I recently went to see an art exhibition at Guildford Cathedral. The current exhibition is a series of paintings by Iain McKillop that portray the Easter story in 27 paintings. They are extraordinary works of art, showing a great deal of emotion with the minimum of colours. The exhibition is done with minimal colours, I believe 4 colours for most of it with an additional splash of purple for the cloak. The paintings get darker as Jesus’ crucifixion approaches and then burst into glorious light as he rises. If you get the opportunity, I recommend seeing this exhibition.
But there were a couple of panels that stood out to me. Maybe I’ll write about some others this lent. For now, I want to focus on the painting of Jesus in Gethsemane. At this point in the story, Jesus has had a passover meal with his friends and knows that Judas has gone to fetch the guards. He goes to a secluded garden with his closest friends and asks them to keep watch as he prays. And he seeks comfort from his Father. He knows what is coming and doesn’t want to walk the path although he knows he must. He returns to his friends to find them sleeping – they don’t seem to have grasped the severity of what is happening. He wakes them and prays once more and ultimately makes the choice to surrender to what needs to be done. Judas approaches and he is arrested and taken away. Alone.
The panel of the painting captures Jesus praying alone, the agony on his face as he fears what is ahead for him. It drove home to me that Jesus is human. Yes, he is also divine, but he is human. He can cut his hand and bleed. He can feel hurt and heartbreak. He can even die. And because of that, he can also feel afraid. And here he is in the garden, dreading what is to come. Have you ever been faced with something you dread? Did you cry out to God to somehow change it? Jesus did.
The thing with crucifixion is that it is slow, painful and humiliating. Jesus would have known this. And I wonder if he knew that he was going to come through it? He says about the temple rising in three days, so maybe he had an inkling but would he be the same? Could he endure everything? As a human, did he have the capacity to fail, to give in to temptation to find an easier way?
And while all of this was going on, as he was afraid and praying, his friends were sleeping. He was alone. They didn’t understand. How much it must have pained him that they were there and yet not there, that he couldn’t rely on them because they just didn’t get it. He has to face this alone on a human level. Yes, there was God, but a parent can’t stop the pain and in this case God couldn’t take it away – Jesus had to endure it. I can’t imagine what that would feel like, and yet this panel of artwork seems to have captured some of that feeling.
I know there have been times when I have felt isolated, when I’ve felt like people around me just didn’t understand and I was facing things alone. Maybe you have too. Rest assured, Jesus knows how that feels. Maybe that’s a comfort, maybe that’s not helpful. But let Jesus in in those moments. Let him be with you, let him comfort you. Because he’s been there, he knows the agony of isolation.
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