While You Were Sleeping

By Rev. Heidi L. Barham |  March 24, 2024

Click here to listen to the service

Read Mark 14:32 – 42
 
Today is Palm Sunday which marks the start of Holy Week.  This is a week that begins with Jesus triumphal entry into Jerusalem and technically ends with His crucifixion on a cross at Calvary… but we all know that is really not where the story ends.
 
Now, our New Testament lesson for today comes from Mark’s Gospel.  It is part of what is referred to as the Liturgy of the Passion… which brings to mind the 2004 Mel Gibson movie, “The Passion of the Christ.”
 
 As some of you may have heard me share before, that was a movie that I have only been able to watch one time… because even now, 20 years after the fact, I can still recall the intense emotion that welled up inside of me as I heard the hammer clanging against the nails as Jesus was hung up on that cross.
 
To this day, I can remember thinking to myself… each time that hammer struck nail… it was because of me… it was because of my sin… it was literally my fault…
 
And I wept… at first with tears filled with shame and anguish… but gradually those tears were transformed into love and gratitude for what Jesus did for me… what Jesus did for you… what Jesus did for us all.
 
But fast forward to today… Palm Sunday 2024… as we consider this text from the Gospel of Mark… It is there that we find Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane accompanied by His trusted inner circle of friends – Peter, James, and John… in the time that will ultimately lead to the crucifixion.
 
Consequently, Jesus and His beloved disciples were not at Gethsemane to take a leisurely stroll through the garden… it was not just a typical walk in the park.  No, on that day in particular, Jesus was on a mission… He was there to pray.
 
And it was not just some run-of-the-mill prayer that Jesus prayed.  It was arguably one of the most heart-wrenching prayers recorded in the Scriptures.  In fact, Mark described Jesus as being “deeply distressed and troubled” and recorded these words that Jesus said to the disciples, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.”   
 
That is when Jesus told His disciples to stay where they were and keep watch while He went a little further into the garden to pray.
 
And so, Jesus pressed on… falling to the ground in prayer… asking God to let the cup of bitter anguish pass from Him… the cup of agony and alienation… a cup that was filled to overflowing… because of my sin and yours…
 
In Luke’s gospel, he described this moment this way“…being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.”
 
Jesus started out praying a heartfelt prayer that any one of us might have prayed out of our own sense of deep anguish… “Abba, Father, everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me.”  Or as it reads in the Message, “Papa, Father, you can—can’t you?—get me out of this. Take this cup away from me.”
 
Knowing what lay ahead of Him… the suffering and shame He would have to endure… it is it any wonder that Jesus… in His fully human nature… would ask God to get Him out of it?  Would we, in our fully human nature, have asked for and prayed for anything less?
 
And yet, in His truly divine nature… Jesus finished the prayer in a way that we can only aspire to achieve someday, “But please, not what I want—what do you want?”
 
“Nevertheless, not my will but Thy will be done…”
 
Now, while all this serious praying was going on… what were the disciples doing?  Well… it is sad to say… they were sleeping.  Jesus was agonizing over what was yet to come… all that He was about to go through on behalf of the disciples and everyone else in the world for that matter… and there were the disciples… asleep on the job.
 
And amazingly as we keep reading the text, we see that Jesus woke them up not once, not twice, but three different times… [maybe it was once for the Father, once for the Son, and once for the Holy Spirit.]
 
Now the first time Jesus woke the disciples up, He specifically addressed Peter…
 
Poor impetuous Peter… Peter who did not simply fall asleep three times in the garden… but Peter who would eventually deny three different times that he even knew Jesus…
 
So, reading verses 37 and 38 from the Message Paraphrase, we find:

Simon, you went to sleep on me? Can’t you stick it out with me a single hour? Stay alert, be in prayer, so you don’t enter the danger zone without even knowing it. Don’t be naive. Part of you is eager, ready for anything in God; but another part is as lazy as an old dog sleeping by the fire.

And after Jesus chastised Peter, the Scriptures say He went back and prayed the same thing only to come back and find the disciples sleeping once again… they were so tired they simply could not come up with a plausible explanation for their failure to do as Jesus had asked them to do.
 
Then, falling under the category of “the third times the charm” …or perhaps more appropriately “three strikes you’re out” …Jesus left His disciples to pray and came back a third time…
 
This time He said, “Are you still sleeping and resting? Enough! The hour has come. Look, the Son of Man is delivered into the hands of sinners.  Rise! Let us go! Here comes my betrayer!”
 
It is almost as if I can hear Jesus telling His disciples, “WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING things were set into motion and now the time has come… the one who has betrayed me is heading this way.”
 
It isn’t as if Jesus had not given His disciples fair warning about what was to come and yet they still missed the moment… what a thing to wake up and discover.
 
Now if we take a look back at those words of caution and rebuke that Jesus issued to Peter… they echo something that Jesus told the larger group of disciples in the previous chapter of Mark’s Gospel after He had been teaching in the Temple. 
 
In response to several of them asking for a sign of when the things Jesus spoke about were going to happen, Jesus told them, “But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come” (Mark 13:32 – 33).
 
Or as it says in the Message Paraphrase, “You don’t want him showing up unannounced, with you asleep on the job. I say it to you, and I’m saying it to all: Stay at your post. Keep watch.”
 
We can ill afford to have Jesus come back to claim His church and find us asleep on the job.  If we are not careful, we just might find ourselves in a situation like the five foolish virgins in the parable found in Matthew 25 (1 – 13). 
 
Perhaps you may recall the parable Jesus told about ten virgins who went out to meet the bridegroom… He described five of them as being wise and described the other five as foolish… because they had failed to take any extra oil for their lamps.
 
While they were sleeping… the oil began to run out… so when the bridegroom did finally arrive… the five foolish virgins missed out because they had been forced to go buy more oil.   They found themselves locked out of the celebration because they had been ill-prepared. Not so surprisingly, at the conclusion of the parable, Jesus said, “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour.”
 
Now, I may be going out on a bit of a limb here, but I do think it is fairly safe to say that the day and the hour when Jesus will return is getting closer… closer than it has ever been before… and closer than we might dare to… or even want to believe.
 
Every time I look at what is happening in the world around us… I cannot help but wonder… is this the sign we have been waiting for… is this the signal that Jesus is finally on His way like the bridegroom in the parable? 
 
This thought comes to mind as I listen to news stories about the political turmoil this country continues to find itself in… and when I hear about what is going on with Russia and Ukraine, as well as Israel and Palestine… and if I am being honest, even all this hubbub over the eclipse that is coming has caused me to wonder…
 
Is Jesus on His way?
 
Now, on the chance that He just may be heading back for us in the not-so-distant future… there is a question we might want to consider… do we want to be like the disciples… who while they were sleeping, missed the opportunity to be in prayer with Jesus as He was earnestly praying to God for His will to be done… and who awoke to find that the wheels had already been set in motion that would result in Jesus’ prediction about His own death coming true.
 
Do we want to be like the foolish virgins… the ones who failed to make adequate preparation and missed the bridegroom when He arrived to take them to the celebration… and found themselves shut out?
 
Or would we rather Jesus finds us wide awake and alert… doing what it is that Jesus has called us to do…  To love God with every fiber of our being and love our neighbors as we love ourselves… to be a blessing to others even as we have been blessed… to let our lights shine so that others will see God at work in our lives…
 
Now, on the off chance that someone is sitting there thinking, but Pastor Heidi, we cannot possibly stay awake and alert 24-hours a day, 7-days a week… after all, even Jesus took time away to rest and pray… and don’t forget, there was that one time He was even asleep in the stern of a boat while the storm raged around it…
 
Let me just say this… there is a significant difference between taking time to rest and replenish… and simply being asleep at one’s post… being totally oblivious to the needs of others around us and not paying attention to the things that God has called us to do. 
 
After all, the five wise virgins fell asleep just like the five foolish ones… but the difference was that the wise virgins had made preparation ahead of time… they had things in order… can we say the same?
 
What have we done to ensure that on the day that Jesus returns for us… He will not respond like the bridegroom who said, “Truly I tell you, I don’t know you” when the foolish virgins tried to get into the celebration. 
 
Have we been intentional about following Jesus’ command to care for the orphan and the widow, the hungry and the unhoused, the sick and the imprisoned?  Or have we been guilty of simply turning a blind eye to those who are in need… hoping that someone else will fix the problem?
 
Have we made a point of taking time to draw closer to the Lord by studying His word and spending time throughout the day in prayer… or have we just been too busy with or our to-do lists and personal agendas?
 
Let me leave you with this thought… it is not too late… there is still time for us to be about our Father’s business…  
 
Because believe it or not… WHILE YOU [and I] WERE SLEEPING… Jesus was busy praying.  In fact, in Luke 5 (16), we read, “Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.”  And if we were to look at John 17, we would see that it is broken down into three sections that fall under the headings: Jesus Prays to Be Glorified, Jesus Prays for His Disciples, and Jesus Prays for All Believers.
 
And if Jesus prayed for His people so fervently back then, how much more is Jesus praying for us even now? 
 
And that really ought to give us a sense of peace and comfort… knowing that Jesus is praying for us…
 
But not only is Jesus praying on our behalf, in Paul’s letter to the Romans, we find these words:

In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God (Romans 8:26 – 27).

0r as it reads in the Message:

Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God’s Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don’t know how or what to pray, it doesn’t matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God.

Isn’t it good to know that even when we cannot figure out what to say or how to pray, the Lord already has it under control?  That even WHILE YOU [and I] WERE SLEEPING the Lord continues to keep us in mind… loving us and praying for us?
 
So, before we transition to our time of Communion, I want to leave you with these words that come from Jesus’ final prayer just before His arrest so that there is no room for doubt that Jesus has always had you and me on His mind… 
 
Jesus was not simply praying for the disciples that had been ministering and walking alongside Him then… but for all those who were yet to come.  Listen to these words of Jesus as they are found in John’s Gospel (17:20 – 24).

My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
 
 “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.

Jesus’ prayer was that we would be one… that we would live in unity… and that we would one day be with Him for all of eternity.
 
And if it fills your heart with joy and thanksgiving to know that even WHILE YOU [and I] WERE SLEEPING Jesus was praying for each one of us… so that where He is, we may be also…
 
Then I want to invite you to stand and join in singing our Hymn of Discipleship: Sweet Hour of Prayer! #570
 

Return to News