It was well after midnight, and eleven men lay sprawled about on the ground, sleeping soundly. They were suddenly startled by a voice. “So, could you not watch with me one hour?” They stirred a little, realizing the voice belonged to their master. Their spirits were willing, but oh, how tired they all were. They remembered His mysterious words, how He was going to leave them and depart this world. Bad news leads to sadness, which can make you feel sleepy. But this was not the time for rest.
Jesus turned and faced the city, and said,
“See, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand” (John 18:45, 46).
Lights flickered in the trees, then came voices and many stomping feet. In seconds they were surrounded by several hundred hostile men carrying torches and weapons. They were a mixed mob of Roman soldiers, temple guards, Jewish leaders, and their servants. The eleven disciples fell back, but Jesus strode forward to confront them.
Jesus already knew exactly what they intended to do and what would happen. He didn’t shrink back but boldly faced the hostile mob. He was meek and lowly, but never a coward.
Before that night, no one could lay a hand on Him. When the temple police came to arrest Him, they would not, for “no one ever spoke like this man” (John 7:46). That night in Gethsemane was to be a night of horror and agony, for His time had come. A few minutes before the mob arrived, Jesus told His disciples, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with me” (Matthew 26:38). With His soul so sorrowful, Jesus fell on His face, crying out to God, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.” He desperately prayed this prayer three times and then submitted to His Father’s will. Luke reported “And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him” (Luke 22:43).
Angels had a much greater role than merely strengthening Jesus, according to Ellen White. She wrote that in Gethsemane, “everything was at stake,” including all the world, the universe, and eternal separation from His Father (Desire of Ages, p. 600). Jesus was weakening, teetering on the brink of despair and defeat, when suddenly, according to her,
“…the heavens opened, a light shone forth amid the stormy darkness of the crisis hour, and the mighty angel who stands in God’s presence, occupying the position from which Satan fell, came to the side of Christ.”
For Ellen White, Jesus was in real danger of failure, and Satan was overpowering. Only the most powerful angel in heaven, Satan’s replacement after he fell, could carry out this rescue. Apparently, Jesus was getting a little fuzzy on the reasons for His own mission, and He needed an angel to remind Him:
“He came to give power to the divine-human suppliant. He pointed Him to the open heavens, telling Him of the souls that would be saved as the result of His sufferings. He assured Him that His Father is greater and more powerful than Satan, that His death would result in the utter discomfiture of Satan, and that the kingdom of this world would be given to the saints of the Most High.” (Desire of Ages, 605)
Mrs. White’s Jesus was something less than fully God and could fail. The Jesus of Scripture, however, was fully human as well as fully divine. He certainly felt hunger, weakness, pain, and fear, and His human body could collapse. No doubt, in the garden His pain was unbearable by any human standard, and He needed to be strengthened. Even so, Scripture’s Jesus always had divine clarity on His mission and purpose. He was not a victim of the designs of evil men. He is directing events towards His trial and His execution. “No one takes My life from Me; I lay it down of Myself.”
In John’s account of Jesus’ arrest, we have a remarkable picture of Jesus as Lord, in control of events, and fulfilling prophecy. When the armed mob arrives (John 18:3-5), Jesus steps forward and demands to know whom they are seeking.
“Whom do you seek?”
“Jesus of Nazareth,” they answered.
Jesus said to them, “I Am!”
At those words, several hundred violent men “drew back and fell to the ground” (John 18:8). The Man from Nazareth stood against an army with two words, “I Am!” When He speaks His divine name, they fall down at His feet. Truly, every knee shall bow before the only God who can save (Isaiah 45:23).
The Son of Man was nothing less than Mighty God, the one who spoke all things into being. That night in the garden, they came at Him with their implements. He ruled the situation with words. Most Bible translations have Him saying, “I am he.” However, in the original Greek there is no ‘he.” Jesus simply answers with two words, “I am.” Let the reader understand. There are at least nine other “I am” statements made by Jesus in the book of John. For example, He stated, “I am the light of the world,” “I am the way, the truth, and the life,” or, “When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am.” Clearly, Jesus is the I Am of Exodus 3:14, the One who met Moses at the burning bush. “I Am” is God’s name, and Jesus carried that name for Himself.
Jesus asks the mob again, “Whom do you seek?” They answer again, “Jesus of Nazareth.” At that moment, we see not only a significant demonstration of Jesus’ authority but an amazing show of protection over his disciples. Jesus answers them, “I told you that I am he. So, if you seek me, let these men go.” He is not pleading with them. He had just shown that they have no power over Him, except what He allows. His voice commanded, and the mob obeyed.
Jesus protected His disciples from beginning to the end. As their Lord and Master, He was also their protector and keeper, even while they slept.
“He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep…The LORD will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life” (Psalm 121:3,4,7).
Jesus was also their High Priest and Intercessor. Earlier that night, He prayed that His disciples might be kept in His Father’s name and protected:
“While I was with them, I kept them in your name, which you have given me. I have guarded them, and not one of them has been lost except the son of destruction, that the Scripture might be fulfilled” (John 17:12).
All during His life on earth, during the darkest moments, Jesus always protected His own from spiritual calamity. That night in Gethsemane, we see that protection played out in a dramatic way. Jesus knew that if any of His disciples were arrested and punished along with Him, they could not bear it and would perish. They had no idea how much they needed Him to guard their souls.
Today, Jesus continues as High Priest, to keep and guard His own. There is no time in the future when Jesus will abandon His place as our High Priest, as some have taught us. Our Intercessor lives, and will never cease from guarding us from all harm:
“He holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues forever. Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them” (Hebrews 7:25).
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It seems to me that there is some ‘hair splitting’ here. Jesus did of course know His purpose in coming since childhood. He obviously did feel He would like some other way to be found if possible all the while knowing that there was no other way. Could He fail? If He could not fail then He didn’t have a choice. If God gives us freedom of choice surely Jesus also had that freedom? He choose to go ahead, to follow God’s will in this as in everything else; why was this? Was it just to be obedient to God per se or was it because He understood the ramifications? Vindication of God’s character before all creation as well as salvation for believers. I do not think that it would be inconsistent for a heavily messenger to come with words of reassurance and encouragement to Jesus in this very trying time. Was Ellen White exactly right in her wording? I don’t know but certainly the sentiment seems consistent with the facts.
Yes, Jesus knew from all eternity that He would come and die for human sin. His coming was not “Plan B”. He did not beg the Father to let Him come. He is the Lamb slain from the creation of the world (Rev. 13:8).
Jesus did not come to “vindicate God’s character”. He came to die for sin. God’s character had never been in question; the angels had never wondered how God could be fair in giving a law so difficult to keep. Jesus did not come to demonstrate that the law could be kept; He came to fulfill its terms: death for sin. The only unanswered question before Jesus’ blood became the propitiation for sin was why God had allowed human sin to go unpunished. Never had the question been whether or not God was FAIR in punishing sin! Romans 3:26-27 settles this notion forever!
Jesus came to propitiate for human sin to demonstrate His righteousness “at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus” (Rom. 3:27).
If we want to know the truth about Jesus, we have to look at Scripture ALONE and give up our attachment to the commentary of EGW. She changes the clear message of the Bible and gives us her great controversy paradigm instead. We are not given an overriding “free will”; we are born dead in sin, unable to seek God, please God, or know Him without His intervention (Eph. 2:1–3; Rom. 3:9–18). We cannot rise above our natures; God has to make us alive in Jesus—something He does when we hear the gospel of our salvation and believe (Eph. 1:13-14).
God is sovereign over everything—even our “free will”. We are mere creations. Jesus was not a mere creation; He was eternal, almighty God the Son veiled in a human body. He gave up none of His eternal deity and attributes by taking on a human nature with His divine nature. The Lord Jesus, in a mystery we cannot explain, suffered and was tempted as a man, but as God the Son, He could not sin and could not fail. He came to do a mission that only God could do, and He took a body to offer a human sacrifice for human sin.
He most definitely DID have advantages we do not have: He was always eternal God! But His advantages were for the purpose of His suffering more than any of us will ever suffer. He suffered for the entire human race. He became sin for us so we might become the righteousness of God in Him (2 Cor. 5:21).
The Adventist worldview is entirely different from a biblical worldview. For a closer look at the differences, this article may be helpful: What Is Seventh-day Adventism? http://www.lifeassuranceministries.org/proclamation/2015/4/whatisseventh-da.html