Reading with the Pastor
Mark 1 and Psalm 37:1-22
As you are reading Mark today, don’t miss verse 35-39, but especially verse 35. These verses and the lifestyle that they hint at are a constant challenge to me as a morning-shunning night-person.
35 And rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed. 36 And Simon and those who were with him searched for him, 37 and they found him and said to him, “Everyone is looking for you.” 38 And he said to them, “Let us go on to the next towns, that I may preach there also, for that is why I came out.” 39 And he went throughout all Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and casting out demons.
Notice:
- Jesus rose early in the morning to get away to an undistracted place to pray.
- The disciples were not with Him.
- Everyone was looking for Him.
- He was about to start a rigorous preaching and healing tour.
Applications and Conclusions for Us: (in reverse order)
4. We ought to engage in significant, concentrated prayer before any spiritual plan
. or activity that we are about to engage upon.
3. Sometimes it is okay to ignore the people who are looking for you (cell phones
. don’t have to interrupt everything we do.)
2. If disciples are followers why wern’t they with Him. We all stumble, even the.
. apostles. It is great to know he still can use us.
1. If Jesus needed to pray, what makes us think that we don’t need to pray with.
. greater intensity than we do and in undistracted places like He did?
It is a brain-strainer to think about Jesus, who is God, praying to the Father, who is one with Jesus. God the Son talking to God the Father is a mystery that our finite capacities cannot fully comprehend. But while my mind marvels at that mystery my heart and my will need to engage a greater passion for prayer. If Jesus prayed, I need to pray.
Try building prayer (with an open Bible) into your schedule. The One you follow did.
Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him; …
Psalm 37:7a
