GREAT DROPS OF BLOOD

What a night this is.

I read your Book, Jesus, and I know what happens in a few hours. You do too.
This night is the last checkpoint before the awesome plan of salvation crafted in Heaven unfolds.

It is the Eve of Redemption.

You chose a garden, familiar place, a quiet place you had been to many times. Two thousand years later I visited this place and saw olive trees so ancient they had known your presence. Of all the historical holy sites, Gethsemane remains the most emotional to me.

I know you told your disciples what was coming. What did you feel as you walked into this garden with them for this last time?

You could tell they didn’t really sense the urgency and finality of the moment. Did you wonder if you could really trust them with your mission? Would they rise to the occasion and carry your message into all the world?

I know you knew the end from the beginning, but you are also God and have the power to alter events however you wish.

When you slipped away deeper into the garden you asked them to pray with you. You knew their weak flesh would drowse them into sleep.

Maybe I understand this. You knew what they would do based on your foreknowledge, but you still gave them the option—even though they’d disappoint you.

How many times have you done that very same thing for all of us? You always let it be our choice even though you knew what choice we’d make. And because you didn’t intervene and over-ride our choice, it can be said you ordained it to happen the way it did.

How alone you must feel just now as you walk on to your praying place.

This is it.

The plan of all ages past and for all ages to come has come to this very moment. It’s decision time.

Is your mind reeling with the myriad of alternatives that you as God could ordain?

I remember that when the religious leaders brought before you the harlot they had caught in the act. You were teaching in the temple. They interrupted your teaching and presented you with what they thought was a brilliant trap. Jewish law required one thing, Roman law another and they asked you what should be done to her.

You are bigger than any logical box man could put you in. You surprised them with a third option. Faced with their own sin-guilt they just walked away and abandoned their charges.

Surely right now you can think of another way to redeem my soul.

You know Judas’ kiss is coming tonight. His name and action will evermore be the symbol of betrayal.

But you could stop it.

Vain little men with puffed up egos are going to stand in mocking judgment over you. One word and legions—ten thousands of angels--would come to your defense.
You could rise up in your God-ness and thunder out, “I am God!” and destroy every human imagination against you. But if you do, man will know you as God, but we won’t know you as our Redeemer who is touched by the feelings of our infirmities.

The body you are in is just as human as mine. You know the beatings by whips and sticks, the nails, the thirst are coming. Don’t you already feel the pain?
Beads of sweat on your face tell me of the inner battle you now fight.

The crown. What a cruel device. You know the acute sting of a thorn stab.

This night marks the border between time and eternity for your begotten body.

Did those great drops of blood on your brow escape into the present from the thorn wounds that will come later on tonight across this blurring edge of time?
Right now you are totally aware of the unmeasurable weight and pain of evil and sin. It’s no wonder you groan. In a few hours you’ll be carrying it to the cross. No wonder you will stumble under its load.

“O my Father!” Your cry shatters the garden silence and pierces my soul. I’ve never seen such pain.

“If it be possible, let this cup pass from me.” You say “if.” If there is another way…

But surely, even as you say it, you know there will be no other way. Every offered sacrifice—all the way back to the first atoning sacrifice in another garden called Eden—depends on your decision tonight for its meaning and efficacy. Your death, your blood, will be the atoning empowerment of your peoples’ sacrifice and prayers. Every sinner’s appeal to your blood from now on depends on this night.
You know you must.

“Nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt.”

There.

It’s done!

Even as you said it, I could sense the immediate calm in you—and in me. That cleansed feeling of every new believer was born with the one word, “Nevertheless.”

This night’s drama will unfold rapidly. Within hours it will be over. Confessed sins will forever be forgiven. Broken bodies will be healed.

And Lie’s head will be crushed.

You will say, “It is finished!”