The spirit is indeed willing, but the flesh is weak. — Mark 14:38

Our Lord himself said this, and the context indicates that he was applying it to himself as well as to his disciples — and to the rest of us! We are all weak in the flesh, and it appears that Jesus was also. Even though he was divine and sinless, he came to planet earth "in the likeness of sinful flesh" (Romans 8:3). He tired like the rest of us, and thirsted and hungered. He was even "in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin" (Hebrews 4:15).

   This is why I am not a traditional Trinitarian. I do not believe that Jesus was God, who according to James 1:13 cannot be tempted. Like Peter I confess that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and therefore divine (Matthew 16:16), and I share Paul's faith as spelled out in 1 Corinthians 8:6: "For us there is one God, the Father . . . and one Lord Jesus Christ." When we see Jesus as the eternal Logos, as in John 1:1, we see him as both "with God and was God." This must be what he "emptied himself" of when he became human, as Paul describes in Philippians 2:8: The Logos was "equal with God" but he emptied himself and became human. In doing so he became Son of God, but not God. This is why our Lord resisted being called God: "Why do you call me good, for no one is good but One, that is God" (Luke 18:19).

   But there remains abundant mystery to the relationship between Jesus and God, whom Jesus called Father, even "Abba Father," the tenderest of addresses. He even said "I and the Father are one" (John 10:30), and "If you have seen Me you have seen the Father" (John 14:9). Moreover Colossians 1:15 describes Jesus as "the image of the invisible God," and Hebrews 1:3 depicts him as "the brightness of God's glory and the express image of His person."

   While such references underscore the divine nature of Christ, they fall short of calling him God. Jesus can bear the mage of God, be one with him, and reflect his glory without being God. Moreover, the New Testament emphasizes the humanity of Jesus, as in 1 Timothy 2:5: "There is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus." But it is amidst his Passion — in Gethsemane — that our Lord most dramatically showed not only his humanity but even the weakness of the flesh, thus fulfilling, "The spirit is indeed willing, but the flesh is weak.

   Mark first depicts Jesus as "troubled and deeply distressed" (14:33), and then goes on to reveal what Jesus said to his disciples "I am exceedingly sorrowful, even unto death" (14:34). Then he left his disciples to go away to pray. He prostrated himself on the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him, even when he knew it was not possible (14:35). He returned to his disciples, only to find them sleeping, and then went away to pray again, apparently more desperately, "Abba, Father, all things are possible for You Take this cup away from Me. Nevertheless, not what I will, but what you will" (14:36).

   Returning to his disciples he urged them to "Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation, The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak" (14:38). He then went away to pray once more, using the same words (14:39).

   It is an amazing display of the struggle between one's will (inner self) and one's flesh (carnal nature), and it victimized our Lord. He knew very well what he faced. It was scripted by he will of God. At least three times he told his disciples that he had to go to Jerusalem and be crucified, and yet he prayed that he might be spared such agony. But this was his carnal nature, the weakness of the flesh, speaking, not the will of his inner-self. His spirit was willng, but his flesh was weak. Weakness iself is not sinful; it is the price of being human. It becomes sinful when we allow it to dominate. Jesus was victorious in the struggle in that he could at last pray. "Nevertheless, not what I will, but what You will." From that moment he faced the Cross with resolve and because of "the joy set before him" (Hebrews 12:2).

   There is good news here for us. We have a problem in that we are human, and are heirs to the verdict, "The spirit is indeed willing, but the flesh is weak." The poet got it right, "To err is human, to forgive is divine." We will not and cannot turn in a perfect record — not in our daily walk, not in our work, not in our marriage, not as a parent. But we have a Lord who struggled in the same human predicament, and he shows us how to win. Whatever the conflict we teach our heart to pray, "Nevertheless, not what I will, but what You will."

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