Situated at the foot of the Mount of Olives, the Garden
of Gethsemane was the place Jesus chose to pray the night before he was
crucified. Its name means “oil press.” The image is unmistakable; olives
pressed between two heavy stones, all the life squeezed from them, oozing with
a smooth, fragrant emollient used for healing and for food. It was just the place
to pray the kind of prayers Jesus prayed that night.
The writer of Hebrews described what happened in the
garden:
Jesus “offered prayers and
pleadings, with a loud cry and tears, to the one who could rescue him from
death. And God heard his prayers because of his deep reverence for God.”
(Hebrews 5:7).
Prayers and pleadings, with loud cries and tears. Jesus was
in agony. He wanted to be spared this suffering and so he turned to the One who could save him. He brought the fullness
of his humanity, the honesty of his desires, into his prayerful petition. Perhaps
as the image above suggests, Jesus placed his own head between his arms as
though between a vice of mill stones, embodying his anguish. “My Father! ‘If it
is possible, let this cup of suffering be taken away from me. Yet I want your
will to be done, not mine’” (Matthew 26:39)—you can hear him saying.
“And God heard his prayers because of his deep reverence
for God.”
God heard the heart of Jesus’ prayers, his willingness to
yield his will to his father’s. And God responded—not with a benevolent gesture
of swiping the cup from his hands. God’s heart opened to Jesus’ deeper prayers,
his surrendered prayers that found their way out through the oil press. “Your-will-be-done-prayers.”
Deep reverence.
I know a little about this kind of praying. Lately, it’s where
I’ve gone to process a dream I have—a dream I’ve been pursuing. When I pray, pleas
are squeezed out of me and anguish spills over as I embrace my desire while
simultaneously surrendering it to God. It’s been metamorphic. The pressure has forced
me to face my own willfulness and need to entrust God with my desires.
There are times in our lives when we must choose, like Jesus, to
go to the Garden of Gethsemane and engage in prayer that feels as though we are
in an oil press. The passion inside us is squeezed out into churning petitions
as we work through our willingness to choose God’s will over our own.
Is there anything you need to process in the oil press of Gethsemane prayer?
This post is part
of the InterVarsity Press Lenten Blog tour. To read the other IVP authors contributions, here are their blogs:
February 20th
Rachel Stone: http://eatwithjoy.org/2012/02/20/lenten-fasting-easter-feasting/
February 27th
Margot Starbuck: http://margotstarbuck.blogspot.com/2012/02/being-formed-in-grocery-checkout-line.html
March 5th Brent
Bill: http://holyordinary.blogspot.com/2012/03/time-is-fulfilled-lenten-meditation.html
March 12th Logan
Mehl-Laituri: http://feraltheology.wordpress.com/2012/03/10/maximilian-tebessa-lenten-abstinence/
March 19th Andrew
Byers: http://abyers.wordpress.com/2012/03/19/when-salvation-hurts/
March 26th Valerie
Hess: http://www.valeriehess.com/generalnews/spiritual-warfare-or-spiritual-laziness
April 2nd Beth
Booram: http://peregrinejourney.blogspot.com
April 6th;
Good Friday Chad Young: www.findingauthenticchristianity.com
1 comment:
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