Bethel Lutheran Church - Pastor Luke Bernthal
Soli Deo Gloria

Father Forgive Them! – Forgive our Fearful Lack of Trust! ; Mark 14: 48 - 52; 2009-02-25

1. We abandon You when our faith is weakest
2. Father, increase our faith

The Bulletin (order of service)

Text: Mark 14: 48 - 52;
48 Then Jesus answered and said to them, "Have you come out, as against a robber, with swords and clubs to take Me? 49 "I was daily with you in the temple teaching, and you did not seize Me. But the Scriptures must be fulfilled." 50 Then they all forsook Him and fled. 51 Now a certain young man followed Him, having a linen cloth thrown around his naked body. And the young men laid hold of him, 52 and he left the linen cloth and fled from them naked.

Dear Fellow Redeemed,

“Even if I have to die with you, I will never disown you” (Matthew 26:35). “Even if all fall away on account of you, I never will” (Matthew 26:33). “Lord, I am ready to go with you to prison and to death” (Luke 22:33). These were all words which Peter and the disciples spoke to Jesus on Maundy Thursday evening, the same night the events of our text happened. If ever words came back to haunt people, and haunt them quickly, these were the words! Had it only been a few hours earlier that they had spoken them, in that warm, safe upper room in a house in Jerusalem? And now Jesus’ disciples were running in every direction, running for their lives, while the man they had promised to stand beside was bound and led away to judgment and death.

The sad fact about courage is that, all too often, we feel it most when we need it the least and feel it the least when we so desperately need it the most. Before the catastrophe in Gethsemane, the disciples had known what they were supposed to do when the time came. Stand with Christ! “Stand up, stand up for Jesus!” as the hymn says. Never leave him or forsake him! But in that dark and shadowy garden, where who knows how many soldiers there were with torches and swords and clubs everywhere, the courage that the disciples had all so strongly felt in themselves while eating supper with Jesus in the upper room melted away.

Why did their courage disappear and dry up so quickly? It was because their trust was abandoned. That was why the disciples ran in the garden. They no longer trusted in Jesus. That was gone. The man had once walked across water to rescue them and had rebuked a gale-force wind when it had frightened them. But now they feared that if they would stay with him, they would be arrested, or even worse—killed!

Arrest and/or death for the sake of Christ doesn’t threaten us too often, especially in this country. And yet, like the disciples on that sad Thursday night so long ago, we sometimes find ourselves tempted to run away from wherever it is that Christ, our Lord, wants us to stand. And, to our sorrow and shame, we run away for the same reason: Lack of trust. And that is when we must pray: Forgive Our Fearful Lack of Trust!

1.

The disciples had never thought of themselves as cowards. Nor had they considered themselves to be boastful or braggarts. They really loved Jesus, and they really wanted to be his loyal followers. When they had said those things about staying with him through thick and thin, I’m sure they had meant them—every word! But how soon the disciples’ boasting changed to fear and fleeing! The most festive night of the year, the Passover, steadily became a nightmare from the moment the meal had been set out.

The disciples, of course, should have known better and should have done better that evening! Again and again during His time with the disciples, He had rebuked them for the weakness of their faith. When they panicked during the furious storm on the Sea of Galilee and wondered whether Jesus even cared that they were drowning, He asked them, "Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?" Then He arose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm (Matthew 8:26). Time and time again during His ministry He showed them His power, His trustworthiness, and especially His care for their bodies and souls.

Jesus saw this coming, however. Just hours earlier, he had reminded them of a prophecy: “I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered” (Mark 14:27). One would betray him (Judas); another would deny him (Peter); all the others, as he put it, would “fall away on account of me” (Matthew 26:31). None of them had believed these things would happen. All of them had protested. And now these things were coming horribly true.

No doubt their confusion played a big part in leading the disciples to abandon the trust they had once had in Jesus. Jesus had told them exactly what was going to happen to Him; He had been telling them for months! And He had taught them again and again what He was here to do: to give his life for the sins of all people. When some of His disciples had first met Jesus, John the Baptist had told them clearly, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29).

Yet somehow they still harbored ideas of an earthly king and of glory and honor in a kingdom of this world. All the old legends and hopes about the splendors of the days of the Messiah still “danced” in their heads and hearts. And when Jesus wouldn’t lift a finger to stop the temple guards from arresting Him, it all came crashing down for the disciples. What was Jesus doing? Why wouldn’t He fight? Why didn’t He summon those 12 legions of angels to defend Himself from His bloodthirsty enemies (cf. Matthew 26:53)? The disciples didn’t know. They were scared. They lost all their hope that Jesus would make things turn out right in the end. And with their faith in Him shattered, they ran in fear.

We must admit, however, that the same thing happens to us as well. Like the disciples, we find courage is easier to come up with when we don’t really need it. What grand and successful struggles against temptation we can come up with in our dreams and imaginations! “Satan may tempt us, the sinful world may sing its siren song, but we know that we will stand fast! We won’t give in. We will fight the good fight of faith—we will!”

And yet we know how, when push comes to shove, all our resolve can fail. It’s easy here, in church, to make the promises of everlasting loyalty to Christ, like we did on our confirmation day. It is easy during our nighttime prayers in the solitude and safety of our bedrooms to pledge undying devotion to our Savior and our King. But get out from behind these walls; get out of your house; be forced to deal with that world of sin and temptation—to be face-to-face with the enemy and his deceptions—and see what happens!

The sad fact is, most of our fears are so much less than those of the disciples!!! They abandoned Jesus to save their lives. Have the stakes ever been that high for us? We abandon his commands so that we won’t be laughed at or thought of less highly, or so that we won’t miss out on something that we feel would be very enjoyable. We know His Word, we know what his commandments say, and the price of loyalty to Him, but we fail Him.

And so it is the same sad story: Our lack of trust leads to our foolish fear and falling. We don’t think Jesus is leading us to a place that is safe and good for us. Instead of trusting that our Good Shepherd knows where he is leading us, we fear that he has taken a wrong turn. We fear that he is leading us into some place we don’t want to be. It looks like it may be dark there. It looks like it may not be pleasant. It looks as if he doesn’t know what he’s doing.

And so we run from Him, driven by foolish fears that often hardly deserve a shiver! Our trust in Him melts away, and with it dissolves all our resolve to be His true and obedient followers. We abandon Him, as surely as the disciples did, when our faith and trust in Him grow weak.

2.

And that is why every Christian, every day, needs to pray these words: “Father, increase our faith!” When our trust in our Savior is at its lowest, that is when our prayer level must be at its highest! God forbid that we should run away from Him because our faith has grown weak! He has certainly done nothing to deserve such lack of confidence from us.

That is why we study the commandments, so not only will we know what is expected of us but we also might marvel again at the understanding and insight of Him who wrote them. If we would just do that—study and think through the ways He would have us go—how quickly we could put to rest our foolish fears! He knows what he is doing. Our Creator certainly knows the best paths on which to lead us. We truly have nothing to fear. We should always be able to say with the psalmist, “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me” (Psalm 23:4).

That is why we study the stories in the Bible as well, so we might see again and again how true it is that “in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28). Remember Moses and the people of Israel—seemingly trapped between the Egyptians and the Red Sea, murmuring about the hopeless place to which they had been led—until Moses told them, “Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today” (Exodus 14:13). Remember the calming voice of the Savior as he walked through the tumultuous Sea of Galilee and told His disciples, “It is I; don’t be afraid” (John 6:20). He has never let down anyone who has faith in Him: “The one who trusts in him will never be put to shame” (Romans 9:33).

That is why we remain constant in his Word and faithful to the sacraments by which he increases our faith and, consequently, decreases our fears. Do you fear sometimes that he may lead you to a dark and bad place and leave you stranded? Then remember your baptism: the day he claimed you through the washing of water with the Word and told all the world, “I have cleansed you; you are mine! I will never leave you or forsake you!” Do you fear that Jesus may not always have your best interests at heart as he leads you on a sometimes confusing and frightening path? Then come to His communion table. As you eat that bread and drink that wine, remember the dark road he traveled alone so that he could purchase your forgiveness with the sacrifice of his body and his blood.

That is why we also not only read, study, and digest God’s Word, we also turn to Him in prayer! We pray, “Lord, help us trust your wisdom in all things, even if actual dangers should come along when we follow where your Son leads us.” The Christian life is not a cakewalk. God has made it abundantly clear to us that troubles will plague us if we follow his guidance (Matthew 16:24; Acts 14:22). “We walk in danger all the way,” as the hymn puts it. But He will never lead us into any place where his Son has not already been and has not already conquered all that we might fear. Jesus assures us, “Take heart! I have overcome the world” (John 16:33).

And so, cleansed from our guilt and sin by His blood, we can dedicate ourselves, body and soul, to living out the trust that He so rightly has earned and deserves from us. Let us never fear that He doesn’t know what is best for us when He points out the way for us to follow him. Let us never think that we know better which path is best for our lives, but let us always rely on our Savior to know and show it to us.

We won’t end now with great and eloquent promises of lifelong faithfulness. Such pride went before the disciples’ downfall in the Garden of Gethsemane. No, we will end with the fervent prayer that, for Jesus our Savior’s sake, our heavenly Father might give us an ever greater measure of his Holy Spirit. May he increase our faith and, with it, our courage. We pray: “Lord God, when we face our crises in our Gethsemanes, make us stand firm in the power of Your might. Help us to trust in You daily and give us courage through Your Spirit at all times, especially during times of trial. In Jesus’ powerful and trustworthy name we pray. Amen.” (Sing hymn printed in bulletin on p. 3 – “Christ by Countless Foes Surrounded”)