Stay here and watch with Me. —Matthew 26:38
{CHAMBERS} “Our Lord is
trying to introduce us to identification with Himself through a particular
“Gethsemane” experience of our own. […] The disciples loved Jesus Christ to the
limit of their natural capacity, but they did not fully understand His purpose.
In the Garden of Gethsemane they slept as a result of their own sorrow, and at
the end of three years of the closest and most intimate relationship of their
lives they “all…forsook Him and fled” (Matthew 26:56). “They were all filled with the Holy Spirit…”
(Acts 2:4). “They” refers to the same people, but something wonderful has
happened between these two events— our Lord’s death, resurrection, and
ascension— and the disciples have now been invaded and “filled with the Holy
Spirit.” Our Lord had said, “You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has
come upon you…” (Acts 1:8). This meant that they learned to watch with Him the
rest of their lives.”
{ELGIN} This new life we live, we live by faith in Christ, (Galatians 2:20) by the power of the Holy Spirit of God in us. Making the connection to that reality is what
most of us stumble over. The thing that
trips us up as we walk in the way that the Lord has shown us. We are so easily drawn to the influence of
the flesh and away from a life of faith.
Trusting in ourselves. Relying on
our own designs and abilities, when the success in life we live in Christ is
totally dependent upon faith, trust and obedience. We tend to switch our spirituality on and off
like a light switch. All along feeling
justified in what we have done or said or thought. The danger is that we don’t recognize it as
sin, but rather, as acceptable to us, and therefore acceptable to God. The problem is that we have quenched the
Spirit and are unaffected by His influence because we have hardened our hearts
and dulled our ears to His voice. Are
you thinking “that is not me”? It is all
of us my friend! It is the struggle we
all have with our old nature.
Turning to
our old nature is like slipping into an old pair of shoes. So easy and so comfortable, but so
wrong. (2 Corinthians 5:17) “If anyone is in Christ, they are a NEW
creature, OLD things have passed away, and all things are becoming New.” This is something that is easy to see in
others. (Luke 6:42) “How can you say
to your brother, 'Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,' when you
yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the
plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from
your brother's eye.” In psychology it is
called “projection”. Recognizing your
own faults in the life of someone else.
Being critical of the faults in others so you don’t have to deal with your own sin. Christian,
we have been called to a life that we must live by faith and dependence upon
God, by the power of the Spirit and the Word of God. I want to encourage you to meditate on
that. To stay and watch in the garden of
this life and look to the Father as your source for everything.
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