NT 6: Gethsemane and Us

The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.

For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.

Gethsemane.
The place where the most righteous, holy, pure person ever to live on the earth was subject to pain beyond measure, to sin that he had never partaken in, to the sorrows and heaviness and the weight of the world.

No matter how good we are, each of us has to partake of suffering in this life as well. It will never be to the extent of the Savior, but each of us will partake in our own Gethsemane. It is part of being a disciple of Christ. Whatever it may be, God will have a tried people. If we never had bitter we would never know the sweet.

When we go through suffering, not from sin, but from the circumstances of life, we have the opportunity to come to Him, the one that suffered all so that our suffering would be less.

No matter how great our suffering, He understands.
Deep personal trials and suffering can allow us to feel the Savior's love more deeply and more powerfully when we realize He has traveled here before.
This is a beaten road, a path that we never have to walk alone.

Yet sometimes we will feel very alone.
That is part of Gethsemane.

When we suffer, we partake of Gethsemane. Our personal Gethsemanes, while far from the suffering of the Savior, bring us to Him. If we never suffered--even the smallest part of what He suffered--how could we ever feel worthy to be in His presence?

Suffering can be a purifying process for us. It allows us to move upward.
This painting taught me that.

The title of the painting is The Sacred Incline.
It pictures a pioneer family, headed to Zion--but how far Zion must have felt at that moment.
They are pictured on Rocky Ridge with the snow and the ice and the wind.
Yet, they are on a sacred incline. Think about what that means.
Their suffering is sacred.
Their experience, their nearness to death, their pain, is holy.

I found this painting at a time in my life when I was experiencing a great deal of emotional pain--and I was asking why.
Why was I going through this?

The answer came in part through this painting.
It was my sacred incline.
My Gethsemane.

Once I realized this, I almost wish I could tell you things got better from then.
They didn't.

After this, life became consistently more painful and lonely.
For a long time.

But I made it through. I made it through that Gethsemane.

My sorrow and suffering may be so small compared to the Savior's, and compared to what many other people suffer.
But it was more than I could suffer on my own.
But I knew, I knew, that I was not beyond the Savior's care.

Because He had been in Gethsemane.
Part of His Gethsemane was my Gethsemane.
And nothing, nothing, could separate me from His love.

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

...Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.

For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.