rose garden full of loveliness and peace, but the Garden of Gethsemane full of loneliness and struggle. I want to learn how to pray from the way Jesus prayed.

The first thing I noticed was that while Jesus took His disciples with Him, His prayer was a solitary one.  “Then Jesus came with them to a place called Gethsemane, and said to the disciples, ‘Sit here while I go and pray over there.’ And He took with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and He began to be sorrowful and deeply distressed. Then He said to them, ‘My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death. Stay here and watch with Me.’ He went a little farther and fell on His face and prayed.”  [Matt 26:36-39 NKJV]

He told most of His followers to stay in a certain place, and took the closest three, Peter, James and John, a little farther with Him.  Then He left the three and proceeded even farther away. Jesus’ prayer was a solitary one.

There is room in our lives for corporate prayer, of course.  It is a good thing to pray with others, family, friends, or in a corporate setting.  There is power in that type of prayer where two or three are gathered, but in the times of intense pain and trouble, going into our prayer “closet” where no ear hears but God’s is best.

I often spend time in private, personal prayer before I pray with others. There I pour my deepest desires and most intense pain out before my LORD. I can be completely transparent and honest. Most times I say little, my words are few. I don’t need to tell God what He already knows. I just need to be with Him.

Solitary prayer.