The Crushing Place

Secondly, the story of Gethsemane reinforces the importance of prayer and the necessity of persistent prayer. We live in a microwave society where we expect answers immediately and we are conditioned to give up. So many Christians simply refuse to prevail in prayer. They submit a prayer, give it a little time, and then give up. They wrongly assume that God has said no or that the heavens are brass that God does not hear them. Yet look at the story here in the garden. Jesus not only prays to the Father to take this cup from Him but He does so three times! God does not mind persistence in prayer beloved, He requires it.

Then, teaching them more about prayer, he used this story: "Suppose you went to a friend's house at midnight, wanting to borrow three loaves of bread. You say to him, 'A friend of mine has just arrived for a visit, and I have nothing for him to eat.' And suppose he calls out from his bedroom, 'Don't bother me. The door is locked for the night, and my family and I are all in bed. I can't help you.' But I tell you this--though he won't do it for friendship's sake, if you keep knocking long enough, he will get up and give you whatever you need because of your shameless persistence. Luke 11: 5-8 (NLT)

This parable is given during a teaching on prayer. God is closer than any friend we may have on this earth. He will not care if it is three o'clock in the morning when you come to Him. He will not mind that you repeatedly come to Him. We may not always get the answer we think we want but He always hears our prayers; especially in the crushing place.

Next, it is in the crushing place where God wants us alone with Him. We can no longer rely upon others in our lives. We can no longer rely upon spouses or parents, pastors or friends. Note who Jesus takes with Him into the Garden of Gethsemane. He chooses Peter and the sons of Zebedee. Peter is arguably one of the closest disciples Jesus has and James and John are also referred to as the "Sons of Thunder" elsewhere in the Gospels. Together, they would pen eight of the books of the New Testament. In His humanity, Jesus asks those closest to Him to go with Him a bit further. To help Him to "keep watch." Each time He asks this of them, He returns to find them sleeping. Here is the last exchange:

Then he returned to the disciples and said to them, "Are you still sleeping and resting? Look, the hour has come, and the Son of Man is delivered into the hands of sinners. Matthew 26: 45

The crushing place is not a place to rest. It is not a place to sleep. It is not a place to be distracted. Jesus had warned these three after the second time that the spirit may indeed be willing but the flesh is always weak. God is teaching us here that even our closest friends can let us down in the crushing place. That when we are faced with such moments in our walk that the only person we need to seek is God. The only direction we need to look is up.

What is further interesting is that each time Jesus wakes His friends He equates their sleepy state with falling into temptation. What is God saying to us here? I think it can become too easy to not see the crushing place for what it is. To become so calloused to the world and the depravity we must face every day that we can become numb to it. That we could be sitting in a garden with God Almighty and even though He is sweating blood over the agony He witnesses, we can casually fall asleep. We can watch the horrors unfold on our televisions such as the Giffords shooting and dismiss it out of hand as if it is some reality show. We can have the opposite reaction to the crushing place. We can become indifferent to the need to pray and intercede. We can become so self-centered in our Christianity. We can become so prideful. But God teaches us the opposite:

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