His Fathomless Pain

“And being in an agony He prayed more earnestly: and His sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground.”

Luke 22:44 (KJV)

It is interesting that Luke is the only one of the gospel writers to mention that Jesus’ sweat was ‘as great drops of blood’. This is probably because Luke was a physician (Colossians 4:14), and therefore this had special significance to him.

There are documented cases of people actually sweating drops of blood under extreme emotional pressure. This might explain why Luke is also the only writer to mention the angel strengthening Jesus (Luke 22:43). Just as when Jesus encountered Satan during His forty days of fasting and temptation in the wilderness and the angels ministered unto Him (Mark 1:13), so here He needed supernatural strength to endure His sufferings.

The use of the words “as it were” might also mean that the sweat of Jesus was only comparable to blood in consistency or size, but it certainly underscores the effect Jesus’ agony had on His physical body.

Jesus’ sufferings for us were more than just physical. In the garden, before He suffered physically, He suffered emotionally, almost to the point of death. As Luke records, another angel had to come and give Him strength or the emotional struggle alone might have killed Him.

Everything that Jesus did was motivated solely by love. It was for the joy that was set before Him that He endured going to the cross. As our Creator, he didn’t do what He did to save us out of pity or a sense of obligation, He did it because He loves us.

Whatever we may have to face in the future, we always need to remember that when we belong to Jesus, His blood washes away all our sins.  God looks on us as His holy children, and when our physical lives end, we will enter into eternal glory with Him!

Praise the Lord!

Prayer

Lord Jesus, thank you for loving us so much that You were willing to die in our place so that Your Father could look on us as His holy children.

Amen

Study by Allan Frankcom