Luke 22:45

‘And when he rose up from his prayer, he came to the disciples, and found them sleeping for sorrow,'

On returning to His disciples after His bitter struggle He discovered that they had failed to maintain their watch. Once again He suffered the bitterness of seeing and experiencing the failure of His friends. No wonder that He had some doubts as to whether they were yet ready for the task that lay ahead. But the contrast with their forward going outlook in Acts is deliberate. Without the dynamic and impetus of the Holy Spirit they could but fail when such mighty forces were at work. Fortunately for them, however, they were in the hand of God, and were being prayed for by the Great Intercessor, and so their failure was ameliorated.

‘Sleeping for sorrow.' Possibly being overcome by having watched His agony and unable to bear it any longer, and because they were bewildered at what was happening, something which was beyond their ability to comprehend. Possibly they had been discussing His words about His coming betrayal among themselves and had become very apprehensive as they recognised that Jesus must have some reason for being here, a reason which they may well have seen as linked with the dark hints that He had been dropping previously, and especially on that very night. And perhaps their thoughts had been too much for them after the strenuous week that they had had (even though it was no more strenuous than His). For the idea of the sorrow that was afflicting the disciples, even in their partial ignorance, see John 16:6; John 16:20; Mark 14:19. It had been enough to drive them to exhaustion.