“And saith unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful unto death: tarry ye here, and watch” (Mark 14:34).

Whatever Jesus suffered throughout His 33 years here on earth, nothing compared to what He started to face in the last hours before the cross. From the eternal ages (Ephesians 1:1-4; 2 Timothy 1:8-9; Titus 1:1-2) the sacrifice of Jesus as the offering for the world’s sin was planned, and now it was all coming to pass.

What do the following verses tell us about Christ’s suffering in Gethsemane? Matthew 26:39, Mark 14:33-36, Luke 22:41-44.

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“He went a little distance from them — not so far but that they could both see and hear Him — and fell prostrate upon the ground. He felt that by sin He was being separated from His Father. The gulf was so broad, so black, so deep, that His spirit shuddered before it. This agony He must not exert His divine power to escape. As man He must suffer the consequences of man’s sin. As man He must endure the wrath of God against transgression.

Christ was now standing in a different attitude from that in which He had ever stood before. His suffering can best be described in the words of the prophet, ’Awake, O sword, against My shepherd, and against the man that is My fellow, saith the Lord of hosts.’ Zechariah 13:7. As the substitute and surety for sinful man, Christ was suffering under divine justice. He saw what justice meant. Hitherto He had been as an intercessor for others; now He longed to have an intercessor for Himself.” — Ellen G. White, The Desire of Ages, p. 686.

<–Monday Wednesday–>

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Read the following verses, all the while keeping in mind the fact that Jesus was divine, the Creator of heaven and earth, and that He came to offer Himself as a sacrifice for the sins of the whole world (Matthew 12:22-24; Luke 4:21-30; John 8:58-59). How do these verses help us understand the sufferings that Jesus faced here on earth?

Whether by leaders, or even by the common people, Jesus’ life, acts, and teachings were constantly misunderstood, leading to rejection and hatred by people He came to save.

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In a certain sense it must be like a parent who sees a wayward child in need of help, and though the parent is willing to give everything for that child, the child spurns the parent, heaping scorn and rejection upon perhaps the only person who can spare that child from utter ruin. That’s what Jesus faced while here on earth. How painful it must have been for Him.

Read Matthew 23:37. What does it tell us about how Christ felt about the rejection? As you read, ask yourself, too, “Was He feeling bad for Himself (as we often do when facing rejection), or was it for another reason?” If for another reason, what was it?

We’ve all felt the sting of rejection, and maybe our pain was similar to Christ’s in that it was unselfish: We were pained, not because we were rejected, but because of what the rejection would mean for the one who was rejecting us (perhaps someone we care about who refuses to accept salvation in Christ). Imagine, though, how it must have felt to Jesus, who was fully aware of what He was to face in order to save them, and at the same time fully aware of what the consequences of their rejection would be. “It was because of His innocence that He [Christ] felt so keenly the assaults of Satan.” — Ellen G. White, Selected Messages, book 3, p. 129.

<–Sunday Tuesday–>

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Scripture gives us little information about the early years of Jesus. A few verses, however, tell us something about those conditions and the kind of world the Savior entered.

Read Luke 2:7, Luke 2:22-24 (see also Leviticus 12:6-8) and Matthew 2:1-18. What do we see in these verses that gives us an indication of the kind of life Jesus faced from the start?

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Of course, Jesus was not the first person to live in poverty or to face those who wanted to kill Him, even from an early age. There is, however, another element that helps us understand the uniqueness of what Christ suffered from the earliest times.

Read John 1:46. What element does this add to help us understand what sufferings the young Jesus had faced?

With the exception of Adam and Eve before the Fall, Jesus was the only sinless person who ever lived on the earth. In His purity, in His sinlessness, He was immersed in a world of sin. What a torture it must have been, even as a child, for His pure soul constantly to be in contact with sin. Even in our hardness because of sin, we ourselves often shrink away from exposure to sins and evil that we find repulsive. Imagine what it must have been like for Christ, whose soul was pure, who wasn’t the least bit tainted by sin. Think of the sharp contrast between Himself and others around Him in that regard. It must have been exceedingly painful for Him.

<–Sabbath Monday–>

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Sabbath Afternoon

Read for This Week’s Study: Luke 2:7, Luke 2:22-24; Matthew 2:1-18; John 8:58-59; Luke 22:41-44; Matthew 27:51-52; Romans 6:23; Titus 1:2.

Memory Text: “And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46).

Whenever we look at the issue of suffering, the question comes: How did sin and suffering first arise? Through divine revelation we have good answers: They arose because free beings abused the freedom God had given them. This leads to another question: Did God know beforehand that these beings would fall? Yes, but obviously He thought it was, as C. S. Lewis wrote, “worth the risk.”

Worth the risk? For whom? For us, while God sits in heaven on His throne? Not exactly. The freedom of all His intelligent creatures was so sacred that, rather than deny us freedom, God chose to bear in Himself the brunt of the suffering caused by our abuse of that freedom. And we see this suffering in the life and death of Jesus, who, through suffering in our flesh, has created bonds between heaven and earth that will last throughout eternity.

The Week at a Glance: What did Christ suffer in our behalf? What can we learn from His suffering?

Study this week’s lesson to prepare for Sabbath, September 24.

Sunday–>

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Part 12: Father is Baptized!

By Andrew McChesney

The day of Father’s baptism finally arrived, and he arrived with Mother and Junior at Manaus Central Seventh-day Adventist Church, a larger church where the baptism would be held, in Manaus, Brazil. About 400 people were seated in the main sanctuary. Pastor Sergio Alan A. Caxeta, president of the Adventist Church’s Central Amazon Conference, whose territory includes Manaus, asked Mother how she felt as she and Junior took a seat on the front row. “We’re fine,” she said, smiling happily.

The pastor acknowledged feeling uneasy until that very afternoon. Then he had prayed, “Lord, please help me. I’m not sure about my own strength. I want Your peace so I can have the certainty that Your power is here when I baptize Eduardo.” After the prayer, all doubt had vanished.

Ricardo Coelho, pastor of the family’s Alpha Community Church, led Father to the second floor, where seats were reserved for Alpha’s 300 members. Father greeted Dilma Araujos dos Santos and her son Clifferson, who first introduced the family to the Adventist Church, and the others. Then Pastor Ricardo asked Father to return downstairs to don a baptismal gown.

As Father descended the stairs, a man suddenly darted up and rushed toward him. Father turned to look at the man and, as their eyes met, the man’s pupils slid up into his head and his eyes went white. Then the man fell down and writhed on the stairs. “I’ve been ordered to kill him!” he shrieked.

Concealed in a pocket, the man was carrying a small dagger, the type that Father once had used to sacrifice animals at the temple. But before the man could pull out the dagger, Pastor Ricardo and several other men lifted him up and led him to a backroom, where they found the weapon.

A short time later, Father waded into the baptismal pool. Alpha church members sang a hymn from the second floor as he went under the water.

Afterward, Pastor Ricardo told the congregation about the attempted attack and invited a physician, Luiz, up to the front to speak. Luiz, who had examined the attacker in the backroom, was a frequent guest at the church but had never committed his life to Jesus. “I didn’t understand the reality of the great controversy between Christ and Satan until today,” he said, his voice shaking. “I saw it right here. Praise the Lord that nothing bad happened. It was God’s power.” He began to weep. “As a cardiologist, I felt for the attacker’s pulse,” he said. “I have never seen anything so abnormal. His pulse was too fast. No human could have such a high pulse rate and live.”

The experience changed Luiz’s life, and he decided to be baptized.

The knife attacker, it turned out, had struggled with satanic possession for some time. The evil spirits left when a pastor gave him Bible studies several months later. Through Father’s baptism, at least two souls were led to Jesus.

Your Thirteenth Sabbath Offering will help open eight churches in the South American Division, including four in Brazil, where Father (Eduardo Ferreira dos Santos) and his family live.

Produced by the General Conference Office of Adventist Mission. Find more mission stories at adventistmission[dot]org

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