Buechner: Maundy Thursday
“’WHAT YOU ARE GOING to do,’ Jesus says, ‘do quickly.’ Jesus tells them, ‘My soul is very sorrowful, even to death,’ and then asks the disciples to stay and watch for him while he goes off to pray. His prayer is, ‘Abba, Father, all things are possible for thee; remove this cup from me; yet not what I will but what thou wilt,’ this tormented muddle of a prayer which Luke says made him sweat until it ‘became like great drops of blood falling down upon the ground.’ He went back to find some solace in the company of his friends then, but he found them all asleep when he got there. ‘The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak,’ he said, and you feel that it was to himself that he was saying it as well as to them.” Frederick Buechner, from The Faces of Jesus, The Frederick Buechner Center, Frederick Buechner quote of the Day.
Hofmann, Jesus Praying
We all so struggle with our own humanity. So many spiritual friends I meet with, including myself, spend a lifetime seeking perfection. Holy Week is a time for us specially to remember Jesus’ struggle with his humanity best told in the synoptic gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. On Maundy Thursday in these gospels Jesus lets us know how difficult the human condition is as he asks this cup to pass, he sweats “blood”, he suffers, he cries out in anguish, he thirsts, he even asks God, “where are you?”
A huge painting similar to Hofmann’s hung at the front of the Methodist Church where I grew up in Virginia. The image of Jesus praying in the garden is different from any of the other references in the gospels to his praying. This time scripture connects us to the human side of Jesus. This is an image to keep when we as well are praying for difficult situations in our lives.
We can talk to and identify with those who have had similar experiences to ours. I see this most in grief recovery groups where people listen to each other because they know that the other has some idea of the pain they are going through. I see this in 12-step groups where alcoholics and addicts and co-dependents listen to others who walked a very similar path to theirs. How amazing that our God loves us so much, so much that God came to be among us to let us know that God has experienced and understands what it is like to suffer and be human. There is no greater love.
Joanna joannaseibert.com