2.108 Gethsemane

In Matthew 5:13, Jesus calls us the salt of the earth, a bold reminder that our lives are meant to carry his flavor, his truth, and his love to the world. Join me each day to explore one verse of scripture and one thought, striving to stay full of savor and truly live as savory salt. Hello my friends, great to have you with me.

Today let's be anxiously engaged in a good cause and bring to pass much righteousness. Happy Holy Week. I know I've been saying that at the start of some of these episodes, but I truly do hope that your Holy Week and your personal study is at a whole another level this year as you've gone through and studied the life and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

We're going to continue that study. I'm going to study a little bit, although I will remind you if you're staying on track with our Book of Mormon reading as well, that you're reading Jarom, Omni, Words of Mormon, and Mosiah chapters 1 and 2 this week. We've been sprinkling those in in between our Easter thoughts.

Today we're going to go back into an area we've studied earlier this year, but a verse that we have not looked at. And it actually comes from my blend of studying Matthew 26 that I referenced earlier this week as we talked about Peter and his experience in Matthew 26. If we go a little bit earlier in Matthew 26, we have the experience of Jesus Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane.

Biblically, I don't know, it's interesting the different ways that Christianity views what happens in the Garden of Gethsemane. Biblically, we know that Christ falls on his face, as Matthew describes, and we know that he prays for some time and then goes back and prays again. But for me personally, my understanding and my view of what really happened in Gethsemane was not abundantly clear until Doctrine and Covenants section 19.

And in section 19, we've talked about many of the sections in Doctrine and Covenants are direct quotations and revelations from the Lord Jesus Christ. 19 is one of those, and it's here that we actually get a first-person. We're going to take a second perspective on what happened with Jesus Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane. And this is him speaking.

Our verse for today comes directly from Doctrine and Covenants section 19. It's verse 18. He's talking about the need for us to repent or face the suffering that he faced.

And this is what he says in verse 18. But this is such an insight to what the Atonement of Jesus Christ, or at least his suffering in Gethsemane, means for you and for me. Here is the literal Son of God.

The greatest of all, trembling, shaking in pain and bleeding at every pore. This is the moment that makes the birth of Christ matter. This is the moment that makes any history of him in the Bible matter.

It is in this moment that he truly suffers for our sins. Now he's going to still die and resurrect, and those moments are going to fulfill the Atonement of Jesus Christ for us. But as I think about this moment here, I hope that our Christian brothers and sisters can truly understand the suffering that Christ fulfilled for each one of us individually in Gethsemane.

And a way to do that, I've done this throughout this week a little bit. I love music. I love the power of music in my life.

And I have for you a link inside of here if you did not listen to the October 2024 General Conference when an entire choir of primary children sang "Gethsemane." I put the link in here. Even if you heard this, follow the link and take three minutes to listen again. These children truly are accompanied by angels in singing of the suffering of Jesus Christ in Gethsemane.

It's a beautiful song. It will bring the Spirit into your life and it will give you a moment of reflection on what Jesus Christ has done for us in fulfilling the will of the Father and in accomplishing his Atonement in our lives. I am so grateful to our Heavenly Father and our Savior Jesus Christ.

They live. They are real. Christ suffered for me and for you and did so that we may have joy and rejoice in our families and in our lives.

That's all for today, my friends. Lift up your hearts and rejoice. Cleave unto the covenants you have made and together we will be savory salt.