Could you not wait with me. . .

Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane; and he said to his disciples, "Sit here while I go over there and pray."

Tonight - Holy Thursday or, depending on who's referring to it, Maundy Thursday - marked what was, in any earthly sense, the beginning of the end for Jesus. He had spent the last - year? three years? the record is uncertain - of his life preaching: "The kingdom of heaven is at hand!"; teaching: "Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me"; giving sight to the blind and freeing those possessed and curing the ill and even raising the very dead.

It had to come to this, didn't it? Someone who says things like "The first shall be last and the last shall be first" is bound to be a bit unsettling - downright scary - to the powers that be. Sadducees and Romans alike had to be unnerved by someone who was utterly indifferent to the power they thought they had. That raising the dead thing - this guy could be awfully hard to defeat. The Scribes - the teachers of the law - and the Pharisees had to be mightily put off by Jesus' insistence that all their wisdom, accumulated through all the ages, wasn't so wise after all.

He took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be grieved and agitated. Then he said to them, "I am deeply grieved, even to death; remain here and stay awake with me."

If it was difficult to be an opponent of Jesus, being a disciple of his was no day at the beach, either. Still isn't, as you might have observed. He keeps making these outrageous demands of us. "Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also." Jesus - seriously? "I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me. . .just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me."

Jesus doesn't ask much of us. He just asks everything. All we are. All we can do. All we will ever be. If one would follow Jesus, then obeying Jesus is mandatory, not optional.

And the pressure got to one of the disciples. Too much for Judas, who betrayed Jesus and set in motion the events that came to a head on that Maundy Thursday.

But all Jesus wanted from Peter, James and John was the company of his friends on the most dangerous night of his life. But they couldn't do it.

Then he came to the disciples and found them sleeping; and he said to Peter, "So, could you not stay awake with me one hour? Stay awake and pray. . .,"

Could they not stay awake with me one hour? The question haunts me, even now. My prayer life - much of it - consists of just that. Stay awake with the Lord. Just listen. Rest in Him. It's not easy to stay awake with the Lord for an hour. But, if ever there was a night to pull an all-nighter with Jesus, Maundy Thursday is the night. I don't know that I'll manage an all-nighter. But sometime, after all are in bed, I will spend some quiet time with him.

On this night. On the night he was betrayed, with a kiss, no less. On the night he was arrested, and tried. On the night when Peter, no less than Judas, betrayed Jesus - three times before the cock crowed. On this night, let me be with you, even for a while, Lord.

Because everything you do, everything you suffer, even your death itself, is for me. And us.

Then he came to the disciples and said to them, "Are you still sleeping and taking your rest? See, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. . .See, my betrayer is at hand."

Thanks for hanging out. Loved your company. Would love your thoughts.