³⁸Then He said to them, “My soul is deeply grieved, to the point of death; remain here and keep watch with Me.”

Heart-wrenching to the core, in these words we can hear Jesus’ groan as He was facing the judgment due to the entire human race. He felt like He would die from the weight of sorrow. The prophet Isaiah foretold:

Surely our griefs He Himself bore, and our sorrows He carried; yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. (Isa. 53:4)

What human soul can comprehend the excruciating burden Jesus was bearing? No human suffering can compare with the totality of all judgment and condemnation—for all have sinned, and the wages of sin is the judgment of death (Rom. 3:23, 6:23). The path to our redemption ran through the valley of grief, far deeper and darker than any human imagination could begin to comprehend. The apostles certainly didn’t get it, though they were closer to Christ than anyone—they slept when He wanted them to stand with Him in His anguish.

It is regrettable that most Christians only think about the experience of Christ’s emotional suffering once a year, during so-called “Passion Week” on the church calendar, the week leading up to Easter Sunday. While we do not want our Christian devotion to center depressingly on the morbidity of Jesus’ suffering, we must never forget the price of our redemption. To be sure, we are not saved by His grief but by His death in our place. But Scripture invites us into the inner sanctuary of what was going through our Redeemer’s mind, soul, and spirit as He considered the cost of our salvation. He was going to pay it all.

So where is the joy of our salvation if we dwell on Jesus’ grief? Are we confined to a funeral dirge of depression? No! We take our cue from the perspective of the Lord:

[fix] our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. (Heb. 12:2)

Our meditation celebrates the victory Jesus had over the cross and the shame. Though His grief was deep, His joy was greater. The more we understand the former, the more we appreciate the latter. The magnificence of Jesus’ work in redeeming us is far more glorious when we see it in contrast with what He went through for us. He grieved, but He did not shrink back. Praise God!

Lord, thank You that the grief of what was about to happen did not deter You from redeeming my soul.