Strike Two

Strike Two

Mark 14:40, NIV

When he came back, he again found them sleeping, because their eyes were heavy. They did not know what to say to him.

Setting the Scene

None of the three accounts of this second visit from Jesus to the sleeping threesome records that Jesus said anything. Nothing needed to be said. Guilty silence may have filled the air. Jesus apparently recognized that further comments were not going to help or change the situation.

We might imagine ourselves doing better than those three men, but we would probably also have been hard pressed to maintain vigilance beyond what our “heavy eyes” would allow. Many of us who claim to be following Jesus are often “asleep at the wheel.”

It is amazing that the disciples themselves recorded or reported these humiliating events. Only John’s Gospel omits this episode in the sequence. In his account, Jesus’ arrival in Gethsemane is followed immediately by the arrival of Judas and the mob. Apparently John felt that it would serve little good to rehash these moments given the subsequent history of the three disciples involved. By the time of John’s writing, both James and Peter were dead. Their testimony was sealed, and God had done a lot with their willing spirits and weak flesh.

Getting Personal

As Jesus monitors your life today, in what state is he finding you—slumbering, watchful, or somewhere in between?

What aspects of your Christian life require the most diligence? What can you do to be more awake and watchful and less spiritually lethargic?

Settling into repetitive failure is easy. We are tempted to give in to those temptations that have tripped us up in the past. We become inattentive to patterns of disobedience or unbelief. In light of this, we ought to be thankful for the shock, embarrassment, and even shame that comes when we realize God has again shown us an area in which we can make progress. Giving up is no way to arrive where God wants us to be.

Talking to God

The Lord is already aware of areas of spiritual lethargy in your life. Ask him to show you these areas and to wake you into more diligent attention or watchfulness by his Spirit. Thank him for his nearness and his persistent investment of loving attention in your spiritual development.