No Hiding

 "He came out and went, as was his custom, to the Mount of Olives" ~ Luke 22:39, emphasis mine

When we think of the power Christ had to prevent His crucifixion, we often think of the army of angels that he had at His command or the power over nature he held. Any one of the people who were responsible for His death could have been smote, scattered, or suddenly thrown into confusion with just one word from His mouth. When passersby mocked Him, they were right in knowing about His power to save others, but wrong in thinking He could not save Himself. A devotion I read Sunday morning caused me to think of another power He had that could have saved Him if He had chosen to use it: the power to choose a hidden spot to pray.

The verse quoted above tells us that going to the Mount of Olives to pray was something he did often. According to the author of the devotion, "it was easy for the authorities to find Jesus to arrest him." Another verse says, "Now Judas, who betrayed him, also knew the place, because Jesus often met there with his disciples." (John 18:2) Before He was even in a position to choose not to use His power to smite His tormentors, He chose to offer up His final, desperate prayers to His Father in a place He knew He would be found.

So why would He do such a thing? Saving Himself wouldn't have been difficult had He just prayed somewhere else. The reason He made Himself easy to find is that as much as He wished for another way to win our salvation, He refused to stand in the way of God's will by hiding Himself from His destiny. 

In his song "Nails", Matty Mullins talks about how Christ's love for us held Him to the cross rather than the nails the Roman soldiers drove through His wrists. His love was also what made Him choose to make His final appeal to God in a place where Judas would find Him so he could betray Him. He knew that if He were never found, we would never be saved, and He couldn't let that happen. He had to die a death he didn't deserve to give us the eternal life we could never earn.