Watch and Pray, or Sleep On?

Post 349

(Related readings: Matthew 26:30-46, Mark 14: 26-42, Luke 22:31-46, John 18:1-2).

I am keenly aware that we have a Presidential election in one week. I am also aware that many Christians, knowing full well that Hillary Clinton personifies wickedness, are very zealous and confident that Donald Trump is the right choice to defeat her and her wickedness. I intend to have that discussion in the next Post and I hope to post it before the election. But this Post is more important to have in play before that one. This one helps us correct our foundational error of Worldview perception regarding the topic that is clouding believer’s minds with debilitating sorrow for our nation.
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What’s The Point of the Passage?

“Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane, and saith unto the disciples, Sit ye here, while I go and pray yonder. And he took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and very heavy. Then said he unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death: tarry ye here, and watch with me. And he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt” Matthew 26:36-39.

Anyone who has any familiarity with the Gospels of the scriptures will immediately recognize this as from the passage where Jesus was in stunningly revealing prayer just before his unspeakable horrors began. His disciple’s participation is described as passive at best and, to us looking back on the event, irrelevant: “Bla-bla-bla and Jesus asked God to let him off the hook.” We simply blank out the irrelevant and focus on Jesus’ prayer to contemplate what he must have meant by asking the Father to let him escape what was soon to come. We foolishly wonder if his humanity and fear were causing him second thoughts regarding why he knew he was here (*1). But I ask you; Did his prayer result in the answer he would have preferred? No. So what good were Jesus’ prayers at this time in this garden? Does Jesus waste words? Does he do fruitless things? What are we supposed to get from this passage besides the common assumption that it describes his weak humanity? Why include the bit about the disciples napping?
I propose that what Jesus was looking for in prayer also has something to do with his disciples’ need to pray. Let’s read further to see if we can find it:

“And he cometh unto the disciples, and findeth them asleep, and saith unto Peter, What, could ye not watch with me one hour? Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak” Matthew 26:40-41.

After waking them, Jesus told them why it was important that they should be watching and praying as he had instructed; So that they might not enter into temptation (*2).
What temptation do you suppose Jesus was speaking of? What were their spirits all willing to experience that their flesh might find too overpowering if they didn’t watch and pray? This section so closely follows the previous that it doesn’t even identify who was with Jesus as they went; “Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane…” Who are them? Why it’s the disciples that just told him they would die with him rather than deny him:

“Peter said unto him, Though I should die with thee, yet will I not deny thee. Likewise also said all the disciples. Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane…” Matthew 26:35-36a.

Now stay with me. Jesus had just told them that they would all deny him because of the events of that very night, and he said it was prophesied in scripture that they would (Matthew 26:31=Zechariah 13:7). But instead of appearing as broken as they must have been about the unbreakable scriptures regarding themselves this very night, they confidently replied to the contrary with bold, self-powered bravado, unintentionally but effectively claiming the scriptures to be wrong rather than accepting that their flesh was weaker than their present resolve. I mean; It’s sort of defeatist to just openly acknowledge or accept the inevitable, right?

Jesus was watching and praying in the time that his sorrow was the heaviest. He was preparing himself for what was to come. He was capitalizing on his Father’s bigger Worldview, which has the power to expand our limited human perspective. If the Son of God needed to do that; how much more the disciples?
But Peter didn’t need it; he was ready! In fact, when a few hours later they came in mass with weapons of war to get Jesus, Peter proved Jesus wrong by swinging his sword to defend his Messiah, alone if necessary; “Deny my Lord? Hardly!”
Now here is the real clincher:
With a smaller, limited, watchless, prayerless, unprepared Worldview, Peter used his sharp intellect, his dedicated brave spirit, and his Jewish education of the scriptures and understanding of the Messiah now come, to do what seemed certain to him to be the right thing, regardless of the personal cost. What bravery! What dedication! What loyalty! Oh to hear the words; ‘Well done thou good and faithful servant’!
What shock it must have been to hear Jesus’ unexpected response:

“Then said Jesus to Peter, Put up thy sword into the sheath: the cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?” John 18:11.

(For more detail of Jesus’ bigger perspective on this, read Matthew 26:52-54).
So is it possible that the temptation Jesus spoke of to Peter, regarding the temptation he was to watch and pray to avoid or at least be victorious in, might have been the temptation to take up arms and fight to the death to defend the Messiah himself? And if Peter’s focus was instead on overcoming the temptation to deny his Lord in this way, it’s just possible that his brave action that was rebuffed by Jesus rather than rewarded, may very well have been the cause of his spirit’s deflation, which then made it impossible for him to keep from denying his Lord later “when all was obviously lost” and his carefully constructed spiritual perspective destroyed. Even as a devout follower of Christ, his focus was on the wrong Worldview entirely. His Normalcy Bias told him matter-of-fact that, in spite of the strange things Jesus had been saying for some time, the long awaited Messiah could not actually die. Peter’s Worldveiw could not even contemplate such a thing. Only watching and praying in the proper time of preparation could have aligned his spirit and his flesh with God’s Grand Tapestry so that he would have the right response in the time of temptation.

“…For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD…” Isaiah 55:7-9.

I’m going to hit this sore nail yet again: I have observed that the more Christian women read their bibles and get excited by the revelation it provides them, the less they are willing to submit their reason to their husbands, as God commands, and we have covered. My concern is not with wives and husbands, but so it is with Christians toward Christ, and specifically at this time, regarding the upcoming election. We refuse to hear what we have not prepared ourselves to hear. We only accept what makes sense to our carefully crafted human perspective of reason. The pattern in layers of Type remains consistent, and we are yet to actually see it clearly enough to apply its point in the practical world. But the time is now.

What they were to be praying for was what they would needed in the time that their very faith was going to be tried to the breaking point, because the events of reality were going to shake their very foundation of faith by seeming to destroy the substance of faith itself.

OK, so with this new bit of contemplation let’s return to our chosen topic of passage. Of those in his tight group of followers, why do you suppose Jesus told the general disciples; “Sit ye here, while I go and pray yonder,” but took Peter, James and John a bit further before telling them to; “Tarry ye here, and watch with me,” before going yet a bit further to pray by himself? I propose that the answer can be found in the distinction between what Jesus knew but didn’t reveal, vs. what he revealed to the three, that he didn’t reveal to the others:

“And he took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and very heavy. Then said he unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death: tarry ye here, and watch with me” Matthew 26:37-38.

I propose that the common disciples that came with him to the garden could not handle the truth that their Lord was unspeakably troubled: “He’s the Messiah for crying out loud; How could he be troubled? such a thought is kin to blasphemy!” so he kept from them anything that would alarm their simple faith, he only required them to participate by their presence as dedicated members of his team, much as David’s keepers of the stuff (I Samuel 30:24-25); “Sit ye here, while I go and pray yonder.”
But Peter and the sons of Zebedee were of the Lord’s inner circle, they had what we might call “better seats” in Christ’s kingdom, much perhaps as the martyrs get a better resurrection than the average saint (Hebrews 11:35). These better seats are earned by condition of experience, while in no way diminishing the place of those who stay by the stuff for weakness. With more capacity comes more responsibility; “Tarry ye here, and watch with me.” And with more responsibility comes more intimate knowledge; “and (he) began to be [visibly] sorrowful and very heavy. (and he said;) My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death:” With the intimate information it was their special job to do more than wait as Jesus had commanded the others (Revelation 3:8-11); they were to watch and pray (Revelation 2:8-11).

Watch G1127 gregoreuo; from G1453; to keep awake, i.e. watch (literally or figuratively):-- be vigilant, wake, (be) watch(-ful).
Pray G4336 proseuchomai; from G4314 and G2172; to pray to God, i.e. supplicate, worship:-- pray (X earnestly, for), make prayer.

So now imagine Jesus’ disappointment when he returned from prayer to find them sleeping:

“And he cometh unto the disciples, and findeth them asleep, and saith unto Peter, What, could ye not watch with me one hour?” Matthew 26:40.

Their watching and praying were not so much for him but for them: “That ye enter not into temptation.” We get more of the right perspective from Luke’s narrative of the evening’s events:

“And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not…” Luke 22:32.

Why would their faith fail? Jesus needed them to be strong for what was coming, because what was coming was going to shake their Worldview; it was going to destroy their “Christian Normalcy Bias” if you will. They needed to be strong in the Lord, not strong in their own strength. This kind of strength comes only through prayer and alertness (Matthew 17:21, Luke 2:37-38).

So just for contemplation’s sake, imagine how the later narrative might have gone if they had stayed awake and watched with the Lord:

“…The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field: but while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way” Matthew 13:24-25.

For one; a prayed up and aligned perspective would not have been to take up swords as a team and successfully defended the Lord from being taken and crucified; that was all in the Lord’s design laid out in prophecy even before the earth was made. Peter did not have the Lord’s perspective… on almost EVERYTHING!

OK fine, but they did sleep. No sense in crying over spilt milk now.
Moving on.
Now contemplate why Jesus stopped his desperate prayer to check on his disciples, wake them, and encourage them to stay awake to pray while he went back to prayer. Their watching and praying for their preparation was obviously very important to Jesus, even at this time of his own great need.
So contemplate that when he came back a second time to check on their praying, he again found them sleeping:

“And he came and found them asleep again: for their eyes were heavy” Matthew 26:43.

We may get the idea in Matthew’s passage that Jesus just left them undisturbed the second time, but Mark 14:40 informs us that at his questioning for their second slumber they had no idea what to say. It’s curious why the scriptures seem to hide the details here among the several gospels, requiring that we earnestly search to find it, but Luke gives us even more explanation for their severe drowsiness:

“And when he rose up from prayer, and was come to his disciples, he found them sleeping for sorrow” Luke 22:45.

Sorrow G3077 lupe; apparently a primary word; sadness:-- grief…

What were they so grief stricken over that it caused them to blank out, turn off, go to sleep? Maybe they didn’t actually know, as evidenced by the fact they had no explanation for their inability to stay awake, but it was the same spirit of sorrow that had overtaken Christ himself: the near future was unimaginably bleak. In our modern vernacular we might carefully call it depression without attempting to add to scripture what it doesn’t actually say. Clearly even this inner circle of three were not so sorrowful that they were close to death, as was Jesus, but he stayed up to watch and pray while they were too sorrowful to. And don’t pull the simple explanation that “he was God,” and so explain away their failure as mere humans. He was human enough to ask the Father to give him an out when he knew there wasn’t one, yet that man stayed to pray it through. It was this same man that asked his disciples to comfort him as team members in mutual prayer. But they just couldn’t overcome the sickness of heart and spirit.

Now comes the confusing part, that has answers in its discovery:
When he finished praying, and came back the third time to find them sleeping yet again, he said to the sleeping; “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.” It might make sense… until the verse goes on as we hear him continue by saying; “Rise, let us be going: behold, he is at hand that doth betray me.” That’s really odd. Let’s read the passage as written to be sure we get it right:

“And he left them, and went away again, and prayed the third time, saying the same words. Then cometh he to his disciples, and saith unto 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. Rise, let us be going: behold, he is at hand that doth betray me” Matthew 26:44-46.

So which is it; “Keep sleeping because…”; or “Wake up because…”? What is he saying? How can it be both?

What we have to understand in the interpretation is that there are two issues going on simultaneously; one spiritual and the other temporal. Their drowsiness was a spiritual issue with a physical affect, providing the second issue.
Jesus was not asking them to stand watch so that bad guys wouldn’t catch him while he was praying; they were to be watching and praying about a spiritual issue that would threaten their very faith. So when they failed to stay praying, and let their sorrow overcome them, they fell asleep spiritually as well as physically. When Jesus came back the third time, his praying was finished, that period of opportunity to watch and pray was past. So he said to the spiritually sleeping; keep on sleeping now, at the same time he told them physically to get up, because the time for praying was over. Now was the time for events:

“And while he yet spake, lo, Judas, one of the twelve, came, and with him a great multitude…” Matthew 26:47.

If you dissect the words of the two instructions you find this truth. “behold, the hour is at hand, and the Son of man is betrayed into the hands of sinners.” Jesus as God called himself the Son of man. He is speaking a spiritual truth: The determined time has come that Christ be betrayed unto the power of the wicked, vs. the physical fact that Judas has now come to betray the man Jesus. The instruction is different for each of the events, though they are one in the same by practical reasoning. How to know which to do in each of the realms of the same event is why we should be alert and in communion with God.
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So what does it mean? How do we apply this?
The scriptures are written in a way that allows many various right applications, while at the same time having one overshadowing point. Here is how I propose this applies to the United States of America, here, at this specific time in history, with our history being overshadowed by this specific time in human history per the prophetic clock that keeps ticking down our seven-thousand-year existence, with events pre-written in stone as it were.

The United States of America has had two recognized Great Awakenings in our nation’s time of watching and praying that we do not enter temptation (Google it). The first was in the 1730s-40s, and the second was in the 1790s-1820s. There is scripturally no third awakening.

“America, America, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not…” Luke 22:32 applied.

As a Christian nation we were to remain alert and prayerful, beseeching God that we would not enter temptation, let alone fall to it. But after being awakened by the Lord, we fell asleep. Twice. Now as Jesus comes to us at the end of our preparation period there is no more time to be praying in that manner for that cause. Now is the time for the events, the preparation is over. Keep sleeping spiritually, even as you intellectually “wake up” to the grave danger now upon us:

“He that is unjust, let him be unjust still: and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still: and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still: and he that is holy, let him be holy still. And behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give to every man according as his work shall be” Revelation 22:11-12.

Remember, this is an application of layer. The actual passage for individuals is specifically written for a time yet in the future, but for the United States of America as a nation, the time of this application is now. “Behold, the hour is at hand, and the Son of man, as the God of this nation, is betrayed into the hands and jurisdiction of sinners.” And for the world; the repercussions will trickle down.
Christians who have been spiritually sleeping during the time they should have remained alert will be unable to see the big picture, and so, like Peter and his sword, though full of zeal, will not be able to respond to the events correctly. It’s generally too late to change that now. Now we cling to the faith we have and see if our faith stands when the smoke and blood clears.

“Every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. … If any (Christian*) man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire” I Corinthians 3:13,15 (*see v.11-12).

Now ask yourself; How does this apply to our imminent choice for U.S. President?
I hope to discuss that in the next Post.
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(*1) Regarding Jesus’ knowledge that his crucifixion was written in stone unchangeable:
“Jesus therefore, knowing all things that should come upon him,…” John 18:4a,
“And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he (Jesus) expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself” Luke 24:27.
“For dogs have compassed me: the assembly of the wicked have inclosed me: they pierced my hands and my feet. I may tell all my bones: they look and stare upon me. They part my garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture” Psalm 22:16-18 as one example among many.

(*2) “Ye are they which have continued with me in my temptations. And I appoint unto you a kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto me; That ye may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom, and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel” Luke 22:28-30.
“And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen” Matthew 6:13.
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