LIFT Renewal Ministries

I’d Rather Not

Of all the places I’ve never been, none is so vivid in my imagination as the Garden of Gethsemane.  I know people who’ve actually been there and have tried to describe it to me, but I’ve never been.  Perhaps one day I’ll go.  I’ll save some nickels, or perhaps round up some church members and lead a junket to the Holy Land, and I’ll get to Jerusalem and I’ll walk right up there with the guide and I’ll see the place.  If I’m ever able to do that I suppose my imagination will need to yield itself to the facts about Gethsemane, and that will be alright.  But as it stands right now, Gethsemane is for me an inward place, a spiritual place, a place where truths are revealed and where faith is tried and proved.

In Gethsemane I picture two friends kneeling to pray.  There is Peter, who spent the night telling anyone that would listen all about the great things he meant to do.  Peter, is drowsing in and out of sleep while Jesus prays.  Earlier that night he’d sworn to Jesus his unshakable faithfulness, his vow to never let Jesus down. Even if everyone else departed he would be there for Jesus.  Those were his the brave words to Jesus that night. 

But for his part, Jesus spent the night praying to God. In the presence of his friends, Jesus carefully considered the work God gave him to do—what he knew HAD to be done—and what it would cost.  As he prayed for strength to complete his work, his prayers were open and honest and fresh:  “God, my Abba, I’d rather not…nevertheless, whatever you will have me do I will do.â€?

Jesus’ ministry is powerfully revealed in one essential truth:  he was here to serve rather than be served.  Jesus’ servanthood was not a career, but a way of life.  Servanthood requires no visions, or motivational speeches, or special credentials and workshops.  Servanthood is simply obedience; just picking up and doing the very next thing required. Every once in a while a servant’s obedience coincides with something enjoyable.  But most of the time obedience does what it has to do…what is “required.â€?  In the lap of God’s love Jesus was free to say “I’d rather notâ€?, but obedience trumps motive and feelings.  Obedience required him to say “nevertheless.â€?  Obedience is the hammer and nails of servanthood.

As it was for Jesus in the drowsy midnight of Gethsemane, so now it is for Jesus’ church in the daylight of his resurrection and the power of the Holy Spirit.  Obedience is the door through which we find “the way, the truth and the life.â€?  Even as we say “yesâ€? in our baptism, we exchange our own lofty dreams and high ambitions—righteous as they may seem—for the higher and purer life of servanthood and simple obedience to Christ our Lord.

Thus begins for us the process of following Jesus, of setting our own face in the direction God chooses for us, of descending into the valley of our own emptiness, darkness, self-denial, and surrender. Often the journey is merely hinted at; the entire height, breadth, and width of the journey remains veiled to our eyes and our understanding. Most days only the next step—and that barely so—is visible to us.  Are we then to sit quietly and bide our time until “all is revealed?â€?  God forbid such sloth be counted as faithfulness, when every day of our lives God is urging, pressing, shepherding the heart to action…earnestly desiring us to follow him.  The way is known to God, and that is enough for us!  We follow today by putting our hand to the plow and refusing to look back…likewise we take no thought for tomorrow.  Today’s own trouble, and the grace to meet it faithfully, will be enough for today.

With Jesus we learn that obedience is the only path to truth, and obedience by any other name is still someone else calling the shots!  It’s not nearly enough to claim to “understandâ€? God’s way without actually setting foot upon it.  It’s of no use to any man or woman to say “God has the perfect planâ€? if she/he doesn’t also strive by every possible means to discern that way, walk that way, search and follow that way.  Oh, but it’s such a narrow, narrow door through which we follow Jesus!  And “Masterâ€? is a name for God I’ve yet to master.

Of course, sooner or later everyone who calls themselves a disciple of Jesus will find them selves with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane.  We’ll look back over a hundred different moments of faithfulness and obedience, and get the sense that it seems to have always been pointing to this place, leading to this “gardenâ€?. There is a sense of inevitability…a dawning realization that if we “set our face to follow in obedienceâ€? then it can’t end up in any other place.  Only this manner of sacrifice will reveal the depth of God’s love.  Only this event at the cross reveals the true depth and meaning of self-surrender.  Only the crucifixion and resurrection can fully reveal the “perfect love which casts out all fears.â€?  For freedom Christ has set us free, and in Jesus our fears of death and hell and failure and taunts and meaningless existence no longer hold us captive.  The “usâ€? we feared losing for so many years is already dead; we are crucified with Christ, dead and drowned in the waters of our baptism.

Our reassuring solace in every moment of doubt or weakness is that Christ Jesus our Lord has gone before us in all things...that Jesus emptied himself (as we are now called to do with him) was found in human form (that frail condition we share with him, temptations and all) took the form of a slave (so that our bondage to fear and the limitations of the flesh might be revealed) and became obedient, even unto death.  In NO matter of human existence will we now encounter anything that Jesus hasn’t already known, experienced, and redeemed…even death…so that in Jesus we might share the resurrection. 

Ordained ministry in the United Methodist Church is a vocational calling which leaves pastors silently praying “God, I’d rather notâ€? hundreds of times every day.  We are pastors, and we are tired.  But we are Christians first, and the way of Christ is the way of obedience—the way of servanthood. May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ strengthen you in your inner will, as you faithfully serve God’s people in this Holy Week.