Wrestling with God: Finding Strength in Surrender at Gethsemane

There are moments in Scripture that speak so deeply into our human experience that they almost take our breath away. One of those moments for me is found in Matthew 26, in the Garden of Gethsemane. It’s a scene where we don’t see the triumphant Jesus calming storms or feeding thousands—we see Him struggling, overwhelmed, and praying through pain. We see Him human. And it’s there, in that garden, that I believe we find one of the most powerful lessons on prayer, surrender, and trust in the entire Bible.

The Weight of the Moment

When I read about Jesus in Gethsemane, I don’t just see a divine figure preparing for crucifixion—I see a man facing agony, betrayal, and isolation. He had just shared the Passover meal with His disciples—a deeply symbolic tradition for the Jewish people. But this meal was different. Out of it, He instituted what we now know as the Lord’s Supper, and with that act, He pointed directly to what was coming: His death.

What struck me most as I studied this scene was how Jesus used the four Passover cups—each tied to a promise from God in Exodus 6—to frame the spiritual significance of what was happening. The cup of sanctification, the cup of deliverance, the cup of redemption, and the cup of restoration. Jesus, fully understanding what each cup represented, took the cup of redemption and said, “This is my blood.” That statement alone carried the weight of all redemptive history. He wasn’t just fulfilling prophecy—He was becoming the very promise.

The Humanity of Jesus

In Gethsemane, Jesus prays, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.” That line always arrests my heart. This is the Son of God, face down on the ground, pleading with His Father. “If it is possible, let this cup pass from me. Yet not as I will, but as You will.”

I’ve felt overwhelmed before. I’ve had moments where the sorrow, the anxiety, or the fear felt like too much to bear. And here, in Jesus’ prayer, I realize—it’s okay to pray like that. It’s okay to say, “God, I don’t like this. I don’t know if I can do this. If there’s another way, please let it be.” What I love most about Jesus’ example is that He was completely honest in prayer. He didn’t sugarcoat His feelings. He didn’t pretend He wasn’t struggling. He brought the full weight of His heart to the Father.

And that gives us permission to do the same.

Persistent Prayer Over Passive Faith

One of the most eye-opening lessons for me from this passage is the persistence of Jesus’ prayer. He didn’t pray once and move on. He went back again—and then again. Three times He prayed the same prayer, wrestling with what was about to happen.

I believe many of us are guilty of what I call “one-pass prayer.” We bring a request to God, but we only do it once. If we don’t get an immediate answer, we back off, or worse, we blame God for not responding. But Jesus shows us that prayer isn’t always about changing God’s mind—it’s often about changing ours.

I used a simple illustration when I preached this: a sanding block and a piece of wood with words like “fear,” “pain,” “lies,” and “hurt” written on it. If you swipe the sanding block across it once, nothing really changes. But if you keep sanding—over and over—the surface begins to smooth, and those words start to fade. That’s what persistent prayer does. It smooths out our spiritual roughness and begins to align our heart with God’s will.

The Power of Surrender

Eventually, Jesus gets up from prayer and says something remarkable: “Rise, let us go. Here comes my betrayer.” It’s not resignation—it’s resolve. Nothing about the situation had changed. The betrayal still hurt. The cross was still ahead. But Jesus had changed. He had prayed until His spirit was stronger than His flesh.

That’s the transformation I long for in my own life. I want to be the kind of person who prays—not just for God to remove the pain—but for the strength to endure it. To say, “Not my will, but Yours,” and mean it.

Sometimes we think prayer is a place to bargain with God. But true prayer is the place we go to surrender. That’s where the breakthrough happens. That’s where our fear turns into faith. That’s where we stop pleading for a different path and start walking the one God has laid before us—with courage.

What Do You Need to Surrender?

So here’s the question I asked our church family, and I’ll ask you, too: What do you need to surrender? Is it a decision you’ve been wrestling with? A relationship that feels too broken to fix? A fear that keeps creeping back in? A dream you’re afraid to let go of?

Whatever it is, find your Gethsemane. Find that quiet place where you can fall on your knees before the Father and pray—not with empty words, but with raw honesty and relentless persistence. Pray until your will aligns with His. Pray until you can rise up, not in defeat, but in holy surrender.

Because that’s where the power is. That’s where the peace is. That’s where God meets us—and carries us forward.

Let’s be a people who don’t just pray passively, but who wrestle with God in prayer until we can say with Jesus, “Not my will, but Yours be done.”