by Rose Murdock

"And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the mount of Olives." Matthew 26:30

This doesn’t seem like a very significant verse in the Bible.  It’s there between the Last Supper and Jesus being taken to be crucified.  It’s before Jesus’ agony in the Garden of Gethsemane.  What is the significance of them singing a hymn right at this particular point?

The word "hymn" in the Greek according to Strong’s Concordance, is a simpler form of a word that means to celebrate.  This wasn’t just a nice sweet religious song that they sang.  It was a celebration.

Why would Jesus be celebrating right before He went to die?  Shouldn’t that be a serious time?  He did have a serious time in the garden.  But right before He went into the garden He had this time of celebration with His disciples.  You see, Jesus knew something about God’s ways.  He knew something about being filled with the Spirit.

Hebrews 12:2 says that Jesus for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross.   Jesus could celebrate right before dying because He was able to look past the cross to the glory—to the joy—on the other side.  Because of looking to that joy He could endure the agony of the cross.

The only way for Him to see the other side of the cross was by the Spirit of God.   God reveals truths to us by His Spirit.  Jesus needed to draw from the Spirit of God in order to receive the strength necessary to endure what He did and that strength came from seeing the joy on the other side.  There’s no way He could have gone through what He did apart from the Holy Spirit strengthening Him.  He had to draw on that strength. He had to see the future, the end result.

Jesus knew that in celebration—in joy—in worship of Almighty God there is strength.  Yes, He was celebrating because He knew the end result of His call, but He was also worshipping and by that worship He was entering into the presence of God and He was able to draw from the Holy Spirit the strength He needed to continue.  As He rejoiced over what was to come He was strengthened to go through the present.

Jesus knew His call.  He knew what He must do.  He was filled with the knowledge and wisdom of God’s will.  But you know that wisdom alone is not enough to keep you on the right path.  Wisdom alone will not keep you from sin.   Solomon proved that.  He was wiser than anyone around but it didn’t keep him from sin.  Wisdom is important.  It’s a foundation.  Proverbs 4:7 says wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom.  But we need wisdom that comes from the Spirit of God.  Not man’s wisdom.  We need His wisdom.   We need to be filled with His Spirit and to see by the Spirit the joy that will give us strength.

He says not to be drunk with wine but to be (continually) filled with the Spirit.   Then He tells us how to be filled with the Spirit—by speaking to ourselves in psalms, hymns, spiritual songs, singing and making melody in our hearts to the Lord.   That’s worship (And this word ‘hymn’ is the same word in Matthew 26:30).  The word "psalms" means not just a piece of music but instrumental accompaniment as well.

So the way we are filled with His Spirit to gain the strength we need to overcome in our lives is through worship.  And really a joyful, celebrating type of worship.   Jesus was worshipping and celebrating in faith.  Nothing was done yet.   He hadn’t made it through yet.  But He was celebrating the victory ahead of time.  We can celebrate the victory ahead of time as well.  He has made us overcomers and conquerers.  We have something to celebrate about!  We don’t have to wait until the end of our life or the end of our problem before we rejoice and worship and thank God.  We do it now.  We do it by faith.  We rejoice now like Jesus did and by joyful worship we are strengthened to overcome whatever faces us today.

You wonder what Jesus’ disciples though about this.  They were singing and celebrating and then Jesus tells them, ‘I’m going to go die and all of you are going to abandon me tonight.’  They didn’t understand and Peter tried to say, ‘Oh no, not me Lord, I won’t abandon you.’

They had just gotten done rejoicing with Jesus but they really didn’t understand the significance of what was going on.  They didn’t understand the idea of Jesus drawing strength from the Spirit of God.  He was able to tell them they’d all abandon Him because He had been strengthened by the Holy Spirit.  He didn’t need them to get Him through, He had the Spirit of God.  But they didn’t understand.

How often do we sense His joy and that something is going on in the spiritual realm but we don’t tune in enough to pick up on what He is saying.  We may rejoice with Him and we sing and dance and celebrate, but are we tuning in to the same Holy Spirit to find out what’s next?  What does He want to do now?  What direction are You leading us now Lord?  How do you want to move?

Are we drawing from His joy—which is our strength—so we will have the stamina to go through and carry out His will for us?  Or do we just say, "Wow that was a good service!" and stop there?  God would love for us to enjoy His presence and celebrate with Him and receive His spiritual strengthening so we can fulfil His call on our life.  And when we do it’ll be a time of great rejoicing just as Jesus’ time was and still is.

We can tune in to the Spirit of God for understanding of His will.  The disciples didn’t yet have the filling of the Holy Spirit.  But today we have the privilege of His Holy Spirit made available to us.  We can tune in to the same Spirit Jesus did and look to see what God’s plans are for tomorrow so that we can rejoice and overcome in the Spirit today!

Go to the crossword for this teaching