Today’s Devotional – “The Passion”

The Passion shows how far Jesus went to demonstrate God’s love, starting in the Garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus prepared Himself for what was ahead.

“And being in agony, He prayed more earnestly. Then His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground.” (Luke 22:44)

The Garden of Gethsemane was a place where Jesus often visited with his disciples to pray. But this time, it was different. This time, He was in agony.

What’s interesting is that this is the only time the word “agony” appears in the Scriptures.

What we learn from its usage is that its meaning was connected to being in anguish or struggling intensely. You might say that Jesus was in anguish, which describes a feeling of severe physical or emotional pain or torment.

Jesus knew He was on course for a painful death on the cross, where He would experience the full force of God’s wrath that His Father would place on Him for all our sins.

Deep within Jesus’s soul, a battle was unfolding. Jesus was fighting, struggling, and battling, not for His own life but for our eternal lives.

So, in deep agony of the soul, Jesus prayed, “Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done.” (Luke 22:42)

His anguish and the torment His soul endured were so intense that the blood vessels in His forehead burst.

The official medical term for this condition is “hematidrosis.” “An extremely rare condition characterized by the sweating of blood, which is said to occur when a person is facing death or other highly stressful events. It has been seen in prisoners before execution.” (Segen’s Medical Dictionary)

For Jesus, it was His passion for you and me.