ed alone. But there are
two things in the Gethsemane experience that give it a meaning quite
different from such. The Gethsemane sorrow is on account of the sin of
others, _and_ it comes to us through our own consent, of our own action.
We need not go through the Gethsemane experience save as we make the
choice that comes to include this. It is only as we _choose_ to follow
fully, close up to His bleeding side, where the Lord Jesus is leading,
that this experience of pain will come.

Moses knew what this meant. As he came from the presence of God in the
mount the sin of the people seemed so terrible, that the fear that
possibly it could not be forgiven unless he made some sacrifice sweeps
over him and came out as a great sob.[73] The sight of their sin brought
sorest pain to his spirit. Paul tells us there was a continual cutting of
a knife at his heart because of his racial kinsfolk, their sin, their
stubbornness in sin, the awful blight upon their lives.[74] There was
sore, lone, unspeakable pain of spirit because he felt so keenly the sin
of others. This is the Gethsemane experience. Have you felt something like
this as you have come in touch with the sin, the blighted lives, the
wreckage of lives among both poor and rich, lower class and better? You
will if you follow where He leads.

Calvary.

Then came the morrow. _The experience of Calvary_ came hard on the heels
of Gethsemane. The pain of spirit became both pain of body and pain of
spirit, intensified clear beyond what the night before had anticipated.
How shall I trust myself to speak of that morrow, or you to listen? Yet,
let us hold still, and, for a great purpose, look at it again, if only for
a moment, that the meaning of it, the flame of it may take fresh hold, and
consume us anew.

Gethsemane was followed by a sleepless night, while bitter hate brought
its utmost iniquity and persistence to hound this Man to death. Nine, of
the next morning, found Him hanging, nailed on the cross, crowned with the
cruel mocking thorn crown. From nine till three He hung, while the strange
darkness came down over all nature from noon till three, the blackness of
midnight shutting out the brightness of noon. The Father's presence was
withdrawn. This tells the bitterness of the cross for Jesus as does
nothing else.

It was out of a breaking heart that the cry was wrung, "My God, My God,
why didst _Thou_ forsake Me?" When you can penetrate that darkness you may
be