Gethsemane

A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest; So shall your poverty come like a prowler, and your need like an armed man. - Proverbs 24:33-34

The night before Jesus was crucified He went into the garden of Gethsemane to pray.

"The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak", He said to His disciples, "My soul is deeply grieved, to the point of death; remain here and keep watch with me".

Do you ever wonder if you would've stayed up through the night and prayed with Him or would you have dozed off to sleep and your comfortable dreams. I've been awake all night before, under high stress and unable to rein in my myriad of anxieties. That happened to me once and I realised then how long a night actually is. I've also dozed off when I should've stayed awake that's the story I'm going to relate now.

Fifteen years ago my wife and I were backpacking across Europe and we had arrived in the town of Dieppe. It was "Bastille Day"

Bastille Day was not in our otherwise handy travel guide and it's the biggest holiday of the year in France. No banks open and every hostel and hotel full. We actually had a room in a hostel from the night before but they couldn't tell us if they had room for us until 5pm the next day.

We waited around until 5 to let them tell us they had no room. Perfect, so we now started on a pointless journey walking from hotel to hotel only to hear how every place was full.

At some point we came to the realisation that we would be sleeping outside that night. Only problem was, and I'm not sure why, but people in Dieppe don't like you crashing in random places in their town and we didn't want to spend the night outside the relative safety of the streetlights. We decided we would buy a dinner we could eat late on the beach, stay up as late as possible and then take turns sleeping on a bench at the train station.

Dinner was good, we hung out and wandered around town as long as possible and then we walked over to the train station and sat down under the pretense that we were waiting for a train.

The attendant would come over as each train arrived and ask us if this was our train and we'd shake our heads no.

I gallantly took the first turn sleeping.

My wife woke me up when it was her turn to sleep and I groggily came to. I started my watch with the best of intentions but I was so tired. My eyes were heavy, I was constantly rubber-necking and there was nothing to do. I guess I kept waking her up by doing the little things that probably seemed innocuous to a person who's awake but make it difficult for a person to sleep. Or worse, I would ask, "Is it my turn to sleep yet".

She finally woke up and let me sleep. I didn't argue.

Dr Phil says "history is the best predictor of future performance" so I guess if I was in the situation Jesus' disciples were in I'd probably sleep too. My wife thinks if Jesus' disciples were women they would've stayed up and prayed with Him. We'll never know but it's probably a strong hypothesis.

Returning the third time, he said to them, "Are you still sleeping and resting? Enough! The hour has come. Look, the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. - Mark 14:41