Trodden the Wine-Press Alone

During His mortal ministry the Savior spoke often and reverently of His Father and their perfect unity. For example, He declared, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise. For the Father loveth the Son, and sheweth him all things that himself doeth: and he will shew him greater works than these, that ye may marvel” (John 5:19-20). He affirmed His total loyalty to His Father: “I do nothing of myself; but as my Father hath taught me, I speak these things. And he that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him” (John 8:28-29). He affirmed their total unity: “Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or else believe me for the very works’ sake.” I love this declaration as He approached His final hours: “But that the world may know that I love the Father; and as the Father gave me commandment, even so I do” (John 14:10-11, 31). He spoke of the love of the Father He felt: “I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love” (John 15:10). He declared His premortal connection with the Father: “I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father.” As He approached His great atoning sacrifice, He said to His apostles, “Ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me” (John 16:28, 32). As He prayed His great intercessory prayer, He spoke of His complete unity with the Father: “That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me” (John 17:21). Jesus knew perfectly that His Father was with Him and had sent Him to fulfill His divine mission.

                All of these statements came before the Savior faced His great atoning sacrifice. He found in those difficult hours that His mortal friends had left Him alone, from the three apostles falling asleep in Gethsemane to the disciples who fled at His arrest. President Jeffrey R. Holland spoke of His loneliness at this time: “Essentially His lonely journey back to His Father continued without comfort or companionship.” But Jesus soon found that the Father—with whom He was perfectly united and He knew was with Him—seemed to have also left Him. President Holland continued, “Now I speak very carefully, even reverently, of what may have been the most difficult moment in all of this solitary journey to Atonement. I speak of those final moments for which Jesus must have been prepared intellectually and physically but which He may not have fully anticipated emotionally and spiritually—that concluding descent into the paralyzing despair of divine withdrawal when He cries in ultimate loneliness, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ The loss of mortal support He had anticipated, but apparently He had not comprehended this.” President Holland then commented, “With all the conviction of my soul I testify that He did please His Father perfectly and that a perfect Father did not forsake His Son in that hour. Indeed, it is my personal belief that in all of Christ’s mortal ministry the Father may never have been closer to His Son than in these agonizing final moments of suffering. Nevertheless, that the supreme sacrifice of His Son might be as complete as it was voluntary and solitary, the Father briefly withdrew from Jesus the comfort of His Spirit, the support of His personal presence. It was required, indeed it was central to the significance of the Atonement, that this perfect Son who had never spoken ill nor done wrong nor touched an unclean thing had to know how the rest of humankind—us, all of us—would feel when we did commit such sins. For His Atonement to be infinite and eternal, He had to feel what it was like to die not only physically but spiritually, to sense what it was like to have the divine Spirit withdraw, leaving one feeling totally, abjectly, hopelessly alone.” Isaiah described this when he recorded these future words of the Lord: “I have trodden the winepress alone; and of the people there was none with me…. And I looked, and there was none to help; and I wondered that there was none to uphold” (Isaiah 63:3, 5). The Savior confirmed this through modern revelation, “I have trodden the wine-press alone, and have brought judgment upon all people; and none were with me” (Doctrine and Covenants 133:50). He held on, despite His infinite suffering endured alone, and despite feeling the absence of His Father’s presence still reached out to Him as He overcame and cried out, “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit” (Luke 23:46). We can be certain as we face loneliness and isolation that He understands, and we must never stop reaching out to Him no matter how alone we feel.