The mental anguish of our Lord's battle with temptation pressed his body to such an extreme that his pores poured out great drops of blood that fell to the ground. What crushing weight of sin this reveals! Only sin's tremendous burden could press the Savior until he sweated blood. And what mighty love this demonstrates!

Old Isaac Ambrose made a beautiful observation: the resin that flows from a tree without cutting is always the purest. This precious camphor-tree gave sweet spices when torn by whips and pierced by nails. But look! Here it gives its most precious offering when there is no whip, no nail, no wound at all. This shows us the voluntary nature of Christ's suffering. Without a lance, the blood flowed freely. No need for instruments of torture. It pours out on its own. No need to cry out like Israel did at the well, "Spring up!" Of itself, the crimson torrent flows.

When we suffer intense mental anguish, our blood rushes inward to the heart. Our cheeks go pale. We feel faint. The blood retreats as if to protect the inner person during the trial. But look at our Savior in his agony! He is so completely emptied of self that instead of his blood rushing inward to preserve him, it flows outward to water the earth. The very ground is blessed by his suffering.

Do you see it? Christ's agony literally pours him out on the ground. It pictures the completeness of the offering he made for us. Can we even begin to grasp the intensity of the wrestling match he endured? And can we hear what it says to us? "You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your struggle against sin."

Behold! The great High Priest of our faith, sweating blood rather than yielding to the tempter of your soul. Will you yield so easily when he fought so hard?