The Pain Before The Cross (Mark #49)

Every school day between November and March, at about 2:30 in the afternoon, I would start to get nervous.

My stomach would go queasy. My knee would bounce. I could not concentrate. And I constantly felt like I had to go to the bathroom. Anyone else ever dealt with nervous bladder? It is infuriating.

The reason was that at 3:30 the bell would ring, I would walk down the hallway to the locker room, change clothes, and walk into what I can only describe as an hour of misery.

Most people called it wrestling practice. I called it getting beat up. It was the hardest thing I had ever faced. And if there was a dual meet or a tournament coming on Saturday, multiply that nervousness by four.

Now, if I had ever climbed Everest, wrestling practice would have felt like a nap. But in high school, that was the hardest thing I knew — and so my body started rebelling a full hour before I walked into it.

That is a very typical human response. Your body starts signaling that it does not like what is coming.

Maybe it is because you are heading into something genuinely difficult. Maybe it is something brand new, like a new job. Maybe it is something risky, like jumping out of a plane. Whatever it is, you decide you are going to do it — and beforehand your body puts you through the wringer.

Yes, there are those rare people who seem completely unflappable. Thirty seconds left in the Super Bowl and they walk onto the field like they are walking the dog. Bullets whizzing past and they say, hey, want to hear a good joke?

Those people are rare. Most of us shut down. Our mouths go dry. We feel like vomiting. We get the nervous jitters.

Today We See Jesus Suffer Before the Suffering

When we think about Jesus suffering during Holy Week, we think of the cross, the flogging, the crown of thorns — all that physical pain.

What we often do not stop to consider is that he went through enormous emotional pain first.

Today we are going to look at that. Because I believe that studying what he endured before the cross will show you just how much he loves you.

The Text: Mark 14:32–42

“And they went to a place called Gethsemane. And he said to his disciples, ‘Sit here while I pray.’ And he took with him Peter and James and John, and began to be greatly distressed and troubled. And he said to them, ‘My soul is very sorrowful, even to death. Remain here and watch.’

And going a little farther, he fell on the ground and prayed that, if it were possible, the hour might pass from him. And he said, ‘Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.’

And he came and found them sleeping, and he said to Peter, ‘Simon, are you asleep? Could you not watch one hour? Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.’

And again he went away and prayed, saying the same words. And again he came and found them sleeping, for their eyes were very heavy, and they did not know what to answer him. And he came the third time and said to them, ‘Are you still sleeping and taking your rest? It is enough; the hour has come. The Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand.’”

Put Yourself in a Disciple’s Sandals

Because we have been jumping around Mark 14, let me recap — but to really feel this passage, we need to back up further and recap the whole book.

Imagine you are one of the twelve. You have been with Jesus for three years.

You have heard this man teach, and he teaches unlike anyone else — with authority, wisdom, and knowledge. But it is not only the teaching. It is his sheer presence. No matter what comes at him, he moves through it with an unshakable peace.

And then there are the miracles.

You watched him feed five thousand people with a boy’s lunch. You watched the deaf hear, the blind see, the lame walk. You saw him drive a demon out of a man. You stood in a boat you were certain would capsize in a Galilee storm, and he stood up and said peace, be still — and the sea went flat.

And greatest of all, you watched a little girl who had died come back to life.

So maybe at the beginning you were unsure about this Jesus of Nazareth — he had been a carpenter, after all. But now you know beyond doubt: this is the Messiah, the Son of God.

And you are convinced he is about to set himself up as king. Who knows — maybe you will be part of his cabinet. Maybe you will hold a prominent position, because you rubbed shoulders with him. You know your kids and grandkids and neighbors and former classmates will be asking you to tell them stories, because you were part of the inner circle.

So by the end of chapter 13, you are riding high. You are with this man, and therefore you are pretty significant yourself.

And that is why chapter 14 is so disorienting.

Four Unsettling Weeks

Four weeks ago you were at a meal with Jesus and the others, and during it a woman broke open a jar of expensive perfumed oil and poured it on his head and feet. Judas objected that it could have been sold for a great deal of money. And Jesus said, leave her alone — she is preparing me for burial.

Wait. Burial? This Messiah, this king, is going to die soon and be buried? Surely I misheard him.

Then three weeks ago you were at the Passover meal — a deeply traditional Jewish meal you have celebrated since you were a child — and suddenly Jesus takes one of the cups and says, this is my blood. As though he is the lamb that was killed back in Egypt, whose blood protected the firstborn so they could be brought out. Again, he is talking about death.

Then last week, walking to the Mount of Olives after that meal, you hear him tell all of you that you will abandon him that very night.

No. Never. This is the Messiah. He is going to be a great king, and I get to be with him. I would never abandon this man. I will stay to the very end, even if it costs me my life.

And Then You See His Face

And now you reach verse 32. You enter the garden of Gethsemane, and this great Messiah says, sit here and pray. He calls Peter, James, and John aside and says, we are going over there.

And as Jesus turns, you see something on his face you have never seen before.

Worry. Concern. Turmoil. He is deeply troubled.

And as he walks away you overhear him: My soul is very sorrowful, even to the point of death.

What in the world is going on?

This is the greatest man who has ever lived, and he is shaken. When the religious leaders tried to trap him with trick questions in chapter 12, he was completely unflappable. Now they are nowhere near, it is only his friends here — and he is more troubled than you have ever seen him.

This is the man who stood in a boat and calmed a storm with a word. Why can he not calm the storm swirling inside him?

Because He Knew Exactly What Was Coming

Sometimes we are in turmoil because of the unknown. We do not know what the new job will be like. We do not know what life looks like now that this person has left, or after that loved one has died, or facing a diagnosis. The unknown creates the anxiety.

That is not what is happening to Jesus. It is the exact opposite.

Jesus knows precisely what is going to happen, down to the detail.

How is that possible? Because the Old Testament prophets had been describing it for centuries.

Isaiah 53 describes the Messiah in poetic terms and says he will be pierced for our transgressions — written five or six hundred years before the Romans perfected crucifixion. That same chapter says he will be like a lamb led to slaughter. Just like the Passover lamb whose blood was painted on the doorframe, so that when death came through it would see that something had already died there, and the firstborn could live.

Or take Numbers 21, where poisonous snakes come into the camp and God has Moses raise a bronze serpent on a pole in the middle of the camp — so that anyone bitten could simply look up, trust God to heal them, and live. Jesus later says that pointed to him: that he too would be lifted up, and anyone who looks to him would be healed spiritually.

I could go on and on through the Old Testament. And Jesus, as God the Son who breathed those words out through the human authors, was writing about what he knew was coming.

That is why three separate times in Mark — chapters 8, 9, and 10 — Jesus tells them what is going to happen. And in chapter 10 he does not just say he will be arrested, tried, and killed. He says he will be flogged. He says he will be mocked. He even says he will be spit upon.

He knew down to the saliva.

And that complete knowledge weighed on him.

But There Was Something Deeper

It was not only the knowledge of the physical suffering. He also knew what was happening at a spiritual level.

Paul gives us a glimpse in 2 Corinthians 5:21 — that for our sake God made him who knew no sin to be sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

In other words, just as a sacrificial lamb had never sinned and yet was treated as though it had, Jesus — who had never sinned — became the embodiment of sin, so that the wrath of God would fall on sin rather than on us, the actual sinners.

Peter says the same thing in 1 Peter 2:24: Jesus bore our sins in his body.

So there is far more happening here than whips and thorns and nails. Jesus is bearing the sin of the world. This is not merely physical. It is emotional, mental, and spiritual. And it is heavy.

Now you see why he says his soul is sorrowful to the point of death. Why he goes a little farther, falls to the ground with his face in the dirt, and says: Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me.

Sweating Like Drops of Blood

Luke, who was a physician by background, adds a detail in Luke 22:44 — that being in agony, Jesus prayed more earnestly, and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling to the ground.

Notice it does not say his sweat was blood. It says it became like blood.

So either his sweat became so thick and heavy that in the dark it looked like blood, or he was experiencing a rare condition called hematidrosis — where blood vessels rupture under extreme stress and blood seeps into the sweat glands, tinging the sweat red.

If that is what happened, it tells you the level of stress he was under, knowing exactly what was coming physically and spiritually.

What Was “This Cup”?

So no wonder he prays, remove this cup from me. But what cup?

Remember when we studied the Passover a few weeks ago. In the traditional Passover meal there are four cups — two before the main course and two after. Luke 22 tells us it is one of the cups after the meal that Jesus holds up and calls his blood.

Those two later cups were known as the cup of redemption and the cup of praise, or consummation. They reminded the Jewish people that God had redeemed their ancestors out of slavery in Egypt and made them his own — that they were together again, and this should lead them to praise.

So when Jesus holds that cup and says this is my blood, it is no longer only about bringing Israelites out of Egypt. He is saying: this is my blood, to bring you out of slavery to sin and make you mine again. And that should lead us to praise.

But while that is wonderful news for us, it was horrifying news for Jesus — because it meant it would cost him everything.

Isaiah 53 says that by his stripes we are healed. It was the stripes of the flogging across his back that brought our spiritual healing. It was his agony that brings us joy. It was his death that brings us life.

He went through hell to give us heaven.

And he knew exactly what he was walking into. Which is why we find him face-down in the dirt with a soul sorrowful to the point of death, saying, Father, remove this cup of redemption from me — because the cost is so high.

That is the suffering happening before Judas ever shows up.

Two Things We Need to See

1. Jesus was fully human

Orthodox Christianity has always affirmed the divinity of Christ. But sometimes people imagine Jesus was fifty percent God and fifty percent man.

That is not how it works. I am not thirty-three percent father, thirty-three percent husband, thirty-three percent pastor, and one percent sports fan. I am fully all of those. Jesus was one hundred percent God and one hundred percent man.

I stress this because we sometimes fall for the myth that even though he was fully human, he could dip into his divinity — as though it functioned like spiritual anesthetic that dulled the blow enough for him to get through.

No. Jesus suffered fully as a human. He was fully God, and he did not use that to soften any of this.

In fact, on the cross, a soldier dips a sponge in wine mixed with gall and lifts it to him because he says he is thirsty. And the moment Jesus tastes it and recognizes what it is — something that would numb the pain slightly — he spits it out and turns his head away. He refused it, because he knew he had to suffer this fully.

2. He persevered — and we need to understand how

When we lived in Kansas City, I hit a crisis point. I knew I was called to plant a church, and I believed it was Iowa, but we could not find a place. Through some advice I was told to take a week to fast and pray and figure out what God was doing.

One of the ideas I encountered was that God works in your life to prepare you for what is ahead. And as I looked back, I kept seeing the theme of perseverance. I was not a very good wrestler, and I persevered through the sport. I am not a particularly gifted musician, and I persevered to finish a music degree. And I began to sense that God was calling me to plant a church and that I could persevere and trust him.

But I do not tell that story to make myself the hero. Because looking honestly at my life, there are plenty of times I have not persevered and have instead looked for the escape hatch. The lame excuses I invent to skip a workout. The conversations I avoid because I want someone to like me. The way I look at a mountain of things to do and go hide in entertainment.

Thankfully, Jesus did not do what I do. He did not decide it was too much. He did not decide this was a great moment for a vacation. He did not pull out a distraction. He stayed. He persevered.

Why “Just Persevere” Is Not Enough

Now you are probably expecting me to say: go live like Jesus and persevere.

That is not a bad statement, but it is incomplete. And here is my fear.

If you walk out of here inspired to persevere — through your sport, through school, through work, through the weight-loss program, through that relationship — you will probably make it a day. Maybe a week. Maybe you are more impressive than me and you make it a month, or even a year.

But eventually a moment comes when you are so worn out from persevering and persevering and persevering that you simply give up. And I will have helped you not at all.

And even if you turn out to be the most persistent person since Jesus — if you walk out and persevere to the very end and actually pull it off — if that perseverance does not lead you to Christ, you have gained nothing in light of eternity.

So I cannot just say go persevere. There is something more here.

How Jesus Persevered: His Father

His prayer reveals it. Right after remove this cup from me, he says: “Yet not what I will, but what you will.”

His relationship with the Father is what carried him through.

Remember that Jesus, as God the Son, is part of the Trinity. Christians believe there is one God who reveals himself in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Not one God who is sometimes the Father and sometimes the Son and sometimes the Spirit — but all three simultaneously, always. The Father is not the Son, the Son is not the Spirit, the Spirit is not the Father — and yet they are one. One substance. One mind. One heart. One purpose.

So Jesus was there when they together decided to create humanity. It was not the Father calling a meeting to pitch an idea and take a vote. Genesis says, let us make man in our image.

And as they made that decision, they knew exactly what it meant. They knew these humans would take that image — the will, the personality, the intellect — and use it to rebel. And they knew the penalty for such a grave act was death.

But as a creative God abounding in love, he made them anyway, and his love abounded toward them. So right then, before he ever breathed into Adam, the decision was made: we will die for them.

And you see the whispers of it all through the Old Testament — that God would come and give his life so humans could be free.

Jesus was there. He made the decision. He knew what was coming. And because he is part of the Godhead, because he has this relationship with the Father, because he knows the purpose of all of it, he can say: not my will — not my wants and desires as a human, even knowing what is ahead — but yours.

Two gardens

Here is something worth noticing. Jesus is not the only sinless person who ever lived on earth. There was one other: Adam.

When God created Adam and breathed into him, Adam at that moment was sinless. And he was in a garden. And he gave in to temptation, and sin entered God’s created order and marred the image within us.

Now here is the only other sinless person who has ever lived — once again in a garden, facing temptation. And this time, instead of giving in to the temptation to run and get out and have the cup removed, he stays. Because of his relationship with his Father: this is what we planned. This is what is right. This is what is needed.

How Jesus Persevered: His Joy

There was one other thing carrying him, and we find it in Hebrews 12:2 — that for the joy that was set before him he endured the cross, despising the shame.

So there was a joy dangling in front of him that enabled him to go through hell.

If you have ever tried to lose weight, you understand this a little. It is not comfortable to change your eating patterns. There are foods you love that you now have to give up, or at least cut back. Most people start an exercise program, which is genuinely unpleasant. And the reason you push through is the joy of watching the number drop, the joy of your body getting into the shape you want, the joy of knowing your health markers are improving. You want that joy, so you are willing to endure the hard part to get it.

So what was Jesus’ joy? What was set before him?

You were.

As God the Son, part of the Trinity, he created you. His image is in you. But when sin entered the world and distorted that image, it was as though sin snatched you away.

And because his image is on you — because his brand is on you — you belong to him. He loves you. He is jealous for you. He wanted to bring you back from sin. But the ransom was death.

So he went and paid it, to bring you back.

You are his joy. That is why he went through the garden and went to the cross — so he could have you.

His anchor was his Father. His eyes were fixed on you. And that is what carried him through.

So Where Are Your Eyes Fixed?

When it comes to perseverance, then, the question becomes: where have we fixed our eyes? What is our joy?

All of us have something.

For many of us it is ourselves. For some it is another person — a spouse or a child — and everything we do is for them. For some it is an achievement: a goal, a position, a certain amount of money. That is what we cling to, what we hope for, and we will go through anything to get it. For some it is a feeling, and we keep giving in to something just to feel that way, because that is the goal.

As your friend and your pastor, what I long for is that your joy would be Jesus — that your eyes would be fixed on him.

And I do not say that because we are in church, or because I am a pastor and it is my job. I say it because I believe it is what God wants for you, and because it is right there in the same passage.

After telling us that Jesus endured the cross for the joy set before him, Hebrews 12 tells us to run with endurance the race set before us — looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith.

Fixing your eyes on him is what carries you through school. Through the health crisis. Through the difficult relationship. Through the hurt. Through the pain.

That is complete perseverance. Do not try to do it on your own. Go with him fixed in your sight, and watch him do things in you that you never imagined — and you will come through remarkable things, and on the other side there will be joy.

Come to the Table

I can think of no better way to fix our eyes on Jesus than to come to the communion elements. Jesus Christ died on that cross, giving his body, his blood shed, so that we could find life.

If you are a first-time guest, we celebrate an open table — if you are a follower of Jesus, this table is open to you.

But if you are not a follower of Christ — or even if you have been part of this church for a while and, being honest with yourself, you realize you do not believe this story — I would ask you to respectfully not take the elements.

Instead, deal with God directly. If it is true that Jesus went through this much pain and suffering for you, and gave his life for you, then he now wants you to give your life to him. He loves you. He wants to restore his image in you. He wants to bring you to a place where you live like Jesus lived and love like Jesus loved.

So rather than coming to bread and juice, come to Jesus. Bow before his throne. As we sing, say it right where you are seated. Kneel if you want to. Give all of yourself to him. And let today become your spiritual birthday.

But if you follow Jesus — come. Come and remember that he persevered for you, and that he did it as a human. This is not merely God flexing miraculous power. This is Jesus as a human being, representing you and me, dying our death to give us his life.

So let this cup be a cup of celebration. A cup of praise. A cup of consummation, reminding you that because Jesus has redeemed you out of sin, you are now in relationship with God. Let it be an opportunity to thank him, to confess whatever sin needs confessing, and to rejoice that he has forgiven it and welcomed you in.

Closing Prayer

Heavenly Father, as we come to the table — as we remember that last supper, as we picture you, Jesus, taking the bread and breaking it and saying this is my body, and lifting that cup of redemption and saying this is my blood, shed for the forgiveness of your sins, to establish a new covenant — may we do this in remembrance and celebration and worship of you. God the Son, taking on human flesh, living a sinless life, and dying the death we should have died.

In these next holy moments, be glorified. Reach into our hearts and souls and do what you need to do. If there is unconfessed sin, help us deal with it. If people have hurt us, help us be like you and forgive them. If there are things we have been ignoring by running to our phones, or a screen, or food, or anything else — help us not to run. Help us right now to stay, to sit, to fall to the ground, to pray, and to persevere — so that you get the glory and we get the joy set before us.

Jesus, be our joy today. Be our everything. Help us worship you fully as we do this in remembrance of you. Amen.