Locations & Times

Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and he 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.” 

—Matthew 26:36-38 (NIV)

My husband and I arrived at Elms Haven; glancing at the parking lot, we noticed we had arrived before my sisters. I felt relieved because our early arrival would allow me to spend a few moments alone with my mom. 

We walked down the sterile hallway, and as I approached my mom’s door, I heard chatter coming from the room. I stepped in, waved, and saw a nurse beside my mom engaging in conversation and laughter. The mood felt light. My mom introduced us, and as I went to sit down, I noticed a folder on the table stamped with a company logo; I could read “Hospice” in italicized lettering. 

The nurse was part of the hospice staff, a visitor I hadn’t expected yet. They chitchatted back and forth, and I did my best to maintain a calm composure, but I could feel anxiety silently building in my chest. We all talked a bit more, and just as the nurse was about to leave, she asked if we had any questions. My mom broke the silence, explaining to the nurse, “I can’t die; they don’t know what they are doing,” as she motioned toward me. I was unsure how to respond because my mom wasn’t wrong. 

I sat by my mom’s bedside, staring at the silhouette of the tree outside my mom’s window.  One late evening, I thought, “If this window were the window to my faith, what would I want to see?” I closed my eyes and imagined the Garden of Gethsemane.  

The shades of the olive trees would have been familiar to Jesus and his followers. Amid the curved foliage, Jesus began to feel the weight of the twisted events about to unfold.  Jesus asked those with him to wait and pray while he slipped away to be alone with the Father.  

“Going a little farther, he fell to the ground and prayed that, if possible, the hour might pass from him. ‘Abba, Father’ he said, “everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.” (Mark 14:35-36 NIV)

Jesus prayed the same prayer three times. His repetitive cries, questions, and pleas displayed for me that repetitive prayers aren’t a sin, or a sign of disbelief, or an attempt to bargain with God. It is honest. Jesus’ echoed prayers guided him through mental anguish.  The nails pierced his spirit before his hands. Jesus, fully connected to the Father, had not experienced separation before. Perfect unity would be severed; how sick that must have felt. In complete submission and alignment, Jesus put the Father’s will before his own. He knelt in the garden, fully man, fully God, fully alive, and wholly surrendered. Jesus drank the cup of God’s wrath, which was laced with the sickness of sin, and he did so in perfect love.

Our family sat by my mom in her last days. We cried and laughed, prayed and comforted her while her body grew weak, and the conversations grew still. 

I had often limited the garden to the first stomping grounds to the cross. Attending church during multiple Easter services, I had grown desensitized to the plea in the garden, to the acts of the cross, and the physical pain and mental anguish of Jesus.  

However, in the death process, in the reflections of the window of faith, the garden had texture, an undeserved treatment of Jesus, an undeserved grace for us. Jesus drank the full cup of God’s wrath, which feels so unfair because the cup Jesus passed around at dinner, and for us today, is a cup of sweet wine in remembrance of him. With stretched arms, Jesus’s obedience in suffering built a bridge of reconciliation. He conquered death to wipe out permanent “goodbyes” and replaced them with “I’ll see you later.”