Three main images/places/events fill the pages of Scripture on Thursday of Holy Week:

• The Last Supper (Passover)
• Jesus’ Upper Room Discourse
• Jesus’ Prayer in Gethsemane.

In a few hours, Jesus would be betrayed for a month’s wages, arrested, subjected to a mock trial, condemned, shamed publicly, scourged, stripped, crowned with thorns, spat upon, and nailed to the wood.

Matthew’s account reads as follows:

Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, “Sit here, while I go over there and pray.” 37 And taking with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, he began to be sorrowful and troubled. 38 Then he said to them, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with me.” 39 And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.” 40 And he came to the disciples and found them sleeping. And he said to Peter, “So, could you not watch with me one hour? 41 Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” 42 Again, for the second time, he went away and prayed, “My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.” 43 And again he came and found them sleeping, for their eyes were heavy. 44 So, leaving them again, he went away and prayed for the third time, saying the same words again. 45 Then he came to the disciples and said to them, “Sleep and take your rest later on. See, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. 46 Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand.” (Mt 26:36-46, ESV).

In Matthew 26, we see how Jesus prayed in his familiar spot in Gethsemane. Judas knew Jesus would be there. And in John 13-17, we see Jesus wash his disciples’ feet, predict Judas’ betrayal, and continue his discourse about the exclusive salvation wrought by Christ alone by grace alone through faith alone.

In Luke 22, we see Jesus teach his followers the gospel and how he is the Lamb slain from before the foundation of the world, and that the Old Testament promises are fulfilled in him (Christ) and his church, the true Israel of God, and Christ institutes the Lord’s Supper with his disciples.

It all coheres. The entire biblical narrative fits together seamlessly because it is one coherent story. When Jesus instituted the Lord’s Supper with his followers, he connected the theological doctrines regarding the Suffering Servant and spotless Lamb from Isaiah 53 to himself.

When he taught the disciples in the Upper Room, it was gospel 101—how we sinners are under just judgment, but that Christ is the substitutionary atonement for all who come to him in repentance and faith. And when Christ prayed at Gethsemane and his betrayer did what he did, again it was all in precise fulfillment of the Old Testament (Psalm 41:9; Zechariah 11:12-13, e.g.).

Encouragement/takeaway: If I were an honest skeptic of the Christian faith, I would be drawn to this. Why? Because truth is what matters most to me. If Christ was and is who he demonstrated himself to be, then, as Flannery O’Connor’s character said in “A Good Man Is Hard to Find, “If [Jesus] did what He said, then it’s nothing for you to do but thow (ibid.) away everything and follow Him.”

O’Connor put those words in the mouth of a very sinful character. But as with most things, O’Connor was spot-on, bull’s-eye in her stories. Why? Because all of us must deal with the truth claims and evidence of Christ and the Scriptures.

We can ignore them, suppress them, and mock them, but truth has a way of conquering those who might labor to bury it–even bury it in a tomb in Jerusalem, Israel 2,000+ years ago. After all, Resurrection Day (Sunday) was coming. Again, just as foretold.