Thy Will Be Done

We are told that Jesus prayed three times in the Garden of Gethsemane. Matthew records two of these prayers in chapter 26. They are not the same. In verse 39, the first prayer is “O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt.” We see here a son in agony, crying out for his father to take the pain away. He won’t quit but He’s asking His Father if there’s any other way, if there’s some possibility they had not yet considered, in which the cup may pass from Him. In verse 42, the second prayer is “O my father, if this cup may not pass away from me, except I drink it, thy will be done.” Christ has accepted His Father’s will. In the second prayer, there are no neverthelesses, there is no discussion of Christ’s will, there is no looking for possibilities, for a way out. Even though Christ was perfect, even though He had the power of God, possessed all knowledge, helped create the universe, we can see from one prayer to the next in that garden on that night, Christ was still strengthening His faith, deepening His humility. Christ is the perfect example. He was working through the absolute hardest thing anyone has ever gone through, but He was still showing us the only way to do it. When we are faced with an impossible test that towers over us and completely consumes us and threatens to overwhelm us, we may find the faith and the courage and the humility to pray like that first prayer - “if it be possible, let it pass, nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt.” But this will not be enough. We have to dig deeper. We have to let go of even more of our pride and our fear and our doubt. We have to let go of nevertheless. We have to recognize that this is happening and there is no way around it. “If this cup may not pass away from me, except I drink it, thy will be done.” We have to recognize and acknowledge that there is no other way. We have to get past the struggle between our will and God’s will. We can’t have that push and pull. If we’re going to get through the impossible test, we have to let God take over completely. It’s the only way. But when we pray more earnestly and truly with every fiber of our being and every particle of our soul declare Thy will be done, holding nothing back, then we put God in charge and He will not fail us nor let us fail. The pain and agony that Christ endured in the Garden of Gethsemane should have killed Christ’s body a billion, a trillion times over, but God did not let the forces of darkness kill His Son before His task was finished, and He will not allow anything to stop us from completing our tests. We will face trials that we don’t think we can overcome. If we hold onto our fears and our doubts and our wills and our neverthelesses, we may be right. But if we can let go of our idea of what we think is possible, and instead utter with all sincerity, Thy Will Be Done, then irrefutably, indefatigably, inevitably, invincibly God’s will is done. If, in our prayers, we are still holding onto possible, then we are blocking God’s will from accomplishing the Impossible. But we can follow our Brother’s example and pray more earnestly until our own will vanishes and there is no more nevertheless, but only Thy Will Be Done.