Luke 22:46

‘And said to them, “Why do you sleep? Rise and pray, that you enter not into temptation.” '

How conscious Jesus was of the problems of the hour, and how unconscious they were of the same, otherwise they would have remained awake as He did. So Jesus now stirred them again to rise and pray in order to fortify them against temptation. He knew how much they were going to need it. For only through prayer would they come through what lay ahead.

While Luke does not previously give us the full detail of the disciples' failure, (he wanted our concentration to be on Jesus' submission to the will of God), these very words bring out that their failure has been deeper than at first appears here. For this last injunction would otherwise have had little point now that their time to pray seemed to have passed, (although they would certainly shortly need much prayer). The words rather look back to what they should have been doing while He prayed. And they are no doubt also intended by Luke to be seen as His words to us, and to all men. We too must not sleep, but must rise and pray, for testing lies ahead for us all.