"In the Garden”
- Dr. Todd R. Wright
- 3 days ago
- 5 min read
So when Matthew says Jesus went to Gethsemane, maybe it is just a place … or maybe he is symbolically telling us that our Lord is feeling weighted down by his mission and squeezed by human powers on all sides.
Matthew 26:36-46
March 15, 2026
Dr. Todd R. Wright
We are nearing the end of Holy Week. The tension is building. The shadows are lengthening.
After a last meal with his disciples, Jesus took them with him to a place to pray.
The gospel of John calls this place a garden.
Now when I hear the word “garden”, there is a hymn that plays in my head:
[Howard Salisbury sings, “I come to the garden alone, while the dew is still on the roses…”[1]]
Yes, that’s the one!
It conjures up images of someplace green and growing and bursting with life.
But it should also make us think of the Garden of Eden –
a place of fresh light and land waiting to be tilled;
a place of new relationships and ongoing blessing;
but also a place of temptation and failure;
and thus, a place that sets off the long and winding story of salvation.
So when Jesus goes to a garden, perhaps it signals that he is …
weighing his relationship with the disciples and wrestling with temptation;
seeking a blessing and committing himself to the work of salvation.
Matthew does not call it a garden; he simply calls it Gethsemane.
For us, separated from that place by two centuries and thousands of miles, it is just a place name, but in Aramaic it means “olive press”.
Scholars tell us that, at that point in history, after the olives had been harvested, and crushed, and collected in baskets, they were pressed. Here’s how:
“In [an] oil press, a stone weight was tied to the edge of [a] wooden lever, pushing the lever down on [the] basket. The lever exerts a large force over a small distance. [A] stone [at the base of the lever] squeezed the basket, extracting the precious olive oil into the round grooves of a basin stone. The juice flowed down along these grooves, out through an outlet in the basin, and down into a collecting vat.”[2]
So when Matthew says Jesus went to Gethsemane, maybe it is just a place … or maybe he is symbolically telling us that our Lord is feeling weighted down by his mission and squeezed by human powers on all sides.
Do you remember the context?
The way Matthew tells it, on their way to the Mount of Olives, Jesus told his disciples, “You will all become deserters because of me this night.” Then he quotes a scripture that says the shepherd will be struck and the sheep will scatter. And when Peter protests that he will never betray him, Jesus says he will, three times, before the cock crows.
No wonder Jesus’ heart is heavy. No wonder he feels hard pressed.
His support network is crumbling.
Matthew tells us that he took Peter and James and John with him deeper into the garden. This was the same trio who had gone with him up the mountain and seen him transfigured.
They were strong. He trusted them. They had seen things and were committed to him!
And yet, as the story unfolds, even with them nearby, he feels abandoned.
[Howard Salisbury sings, “I come to the garden alone …”]
That’s right. The one who drew crowds when he preached, who fed thousands, who attracted a dozen designated disciples and many more close followers … felt all alone. Abandoned.
Not a single one stays awake to comfort or console him. Even after he asks them repeatedly.
So what does Jesus do in the garden?
When faced with the temptation to forget who he is and what he has come to do?
When hard pressed?
When abandoned?
He prays.
And the words he prays are strikingly familiar.
They sound like the prayer he taught to his disciples, the prayer we say every week:
He begins, “My Father …”
In Mark’s version, the word used is Abba, Aramaic for daddy. It is the kind of word a child uses when they are awakened by monsters under the bed, or frightened by a snarling dog, or suddenly lost in a crowd. It is a cry of desperation, but also an expression of confidence that the one you depend on will hear you and respond.
Matthew is writing for a different audience, one that may not know Aramaic, but the tone is much the same – a mixture of vulnerability and faith.
Jesus then begs for “this cup to pass”.
That seems like an odd phrase.
But back before the triumphal entry, after Jesus had told his disciples for the third time that he was going to be crucified and rise again on the third day, the mother of James and John asked that he promise that her sons would sit in places of power in his kingdom.
Jesus responded, “Are you able to drink the cup I am about to drink?”
He was probably drawing from Isaiah and Jeremiah who both make reference to God’s cup of wrath[3] – a metaphor for divine anger poured out against idolatry, injustice, and disobedience.
The sons of Thunder have no idea what he is taking about, so they say they can!
Jesus knows better and at Gethsemane he asks God to spare him.
He hopes that somehow he can bring salvation without having to suffer.
That’s always the wish, isn’t it?
Jesus’ prayer continues. He expresses obedience: “not my will, but yours,” an echo of “your will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” from the prayer he taught his disciples.
He prayed this way three times.
Not a quick prayer and then on to something else.
Not a plea with no patience for an answer.
Not a demand, or else.
But a full, intimate conversation. Three times.
NT Wright muses, “Here, [like in the Temptation story,] we see Jesus fighting in private the spiritual battle he needed to win if he was then to stand in public and speak, and live, and die for God’s kingdom.”[4]
In each case there were three rounds. In each, Jesus leaned on his relationship with the Father, and was able to come through battle tested.
Perhaps you will find yourself in the garden someday ... or on the anvil.
That’s the image Max Lucado uses in his poem, “The Blacksmith’s shop”. I think it applies.
He writes that in the blacksmith’s shop some tools are sharpened and ready to use; some are broken, tossed in with the scrap iron; and some lie on the anvil. He describes the last this way:
“hearts open, hungry to change, wounds healing, visions clearing.
They welcome the painful pounding of the blacksmith’s hammer,
Longing to be rebuilt, begging to be called.”[5]
I think Jesus came out of Gethsemane like that. I think his prayer helped him become clear about his calling to bring salvation and ready to go to the cross.
If life brings you to your own garden, your own anvil, I hope prayer will help you feel stronger, healed, and sure that God is with you. Amen
[1] Here and following, from “In the Garden” by C. Austin Miles, 1912
[3] See Isaiah 51:17, 22 and Jeremiah 25:15
[4] From Matthew for Everyone, page 160
[5] From On the Anvil, page xvi
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