Stay Awake!
Read: Matthew 26:36-46
The Garden of Gethsemane is a lovely place with ancient olive trees and a feeling of peacefulness about it, but standing in the Garden on a bright blue-sky sunny day brought to my mind a very different setting when, on a dark night, Jesus came to the Garden and brought his disciples with him. He asked them to wait and watch while he went off to pray. However, when he returned, he found them sleeping. He asked Peter, “could you not stay awake with me one hour?” Two more times he asked them to stay awake while he prayed, and two more times they fell asleep. Jesus had been praying to the Father that if it was possible, that what he was about to bear would not come to pass, but nevertheless he said “not what I want, but what you want.”
Standing there in the garden, I pictured all this in my mind, and later in the days as I thought more about it, I wondered if I would, or could, have said that. Every time we pray the Lord's prayer, we say “thy will be done.” I asked myself if I really try to live my life as God will, or as I will. I wondered if, like the disciples in the garden, would I too have fallen asleep? I wondered is my faith sleeping when I should be wide awake and alert to the teachings of Jesus.
Jesus told the disciples to get up and be going, as the hour was at hand. All I could think was maybe it's time for me to be up and going, but, above all, I thought, “Stay awake! Stay awake!”
Marian Walker
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