Agony In The Garden (26:36-46).
Jesus and His disciples arrive in Gethsemane. We who know what to expect recognise that the crucial hour has come, but it is salutary to recognise that prior to His ordeal Jesus finds it necessary to pray. Aware of something of what lies ahead His prayer is agony as He seeks to ensure that what He is facing is really His Father's will. As with His not knowing the time of His coming (Matthew 24:36) it is a sign of His true humanity that He has to verify the path that He is treading because of how awful it will be. And He does it hoping that He might be wrong in His recognition of the path that He must take, that even at this eleventh hour it might prove not to be necessary. But in spite of all His thoughts and fears He is determined to obey the will of His Father. We should note that the resources that He calls on as He faces His cup of suffering are only those available to any man. His anguish too is like theirs. And in that Garden (although Matthew does not indicate that it was a Garden), unlike one who had failed in a previous Garden (Genesis 3), He prays through until ‘He is heard for His godly fear' (Hebrews 4:7). Then at last He is able to cease praying, with His soul at rest. He has prayed through to victory. Gethsemane means ‘ the oil press' (gat semanim). It was a suitable name for what He would endure.
The fact that previously we have not been introduced to the emotional life of Jesus serves to underline the fact here as His emotions are laid bare. The very soul of Jesus is, as it were being torn apart as He faces the cup of suffering.
The pattern is simple. Jesus arrives with His disciples, Jesus goes apart with the inner three to pray His threefold prayer, Jesus returns to His disciple.
Analysis.
a Then comes Jesus with them to a place called Gethsemane, and says to His disciples, “You sit here, while I go over there and pray” (Matthew 26:36).
b And He took with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and sore troubled (Matthew 26:37).
c Then He says to them, “My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even to death, you remain here, and watch with Me.” And He went forward a little, and fell on His face, and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass away from Me. Nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will” (Matthew 26:38-39).
d And He comes to the disciples, and finds them sleeping (Matthew 26:40 a).
e And says to Peter, “What, could you not watch with Me one hour?
f Watch and pray, that you enter not into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak” (Matthew 26:40-41).
e Again a second time He went away, and prayed, saying, “My Father, if this cannot pass away, except I drink it, your will be done” (Matthew 26:42).
d And He came again and found them sleeping, for their eyes were heavy (Matthew 26:43).
c And He left them again, and went away, and prayed a third time, saying again the same words (Matthew 26:44).
b Then comes He to the disciples, and says to them, “Sleep on now, and take your rest. Behold, the hour is at hand, and the Son of man is betrayed into the hands of sinners” (Matthew 26:45).
a “Arise, let us be going. Behold, he who betrays me is at hand” (Matthew 26:46).
Note that in ‘a' comes with His disciples to Gethsemane to pray, and He tells them to sit there, and in the parallel He calls on them to arise, and to leave with Him. In ‘b' He takes the three apart, it is the time for sore trouble, and in the parallel He returns to the disciples, it is the time for rest. The sore trouble is over. In ‘c' He faces His first ordeal, and in the parallel He faces His third ordeal. In ‘d' He returns to find them sleeping, and in the parallel He does the same. In ‘e' He despairs that they could not watch for the first hour, and in the parallel He goes off to face the second hour. Centrally in ‘f' He calls on them to watch and pray and recognises their weakness.
Interestingly there is also another pattern here in the threefold periods of prayer. The first is given in full detail, the second in less detail and the third with the utmost brevity. And all are sandwiched within the framework of ‘a' and ‘b' in the chiasmus.