FOR THE JOY.............

Hebrews 12:3
Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.


Gethsemane makes clear that Jesus’ death was necessary. Do you think that God the Father would not have gladly removed the cup from his Son’s hand if our redemption could be achieved any other way? If the solution to sin were a mere matter of God saying “let bygones be bygones,” would he have suffered to hear his Son appeal to him and not stop the matter then? If we could be saved by hard work; if our weaknesses could be handled through self-discipline and applying the techniques of the latest guru, would he have let his Son continue on to the cross? Parents know the answer to that question.

Gethsemane communicates to us that there is a spiritual reality beyond what we can see and experience for now – God’s holiness, his perfect justice, the pure love between Father and Son, the terribleness of sin, our full depravity, the reality and necessity of just wrath, the horror of abandonment by God – all these things are mixed into Jesus’ troubled soul in the garden. But what comes forth in the end is our redemption and the joy of our Savior. You don’t see joy? Perhaps Jesus did not feel joyful at the time, but we do know that the goal of joy is what brought him through the moment of crisis. Jesus’ joy was our salvation and glorifying his Father. His joy was that he would be lifted up and restored to glory with the Father. Remember that. Remember that however dark the times may be in your life, what ultimately awaits us is what awaited Jesus – joy. Suffering and sorrow do not have the last word. Jesus’ story does not end in Gethsemane, nor Calvary, nor the grave. It ends – or rather goes on – in glory, the glory of the Son of God who reigns on high as our Redeemer and our Lord.