The Spirit is Willing, but the Flesh is Weak

By Pastor Valson Varghese

Matthew 26:40,41 “Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. “Couldn’t you men keep watch with me for one hour?” he asked Peter.  “Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

On the night before his arrest and subsequent death, Jesus took Peter, James and John with Him to the Garden of Gethsemane where He spent time talking to His Father.  Matthew reports that in the solitude of the quiet garden "he began to be sorrowful and troubled" (26:37). Knowing what awaited him that night and the following day, he needed the company, the prayers and support of his nearest friends. But they let him down. He asked them to wait nearby and watch with him. When he returned, he found them sleeping instead.

In a night when he needed them the most, they had failed him. They had fallen asleep like this was just any other night. He was grieved and warned them to “watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak”

The disciples of Christ were not bad men. They were good men. They wanted to go with him to the garden and to watch with him that night. Their spirits were willing. But they were tired, like most of us, and were sleepy on that very crucial night. Their intentions were good, but good intentions at times can fall prey to fleshly weakness.

We make a lot of resolutions especially in the New Year. Whether it is to exercise and keep ourselves fit, or to get out of debt, or to control the time spent on social media and the internet, or even to spend more time with God in prayer and in the study of His Word – we find that our spirit is willing but our flesh is weak. We hope to do better but often succumb to the dictates of our flesh than pursue the desires of our spirit.

The great Apostle Paul understood this and describes his struggle between his spirit and his flesh in Romans 7.  

¹⁹ For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do – this I keep on doing.²⁰ Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.

²² For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; ²³ but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. ²⁴ What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?

And in verse 25, he concludes by saying… “Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

Jesus knew this human nature too well and He gives the remedy to overcome this. He said “Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation.” If we spend time with the Lord, we can have mastery over our flesh. Our flesh is too strong for us to overpower it, but we can do it in the Spirit.  

Jesus Gave His Sleepy Disciples Some Advice

That Applies To All Of Us Today

"WATCH and PRAY"