Where do you turn in times of trouble? There are a lot of options that we can see people or things that we could turn to. We could turn to family or friends. We could rely on our own will power to get us through. We could go to someone that we trust to help us out during a difficult situation like a mentor or advisor. There is one big problem with all these possible answers though, they are all human and can fail easily. When we are at the end of our rope or the end of our life, there is only one person that we should turn to, and that is God.
In Luke 22:39-46, we can read about Jesus praying in the Garden as he was preparing to be arrested and taken to trial before being crucified. In verse 42 we have the words that he prayed to God, and it starts with “Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless, not My will, but Yours be done.” The first thing that we should take note of is that Jesus says “if it is your will” Jesus recognizes that it is not His will that should be done. Jesus is just as human as you and me, and here he is worried about what is going to happen and the pain that he will go through, but He would rather have God’s will be done than His own will. It may seem selfish, but most of the time we would prefer to avoid pain. Here, though, Jesus is willing to face this pain if it is what God wills for him to do.
The next thing that happens in this story is that God answers Jesus’ prayer. When God saw his Son was worried about the things that he was about to go through, God sent an angel to comfort and strengthen Jesus. We need to see that God will take care of His children even if they are still going to face judgment and pain from people here on the earth. The problem that Jesus faces though is that this angel is not enough for him to feel at ease about what he is going to face. Right after the angel strengthens Him, Jesus prays again, and His sweat becomes like drops of blood. Jesus was still worried about what was going to happen, but he trusted that God would see him through which is why he was willing to face the trial that was about to come to him.
When we face the end, we should follow the pattern that Jesus set. Jesus prayed to God and trusted that no matter what happened after that, God would take care of Him. In the same way, Paul says in Philippians 1:21 “For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.” Paul is in prison when he wrote these words, but he knew that if he were to die, he would be with God. This is the confidence that Jesus showed when he was willing to face the people who would falsely accuse him and would ultimately execute him. This is the confidence that we should have about facing the end of our lives.
We should strive to live lives like both these men who when face to face with the end, they knew that God would be with them no matter what they faced. If there are changes that we need to make in our lives to have the confidence that Jesus and Paul have, we should make them now. We don’t know when the end of our lives will be, nor do we know when the end of the world will be. All we can do is prepare and trust that God will be there to help us through whatever we may face.
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