“AND HE WENT A LITTLE FARTHER”
Matthew 26:39 (NLT)

It always amazes me how different passages of scripture in the Word of God hold larger-than-life significance during peculiar moments in our lives.  Somehow, just a word or phrase has a way of casting or shedding new light on a distressful situation.

During this Lenten season, Matthew’s account of our Lord’s Gethsemane crisis is one such instance. I deemed it a crisis moment because, in the text, Jesus expresses how the feeling he is feeling has brought him ever so close to death.  I harbor the hunch saints that what we have on the inside of us will determine how we handle our crisis moments.  I want to suggest that Jesus was able to find strength in the crisis because he relied on what was inside of Him.

Jesus is in the garden of Gethsemane and is about to be arrested by the soldiers.  He has invited three of His prayer partners, Peter, James, and John, but He soon discovers that in some crises, you have to go a little farther and encourage yourself.  Jesus takes them with Him, but they have fallen asleep.  There will be times, child of God when you will have to press on or go on “a little farther” all by yourself.  I dare someone to go farther and deeper in your study of God’s word. I dare someone to go a little farther and with a little more determination to wait on God and lean not to his or her own understanding.

There will be times when you will need to separate yourself from others and go a little farther to find out what God has in store for you. Jesus did, and when He did, He discovered that God had already arranged some Heavenly help to meet Him at

His point of need and despair. The Gospel writer Luke adds something that Matthew leaves out.  In Luke’s account of this Gethsemane scene, we are told, “Then an angel from Heaven appeared and strengthened Him.”  (Luke 22:43)

Let me “go a little farther” and suggest, beloved, that if you can separate yourself from those with the best intentions and wait on God, God will summon help out of nowhere to meet you at your point of need. Stay strong and stay woke!!

      Dr. Darrell K. White, Pastor