The Overcoming Power of Prayer: A Palm Sunday Message

This morning, we’re taking a break from our Proverbs series to focus on Palm Sunday. And the title of the message is The Overcoming Power of Prayer. We’re going to end up in the Garden of Gethsemane this morning, okay, but we’re going to kind of trace the timeline, not hitting every event, but hitting a number of events in the life of Jesus in His Passion Week. We will end up in the Garden of Gethsemane. Will you stand with me this morning and let’s read that passage in Matthew 26, verse 36-46. This is Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. Then Jesus went with His disciples to a place called Gethsemane and said to them, sit here while I go over there and pray. He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with Him, and He began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then He said to them, My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with Me. Going a little farther, He fell with His face to the ground and prayed, My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from Me, yet not as I will, but as you will. Then He returned to His disciples and found them sleeping. May you men keep watch with Me for one hour, He asked Peter. Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. He went away a second time and prayed, My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done. When He came back, He again found them sleeping because their eyes were heavy, so He left them and went away once more and prayed the third time, saying the same thing. 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. Rise, let us go. Here comes My betrayer. Pray with me. Lord Jesus, thank You for what You endured in the Garden of Gethsemane. Thank You for Your sacrifice. Thank You for Your steadfastness. Thank You for Your willingness to lead the way. You overcame every temptation, every trial, every turning to the left or to the right. You overcame through prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane. Lord, thank You that You’re our great example. You’re our Savior. But You’re the One who charts the path. You’re the One who leads the way. You’ve shown us how to overcome. You’ve shown us how to overcome the flesh, overcome loneliness, overcome sorrow. Lord Jesus, this morning, I’m praying that You would help that one who is struggling in their faith. You would help that one who’s struggling in sorrow or loneliness. Lord, reveal to that one today that You’ve been there. You know what it’s like. And by prayer, You overcame. Speak to each heart, we pray. In Jesus’ name, Amen. You may be seated. God bless you. What is Palm Sunday? Palm Sunday is the day we celebrate the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. One week before His death and resurrection. You can read about it in Matthew and Mark and Luke and also John’s Gospel. As Jesus entered the city, the messianic expectations among the people were high. You can go back to Psalms 22, Isaiah 53. Jesus was greeted in John 12 and I believe it’s Matthew 21. He’s greeted as a conquering king, but Psalms 22 and Isaiah 53 were prophecies preparing us that Jesus would come riding on a donkey, Zechariah 9, verse 9. He would not come riding on a white horse as a king. But even though He was, and this is the first paradox of Palm Sunday. Even though He was a conquering king, when He first came into Jerusalem, headed to the cross, He came as a suffering servant. He came as a suffering servant. Let me just turn in my Bible and read that in John’s Gospel. I love the way John writes concerning the triumphal entry. I’m going to read in John 12, verse 12 through 15. The next day, the great crowd that had come for the festival heard that Jesus was on His way to Jerusalem. They took palm branches and went out to meet Him, shouting, Hosanna, which means save now. Hosanna, blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord, blessed is the King of Israel. You see, they were greeting Him as a king. Their messianic expectation, they maybe had missed Isaiah 53 or they hadn’t read Psalms 22. They were expecting Jesus to come as a conquering king and we know church today that Jesus is coming again and when He comes, He will come as a conquering king, amen? He will come and every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord of lords and King of kings. But on this day, in John 12, verse 14, Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it. As it is written, do not be afraid, daughter of Zion, seeing your king is coming seated on a donkey’s colt. Verse 16, John tells us, at first His disciples did not understand all this. So even the disciples didn’t necessarily understand all that was happening, but Jesus came as a suffering servant and as a conquering king. Another paradox of Palm Sunday is that the miracles of Jesus, you know, you read about all the amazing miracles of Jesus in the Gospels and you would think that if you were there and you saw Jesus feed the 5,000 and the 4,000 and raise the dead, Lazarus, He raised from the dead, you would think you would never turn away. You would never deny Jesus, but one of the paradoxes of Palm Sunday is that the miracles didn’t keep the crowds following Jesus. And I want you to think about that in your own life today because I think that is sometimes a paradox for us today as we follow Jesus. The Christian faith is focused on faith for a reason. Moses had a burning bush, but that didn’t happen every time he went to have devotions with God. There are times in our lives, I was sharing this morning in our Bible study when I was just a boy of 10 years old, I gave my life to the Lord Jesus Christ. I walked the church aisle, I trusted the pastor, I trusted my parents, I trusted Jesus. And I really believe as I look back as a young boy, why did I become a Christian? It was because of that simple promise that I could live forever with Jesus in heaven. The pastor said that if you put your faith in Jesus, you’ll live forever. Though you die, you’ll live, you’ll have eternal life. It sounded cool. It sounded like the right choice. And it still does today. But you know, along the path of my Christian faith, there have been times as I became a teenager and in my early 20s, when the faith of my parents wasn’t good enough. When the faith of my pastor wasn’t good enough. When the faith of my Christian friends, it wasn’t good enough. I needed God to show up for me. I needed God to reveal Himself to me. And I’m so thankful that at different times in my teenage life and in my early 20s, when I cried out to God and said, God, I need to see You. I need to have You do something, God. Or else I’m not sure I want to walk with You. I’m not sure I want to live this Christian faith. I remember one time in particular, I had been seeking the Lord and seeking the Lord, asking the Lord to show up in my life. And I ended up at a youth group all-nighter. We used to do those things called lock-ins. I’m sure youth groups still do those. And we had a time of communion. It was about midnight. We had communion. We all went into this room and we were having communion. There was about 30 plus youth. And there was Pastor Denny, I remember the youth pastor. There was youth leaders. And one of the young youth flipped out with a demonic manifestation. That was news to me. I had never seen anything like that at all. And I slept with my Bible on my chest for six months. I’m being honest. You can ask my wife, when I would first tell the story to friends, I would still get goose bumps later. That’s how traumatic and impactful this experience was in my life. I had asked God to reveal Himself and did He ever? In an unexpected way. I remember the youth pastor that night asked those who didn’t want to pray to leave the room. And many left. And I was one who was foolish enough or bold enough. I don’t know how to describe it, but I wanted to see this young youth delivered from whatever was being manifested in that moment as we were taking communion. And I began to pray and others began to pray. There was a missionary. His name was Mark Buntane, who happened to be in town. They called that missionary and that missionary came and that missionary began to come and rebuke and pray and it seemed like hours. It was such a powerful encounter. It was such a dynamic for a young teenager. I didn’t expect God to answer that way, but that’s how God answered. And I’ve never forgotten that moment. And there’s been other times in my life that I could take time this morning and share when God showed up. But friends, I just want to remind you also that the Christian faith is called faith because it takes faith. So keep crying out to God. Keep crying out to God. He’ll show up. He may not show up exactly like you expect him to show up. He may not show up exactly the day you want him to, but he will show up. He will reveal himself. One of the paradoxes for me, when I think about Palm Sunday and the ministry of Jesus and the Gospels and all that Jesus did is you would think if you’d seen all of the miracles and all of the great teachings of Jesus, you would have never crucified Him. But the crowds that He fed eventually were there shouting, Give us Barabbas. And they wanted to crucify Jesus. Another great paradox of Palm Sunday is that Jesus, who certainly was a Jewish Savior, is a Jewish Jesus from Nazareth. And one of the great paradoxes is us here this morning. I mean, think about it. If this was all just a farce, if Jesus was just a made up story, what are we doing here? We’re not Jewish. Well some of you may be and that’s terrific. One of the great paradoxes of the story of Jesus and certainly of Palm Sunday is Jesus heads to the cross is that Jesus is not just a Jewish Savior for Jewish people, but Jesus is a Jewish Savior for the whole world. He’s a man. He is a fulfillment of the plan of God and the purposes of God. So whether you are Gentile or Jew, whether you’re American or Iranian, whether you’re Persian or Israeli, Jesus is for you. Jesus is the Savior of the whole world. And of course, probably the greatest paradox of Palm Sunday and Easter is that Jesus would defeat death, hell, and the grave. He would defeat the enemy of your soul by coming as a baby in a manger, by living among us with flesh, suffering with us. He would win the triumph and the victory for the world through death. It’s a paradox. And I hope this morning that we can apply some of those things to our life because you might be going through something today where you feel like, oh, there’s just so much sacrifice and suffering and pain and difficulty. Why am I going through this? Friend, Jesus is going through it with you. How do I know? Because he came down. That’s the story of the Christian. That’s the Christian story. That’s the story of Easter. That’s the story of Palm Sunday. That’s the paradox of the Christian faith that Jesus knows what you’re going through because He came down in the flesh and He also suffered. He knows what it is to sacrifice. He knows in the Garden of Gethsemane what it is to agonize and to say, if there’s any other way, Father, please take this cup from me, but not my will, Your will be done. Well, we’re going to end up in the Garden of Gethsemane, but I want to just start with a few other episodes as we think about the Passion Week. Now, the last seven days of the life of Jesus are known as the Passion Week, and we tend to use that word passion like strong emotion, but actually it comes from the Latin word. Help us, Jesus. It comes from the Latin word pati, P-A-T-I, which really just means suffering or to endure something. So when we talk about the passion of Jesus, we’re not talking about the strong emotions of Jesus. We’re talking about the week that leads up to His crucifixion where He was betrayed, where He was arrested, where He was beaten, where He was falsely accused. They had all these trials in the middle of the night where the whole Sanhedrin wasn’t even there. So it was really a mock trial, a false trial. So that’s what we mean when we say the Passion Week. It’s the week that leads up to the crucifixion. It’s the suffering of Jesus. And the first scene I want to look at is in John 12. So if you have your Bibles with me, turn to John 12, verses 1-11. Six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany where Lazarus lived, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. Here a dinner was given in Jesus’ honor. Martha served while Lazarus was among those reclining at the table with Him. Then Mary took about a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume, she poured it on Jesus’ feet and wiped His feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of perfume. I just want to stop there. You can go on and look at Judas and look at Peter’s response. You could preach a whole sermon there, but I really want to get to the Garden of Gethsemane. But I did want to just include this scene in the Passion Week of Jesus, because Mary is an example to us of someone who loves Jesus more than anything else in their life. And if you want to walk with Jesus, you’ve got to love Him more. You can’t just love Jesus a little bit. It doesn’t work out. You’ve got to love Jesus more than your possessions. You’ve got to love Jesus more than your relationships. You’ve got to love Jesus more than anything else in your life. And that’s what that love, that devotion to Jesus, that’s what will unlock the good life in Jesus. The abundant life in Jesus. Remember the words of Jesus in John 10.10. He said, I’ve come to give you life to the full. Jesus wants to give you a full life. He wants to give you a blessed life, a good life. And Mary’s an example to us of someone, as Jesus is headed to the cross, she loves Jesus more. And I remember preaching this last year, this episode, and how this pint would have been worth like a whole year’s salary. This was a huge sacrifice. And so you can see why John remembers, well, why didn’t you just sell that and give it to the poor? Because it was a lot of money. But she loved Jesus more than anything else. A second scene that I think is so important as we consider the Passion Week of Jesus is also recorded in John 12, verse 12 through 19. Let me just read a little bit of the triumphal entry. I read it before, and I’ll read it again. John 12, I’m going to pick up in verse 12. The next day, the great crowd that had come for the festival heard that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem. They took palm branches and went out to meet him, shouting, Hosanna, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Blessed is the King of Israel. Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it. As it is written, do not be afraid, daughter Zion. See, your King is coming, seated on a donkey’s colt. At first, his disciples did not understand all this. Only after Jesus was glorified did they realize that these things had been written about him and that these things had been done to him. Now the crowd that was with him when he called Lazarus from the tomb and raised him from the dead continued to spread the word. Many people, because they had heard that he had performed this sign, went out to meet him. So the Pharisees said to one another, see, this is getting us nowhere. Look how the whole world has gone after him. Now I read all that because I just want you to think with me about how much was going on. You’ve got the Pharisees who are losing control, and they want to get Jesus arrested. The religious leaders are getting more and more upset. You’ve got the crowds, and some of them are seeking Jesus because, wow, look at that amazing sign he performed. And often, people have all these reasons to follow Jesus. But I want to encourage you this morning, as you think about your relationship with the Lord, to seek Jesus for spiritual salvation. Seek Jesus for a relationship with God, not for self-interest. Now when I was a 10-year-old boy, I am convinced. I got saved because of self-interest. I’m sure I did. God’s OK with that. He knows that. And many times, it’s our felt needs, right? It’s the things going on in our lives that bring us to Jesus. That’s OK. That’s OK. I mean, as a 10-year-old boy, I was like, yeah, I want to live forever. That’s a no-brainer. But then, through the years and decades of my life, as I’ve walked with the Lord, the Lord will begin to purify your heart. The Lord will begin to work in your heart and in your life. And He will purify the reasons that you’re seeking Jesus and wanting to commit your life to Him and wanting to follow Him. And so you may be here this morning saying, well, Pastor, the honest truth is, I’m a Christian because I want God to bless me, or I want God to help my finances, or I need some help in my marriage. And God sees that. God knows that. That’s OK. That’s OK. But the greatest reason, and I see that in all the crowds and the different characters in the story of the Passion Week of Jesus, and so God understands that. But I want to encourage you this morning to come to Jesus because you want a relationship with God. Come to Jesus because you’ve recognized that He’s the Savior of the world. Come to Jesus because you want to encounter God in your spiritual life. And Jesus told us, if we’ll seek Him first, He will take care of all those other things, right? Matthew 6.33. So God knows you have this concern and that issue and this need. God knows our human needs. But if we will just seek the Lord, not just because He worked a miracle, not just because He can give you an abundant life, not just because He can help your relationships, but if we will begin to seek Jesus just because we want to know God, we want to have a relationship with God, we want to understand Jesus and who He is and what He means to the world and to our life, will you seek Jesus that way? And if you’ll seek Jesus with all your heart just to know Him, just to walk with Him, just to be His disciple and His follower, guess what, you’ll know Him. It’s the greatest gift ever. You’ll really know God through Jesus Christ. A third scene is the clearing of the temple in Matthew. I’ll read it from Matthew 21. In Matthew 21, we have this episode in the Passion Week of Jesus. It’s Matthew 21, 12 through 17. Let me read it first. Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. It was written, He said to them, my house will be called a house of prayer, but you are making it a den of robbers. I believe it’s Mark who says you’re making it a marketplace. And most agree that the reason Jesus was upset is that in the court of the Gentiles, in the temple where the Gentiles were supposed to be able to come in and worship God, they couldn’t go any further. They couldn’t go into the holy place. They couldn’t go in the, you know, you couldn’t advance into other, but they had the court of the Gentiles where they could come from all over the world and they could bring their sacrifices and they could worship Yahweh, the one true God, creator of heaven and earth. And instead, some of the Jewish people, I know what we’ll do. We’ll set up some tables where they can buy sacrifices from us. They’ve got to pay the temple tax and we’ll make a killing on this. And Jesus got passionate and he turned over the tables and he threw them out. He said, this is God’s house. You see, people are always more important than religion. People are always more important than religious titles, religious authority, religious systems. God loves people, period. And so if you’ve got religious traditions, you’ve got religious thinking, I know I’ve got some. I’ve been in the church my whole life. God wants us to be willing to lay those aside so that we can just love people. That’s the heart of Jesus. Now John’s gospel, and I’ll just, this is a side note, but John’s gospel places the cleansing of the temple or the clearing of the temple in John chapter two at the beginning of his gospel. And some think, well, that means maybe Jesus cleared the temple twice. I do not believe that. I think Jesus cleared the temple once. And I think John is not concerned with chronology. And that’s a whole nother sermon, okay? So I think in this case, Matthew, Mark, and Luke have it right. And there was only one time Jesus cleared the temple. And so the synoptic gospels, they are concerned with the chronology. John’s gospel is concerned with seven signs and he wraps his material around those seven signs in his gospel and how he reveals to us Jesus as the word of God, the Logos of God. Anyways, people are more important than God. A fourth scene, and we’re almost to the Garden of Gethsemane and we’ve got to hurry. Are you with me? Doing okay? Praise the Lord, Sonny. Amen. So the fourth scene is the Last Supper and let’s turn to Matthew chapter 26. Matthew 26, 17. I’ll start in verse 17 through 30. On the first day of the festival of unleavened bread, the disciples came to Jesus and asked, where do you want us to make preparations for you to eat the Passover? He replied, go into the city to a certain man and tell him, the teacher says my appointed time is near. I’m going to celebrate the Passover with my disciples at your house. So the disciples did as Jesus had directed them and prepared the Passover. When the evening came, Jesus was reclining at the table with the 12 and while they were eating, he said, truly I tell you, one of you will betray me. They were very sad and began to say to him one after the other, surely you don’t mean me, Lord. Jesus replied, the one who has dipped his hand into the bowl with me will betray me. The son of man will go just as it is written about him, but woe to that man who betrays the son of man. It would be better for him if he had not been born. Then Judas, the one who would betray him said, surely you don’t mean me, Rabbi. Jesus answered, you have said it or you have said so. While they were eating, Jesus took bread and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples saying, take, eat, this is my body. I want to pause there just to say, I’m not sure we can fully understand how impactful that must have been in that moment for those disciples because they had eaten the Passover meal for years together and it was always just the Passover meal pointing back to freedom from slavery in Egypt. And now Jesus in his passion week, in the last week of his life, and by the way, at least three times in the gospels, Jesus predicts his death and his resurrection, at least three times. And now as Jesus is partaking of the unleavened bread and the Passover meal, the Seder meal, he says, take, eat, this is my body. You can imagine, I mean, I’m trying to imagine as a disciple, Jesus, what do you mean? Take, eat, this is my body. I thought we were celebrating Passover, verse 27. Then he took a cup and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them saying, drink from it, all of you, this is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. I tell you, I will not drink from this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in my father’s kingdom. And in saying those words, Jesus was fulfilling a prophecy from Jeremiah 31, verse 31 through 34, where even the Old Testament prophet Jeremiah, hundreds of years earlier, predicted that in the last days, God will work a new covenant. There was the old covenant, the Mosaic covenant, but God was gonna give his people a new covenant where the words of God will be written on their heart. The law of God will be written on their hearts and in their minds and that he will be our God and we will be his people and we’ll all know the Lord. And now Jesus, as he partakes of this dinner, this Passover celebration, celebrating what really went back to Exodus chapter 12, this freedom from slavery and God delivering his people, now Jesus is saying, I’m that new covenant. I’m the fulfillment of Jeremiah 31. I’m so thankful that we live under a new covenant today. It’s a new covenant of forgiveness. It’s a new covenant of new life, that we can live the life that God promises us and offers to us. We can overcome the world, just as Jesus in John 16, verse 33 said, in this world, you’ll have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world. Jesus, as he faces the cross, he is getting ready to overcome the world. And through Christ, I can overcome the world. And now our final scene, and I’ll move quickly here this morning, but I really wanna focus on how we can overcome through prayer with Jesus in the garden. Turn with me back. We started here in Matthew 26, 36, and we’ll look at this passage together. Let me just preface, as we look at a few truths from Jesus in the garden, preface this with most of you know, this last October, I got to go to Israel and I got to see a number of the holy sites and the Garden of Gethsemane, without a doubt, for me was the most impactful. We got there on a morning. The Garden of Gethsemane is on the opposite side of the Kidron Valley with Jerusalem right on the other side. So like when you’re up on the Mount of Olives, there’s a large area, a grove of olive trees. And I actually got to take a picture with an olive tree that’s more than a thousand years old. So it’s really amazing, not 2000 years old, but they’ve got one that’s at least a thousand years old. So as you’re walking among these olive trees, you’re like, without a doubt, Jesus was in this area. Like they know that for sure. There’s no question about it. So it’s a beautiful garden area. You’re walking along and it was so nice that morning because it didn’t feel commercialized. There was not a lot of other tour groups. It was just kind of our group. They gave us time to pray, to read scripture. And then right next to the garden area with all the olive trees, there’s a church. And in that church, there’s a large slab of rock up near the altar. And so as you’re going through the garden and you’re praying and it’s private and you’re just imagining Jesus being there and how he spent time praying and agonizing as he knew what he was gonna face on the cross. And then you go into the church and I went into the church and I began to walk up to the altar and I saw that slab of rock that they said possibly Jesus actually knelt and leaned against that rock. And for me, it was like in that moment, every time I had ever walked an island, gone forward to an altar, all came in that moment. And a flood of tears began to rain down. I broke. I knelt down against that rock and I just began to cry and really weep and break. And all I could say for about 90 seconds was Jesus, thank you for forgiving my sins. Thank you for forgiving my sins. I don’t know if Jesus, if his elbow actually touched that rock. I don’t know. I know he was in that area. I know that he was in the garden of Gethsemane just as these gospels tell us. And when he was there, he was fighting a battle. And he was fighting that battle for you. He was going to the cross, not just because he was a criminal. He wasn’t a criminal. He was gonna be crucified by the Romans and betrayed by Judas and Peter was gonna deny him. He was going through all of this because of your sin and because of my sin. That’s what the gospels tell us. And for me, it was just to be in that place was so impactful. To be in the place where Jesus prayed and agonized and fully submitted to the father’s will. I want us to think with together this morning about a few truths related to this prayer and this time of prayer that Jesus had in the garden. Look with me at verse 36. Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane. And Gethsemane, by the way, just means oil press. So there’s two words here in the Greek and it’s just this idea of being under a lot of pressure. And there was olive trees in the area. So they obviously had a business where they would press out the olives and have the olive oil. And so the idea of Gethsemane is just being under a lot of pressure. And certainly we see that in the life of Jesus, right? Luke even tells us that Jesus, I think it’s Luke 22, 44, that Jesus prayed so earnestly that even he prayed sweats of blood. He just was like his whole heart and life was just being poured out in the garden of Gethsemane. Sit here, verse 36, while I go over there and pray. So he didn’t even take all of his disciples. Now, as we keep reading, we see that he took the inner circle. He took Peter, James, and John, but he didn’t take all the disciples with him. He kind of went over by himself and spent time in prayer. Young person, if you want to overcome in life, if you want to overcome this world, if you want to overcome the flesh, the first way we do that is through lonely prayer. Through lonely prayer. Now, it’s good to come together and pray with others. It’s good to agree together with others. But when we pray alone, what we’re doing is we’re spending time just with God. And so many of our decisions in life, it’s going to just be you and God. Are you going to go this way? Are you going to go that way? Your parents can’t decide for you. Your grandparents can’t do it for you. Your friends can’t help you with it. It’s going to be what are you going to do as you spend time with God? Jesus overcame with lonely prayer. We also see that Jesus was in great sorrow. You know, I really think of Jesus’ prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane is like charting the path. He is making a way for all of us so that we can pray and we can also overcome. Recently, we were driving home from some friend’s house later at night. And it’s actually an area where I often drive my boat to the lake, but we took a different road and I think I got lost at least twice. And it just reminded me how good it is when you’re going to some new place or you’re headed to some unknown territory. If you just have someone in the car with you who has been there before, or if you just have someone, let’s say you’re going to go try to work on your car or you’re going to do something new and you don’t really know how to do it, but you’ve got someone there who’s they’ve already rebuilt engines. They know what they’re doing. That’s what I think of Jesus’ prayer. Of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. Friends, how do you overcome in your Christian life? Prayer. You got to spend time with God in prayer. Sometimes it’s really lonely. But if you want to overcome the world, if you want to overcome the flesh, if you want to overcome the sorrowful struggles that you’re going through in life, you’re going to have to spend time in prayer. But the good news is Jesus has already been there. Jesus has already been there. When I was there that day, that morning at the Garden of Gethsemane, that thought that Jesus had already been there is what moved my emotions. When I go to prayer on a Tuesday afternoon or I go at home and I begin to pray and know that, hey, Jesus has already been there. Jesus has already agonized in prayer. He’s already been in prayer when it was just Him and His disciples were abandoning Him and not helping Him. It was just Jesus talking with the Father in prayer. Friends, Jesus has already been there. Whatever struggle you’re facing in life, Jesus has already been there. He’s struggled, He’s agonized, He’s suffered. He has had the enemy come against Him with trial and temptation, saying, why don’t you do this another way? Surely God’s way is not the best way. Let’s try this another way. If there’s anything that goes on in our culture today among our young people, that’s it. The culture’s saying God’s way is not the best way. Do it our way. There’s another way that’s better. Friends, Jesus has already been there. He’s been tested, He’s been tempted, He’s been tried and He was found true. So now when I’m driving late at night and I don’t know how to go, as long as Jesus is there, He’ll show me the way, right? Or just someone else who’s been there before. When Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane, He was showing us the way to have victory with the Father. He overcame with a lonely prayer. He overcame His sorrow with prayer. Look at verse 37 and 38. He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with Him and He began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then He said to them, my soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with Me. How do you overcome sorrow today? How do you overcome suffering, the pain in your life? You do it by going to God in prayer. If you know of a better way, I’m all ears. But I know in my own life, when I’ve struggled with anxiety or fear or worry, when I’ve struggled with temptation or trial, when I’ve been under pressure like I’m in an oil press and something’s just trying to squeeze all the oil out of me, there’s only one thing that brings comfort, hope. It’s prayer. Go to God in prayer. And that’s what Jesus did in the Garden of Gethsemane. And He’s our example and He’s the one who leads the way for us in helping us to understand how we can overcome. When you’re struggling with relationships, when you’re struggling with finances, when you’re struggling being a parent, whatever it is, go to prayer. Go to God in prayer. God will help you overcome your sorrow, your struggle, your pain, your difficulty. Another thing we see in verse 39, Jesus overcame with a humble prayer. I’m amazed, again, you can see the agony of Jesus in verse 39. It says, and going a little farther, He fell with His face to the ground and prayed. Think about that. Jesus, God Himself, the Savior of the world, He falls on His face before God. Now, there’s many different appropriate postures when we pray. Sometimes we pray standing up with our hands up. Sometimes we pray just quietly sitting down. We can kneel when we pray. But here is Jesus praying with His face to the ground. And so what I see here is not so much the importance of a physical posture, but a spiritual posture. When you pray, when you truly pray, when you truly get alone with God and spend time in His presence, there is a humility in your praying. There is a cry that goes out to God that says, God, I need You. I need Your help. I need Your salvation. I need Your deliverance. I can’t do this on my own, Lord. I am in a humble position before You. And James 4, verse 10 reminds us that when we humble ourselves before the Lord, He will lift us up. And we see that in Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus overcame with a lonely prayer. He overcame with a humble prayer. And I love this part here. Jesus overcame the flesh through prayer. Look with me at verse 40 and 41. Then He returned to His disciples and found them sleeping. “‘Couldn’t you men keep watch with me for one hour?’ He asked Peter.” And then verse 41, “‘Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.'” And this word from Jesus to Peter was especially important because it wasn’t long before he would be tempted and he would fall into temptation. And he would deny the Lord three times, even though Peter was sure, I will never, ever do that. I will never deny You, Lord. And yet Peter did fall into a time of temptation. I don’t know about you, but isn’t that true for us today? That we can be going along our walk with the Lord and we can be serving Jesus. And then all of a sudden, something’s going on in our emotions or something’s going on in our flesh. And then there’s just this trial or there’s this temptation to give up on faith, to give up on God, to give up on our walk with the Lord. That’s what happened to Peter. And I’m so thankful for John 21. Have you ever read John 21? The restoration of Peter, how Jesus restored Peter back to relationship and back to ministry. God is such a good restorer, amen. But we can be walking along and serving the Lord. And if we’re not careful, if we get complacent, if we stop praying, if we stop reading our word, if we stop spending time with the Lord, we can fall into temptation. And so just like in the garden of Gethsemane, this can happen to us. And so Jesus says to us today, watch and pray, spend time in prayer, spend time in my presence, spend time in my word, because temptation’s gonna come. The hour of trial, the hour of temptation is gonna come when your faith is gonna be tested. And so you’ve gotta spend time in the presence of the Lord praying. Paul tells us in Galatians, I believe it’s Galatians chapter three, 15 to 17, that the spirit is contrary to the flesh and the flesh wants what is contrary to the spirit. They’re in conflict with each other. They’re working against each other. And so if we’re gonna overcome our flesh, that is the physical part of us that has a sin nature, it tends toward disobedience, it tends toward dishonoring the word of God, dishonoring God, if we’re gonna overcome the flesh, we’ve gotta get into the spirit with a capital S, right? We’ve gotta get into the Holy Spirit. We’ve gotta get into the spirit of God and let the spirit of God get into us. That’s how you overcome the flesh. And that’s what Jesus says here in verse 41. He says, the spirit is willing. Can we just preach a while on that? Aren’t you glad that the spirit is willing? And here it’s a small S. And so what Jesus is saying is as human beings, you’re a spirit with a soul inside a physical body. So your spirit that is given by God, it’s the spark of life, you know, Genesis chapter two, verse seven, and God breathed the breath of life into Adam and he became a living being. So you are a spirit with a soul, that’s Greek psyche or psyche, that’s your personality. So you’re a spirit that can connect with God and then you have a soul that that’s kind of your uniqueness with a physical body. Do you realize that everybody that, especially the children and young people here today that yes, we’re physical, but that’s not all you are. That’s what the Bible teaches us. We’re not just a body, but there’s something inside you that’s the real you. Think about that. You have a spirit that can connect with God. And so young people, children, as we were singing those songs, Hosanna, and Jesus says the spirit is willing. Like we want to worship God. There’s something in us, God put it there. Billy Graham used to talk about that hole that only God can fill, amen. You see, God put that spark of life in you. You have a spirit, small s, in you that can connect with the big spirit, the Holy Spirit. And Jesus says the spirit, the human spirit is willing. Like we want to connect with God. But then we’ve got this flesh part. We’ve got this physical part to us that is under the curse of the sin nature. And so we’ve got to go to battle. How do we do that? We do it in prayer. We spend time, Jesus agonized in prayer. When’s the last time you agonized in prayer? When’s the last time you just spent time in God’s presence and you just kept calling out to God and desperately saying, God, I need your help. I need you to do something in this area of my life. Jesus agonized in prayer and he overcame. He overcame the flesh through prayer. We also see that Jesus overcame by persevering prayer at least three times, three times exactly in this story. We see Jesus going back and saying the same prayer. Now that gives me hope. That encourages me because sometimes I feel like, well, Lord, I’ve already talked to you about that. I’ve already asked you to fix that or help that or bless this Lord or show your favor here. And sometimes we can get weary and think, well, I’m not gonna pray about that anymore. It doesn’t seem like God’s coming through. But here’s Jesus, the savior of the world, the son of God, God himself. And yet he’s going to Abba father three times, not once, not twice, three times. He just keeps going back to God saying, God, would you please take this cup? Would you please take this cup? But ultimately we see in the garden of Gethsemane that Jesus overcame by being fully yielded to the father’s will. He was fully submitted to the plan of God. And friends, that’s so important when we pray, that as we pray, that we’re not trying to use prayer as some type of formula to get God to do what we want him to do. But when we pray, what we’re really doing is we’re submitting ourselves to the plan of God, to the purposes of God, to the promises of God. When we pray, what we’re really trying to do is say, God, I want to line up this heart and this mind with you. I want to become more of who you want me to be. I want to become more of the person that you designed and called for me to be. And we see that in Jesus. Look with me at verse 39. Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, my father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me, yet not as I will, but as you will. And so three times we have the example of Jesus being 100% sold out to the purpose of God and to the plan of God. And that for him meant the cross. Jesus came to suffer with us. Think about that just for a moment. It’s one of the most satisfying truths in Christianity. We live in a world of suffering. And yet many different philosophies, world religions, they don’t have an answer for that. And yet the Christian faith says, yes, we live in a world of suffering and God loves you so much, he came down and suffered with you. And he suffered for you. And he won the victory through the suffering so that now there is truly an overcoming power. There is truly the possibility that every day, whether you’re going through sufferings or setbacks or difficulties, you can live with resurrection power in your life, in your mind, in your heart, in your attitude, and in the way you live. You can live with hope because Jesus suffered with you, he suffered for you, and he overcame. He overcame. Thank you, Lord. Thank you. I wanna close with, maybe the worship team, come on up, or Ken, if you could just come up, play on the piano, would be great. For Palm Sunday this year, I just felt so impressed to invite you to a deeper level of prayer. And I want God to do that in my own life. When I think about Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, and of course, we know throughout the Gospels, Jesus prayed in public, he prayed in private, he would often go on mountaintops and pray. In fact, Jesus was such a person of prayer that his disciples said, Lord, teach us to pray. Like they, Luke 11, that’s what they noticed about Jesus. He knew how to get into the presence of God and cry out to God. And so I’m praying in my own life today, this Palm Sunday, Lord, teach me how to overcome the setbacks, the struggles, the negative emotions, whatever it is I’m going through in life, the relationship challenges, whatever it is I’m facing in life, Lord, teach me to be an overcomer through prayer. Through prayer. Now, when I was younger, I feel like I was more focused on being an overcomer by solving it myself. And some of you may have that personality. It’s like, well, I’m just gonna take care of this. There’s a problem, I’m gonna fix it. There’s a problem, there’s an issue, I’m just gonna work harder. Hey, that may be all well and good, but I’m praying for each of us as we walk with the Lord that the Lord will take us deeper into prayer, spending time in his presence, crying out to God. I mean, Jesus agonized. It wasn’t just a quick, Lord, bless this food and see you tomorrow. Jesus agonized in prayer. He knew the plan of God, but yet there was still this temptation to wanna go the way of the flesh. And he agonized with God in prayer, saying, Father God, please help me. I wanna encourage you this Sunday. I wanna encourage you this week, this year, become a person of prayer. Be a Christian who knows how to get into the presence of God and spend time in prayer. That’s where your victory is. That’s where the overcoming power is. Taking your needs to the Lord in prayer, taking your sufferings. If you’re suffering today, Jesus can relate with your suffering and he cares. The Bible tells us that God is close to the brokenhearted, but don’t just suffer, go to God in prayer. If you’re going through a struggle, don’t just struggle, take it to the Lord in prayer. You’ll find an overcoming power in the presence of God, in the presence of God. Will you stand with me this morning? And I wanna just spend a few moments worshiping the Lord. Many Sundays we call you to salvation, but this morning the call simply is to become a person of prayer. And so let’s model that this morning. Let’s spend just a few moments before we go, spending some time worshiping and crying out to God. And if you wanna step out to the altar, I encourage you to do that. Others will pray with you, but let’s just worship the Lord. Lord, we just take time right now to worship you. Thank you for your example in the garden of Gethsemane. Thank you, Lord, that you agonized in prayer and you remain faithful to the plan of God so that our sins could be forgiven. Lord, teach us how to pray. Teach us how to pray, Lord. I am Pastor Tom Ragsdell. I’m Pastor Ellis Benus. And we’re from Columbia First Assembly. We are a church that’s on mission with Jesus. We are on mission with Jesus. Our vision is simple. We wanna make Jesus famous in your heart and in our community. Absolutely. Thank you so much for connecting with us online. We would also love to connect with you in person. We are located at 1100 North 7th Street, right in the heart of Columbia, Missouri, right across the street from Hickman High School. So if you’re in the Central Missouri area and you’re looking for a home church, come hang out with us. If you’re just connecting online and you’re nowhere near us, then please connect with us in the comments. If you have a prayer request, if you have a question, if you’re wondering anything about the Lord or Christianity, please let us know and we would be happy to engage with you in the comments. We believe God’s doing something special at our church and we want you to be a part of it. We’re a multi-generational church. We have people from all different backgrounds. We’re a church of the word. We’re a church of the spirit. We believe Jesus can transform your life. That’s why we’re on mission with him. And we wanna help you know God. We wanna help you grow in God. And we wanna share hope in our community. Connect with us and we wanna connect with you. Awesome, have a wonderful and a blessed day.