Jesus tells the disciples 31"You will all fall away because of me this night." Peter swears he will never fall away, and says that even if he must die with Jesus he will not deny him, and all the disciples say the same. Jesus answers that Peter will deny him three times before the rooster crows. The confident vow and the coming failure will happen within the same night.
At Gethsemane he takes Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and he begins to be sorrowful and troubled. 38"My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with me." The language echoes the psalmists' distress (Psalm 42:5) and points ahead to the cry of forsakenness on the cross (Matthew 27:46). If Jesus did not truly dread what was coming, that later cry would be hollow. The scene rests on being exactly what it looks like: the Son, in a human body with a human will, face down in anguish.
The cup he names is an image the Old Testament uses for the wrath of God against sin (Psalm 75:8; Isaiah 51:17; Jeremiah 25:15). He had used the image before, asking James and John whether they could drink it (Matthew 20:22). They answered too quickly. Now the cup is in front of him. What he recoils from is bearing what sin deserves, in full, cut off from the Father he had never been separated from.
Three times he finds Peter, James, and John asleep. 41"The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak." It is a plain diagnosis. Peter had just sworn that he would die before he denied Jesus, and within the hour he cannot stay awake. Two chapters earlier Jesus told his disciples to stay awake and to watch (Matthew 24:42; 25:13), and now he asks for it directly, face to face, in the hour he needs it. Sincere intentions do not survive weakness alone.
While the three sleep, Jesus prays three times, alone. The first prayer asks whether there is another way. By the second, the request has changed: 42"your will be done." This is the request he taught on a hillside in Galilee (Matthew 6:10). What was a line in a lesson becomes a decision made at the cost of everything he has.
Some readers set this garden beside Eden. In the first, a man was offered everything and reached for the one thing withheld. In this one, the Son is offered a way to withhold himself from what is asked of him, and he refuses it. Obedience answers the ancient grasping.
The cup was his alone to drink. He asked no one to bear it with him, because no one else could have carried it. He drank it so that the cup we deserved would never reach our hands, and he went on to the cross with his eyes open.
When you pray about something you dread, pray the second prayer too: your will be done.
Prayer
Father, forgive us for how quickly our willing spirits give way under pressure, as Peter's did that night. Thank you that Christ's will bent fully to yours in that garden, at a cost we cannot measure, so that our faltering wills could still be received by you. Teach us to watch and pray instead of trusting our good intentions. Hold us to the obedience Christ showed when he said, and meant, as you will. In Jesus' name, amen.