Selections from The Cross He Bore, Chapter 3Luke 22:43
“And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him.”
Gethsemane is not a place for hurried theological tourism: it is where the believer must linger, watch and pray.
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But it was not the Father’s will that the Savior should die in the garden, and just as after the temptation in the wilderness angels ministered to him (Matthew 4:11; Mark 1:13), so now he was strengthened by an angel. How strange is the sight! A creature sent to minister to the Creator!...There is a place for mystery. There is need for ground on which, in a unique sense, one walks by faith and not by sight.
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For one fleeting moment immense joy must have leaped within Christ’s soul as the Father’s hand touched him. This was a message from home. Heaven was behind him. He was forsaken, but not disowned. His Father was there, somewhere in the darkness. His loud cries and tears had not been unnoticed.
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It is true that Christ preached the gospel, but as R. W. Dale says so well, ‘The real truth is that while He came to preach the Gospel, His chief object in coming was that there might be a Gospel to preach.’
~ Frederick S. Leahy
More reflections from Chapter 3
