“When Jesus realized that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, he withdrew again to the mountain by himself.” – John 6:15
I “noticed” this verse while leading the Bible Study last Tuesday with some residents of Sunnyview Nursing Home. We were reading the sixth chapter of the Gospel of John. There are two great stories that begin that chapter. John’s version of the Feeding of the Five Thousand (verses 1-14) and John’s account of Jesus Walking On the Water (verse 16-21.) But there was this verse in-between! “When Jesus realized that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king,he withdrew again to the mountain by himself.”
Jesus realized that they were going to make him king so he withdrew? Jesus had been sent by God to liberate the people, to heal, to teach and to guide them. But to be made king by this crowd? It would only distract him from his purpose, so he withdrew. And we can only imagine what he did there on the mountain, in those few precious moments by himself. When we look at other “in-between” verses in the Gospels, we discover that Jesus often went away by himself to pray (Matthew 14:23.) In between the miracles, in between the encounters of the ministry, in between the moments of doing, Jesus spent time by himself in prayer.
This is one of the great but often unnoticed truths of the Gospels: Jesus himself prayed, talking to God as His Father, and apparently gathering insight, strength, direction and purpose from those precious moments. In the midst of our busy ministries as Disciples, we need to notice the “in-between” moments, “sandwiched in” as it were, between the errands and the meetings, the schoolwork, the housework or the homework, between the harvesting and the bookkeeping, between the driving and the visiting. We need to take the precious “in-between” moments for prayer. You can do this when you find yourself in-between things. You may want to join with others who find 9 AM on Wednesday mornings to be a time between the day’s tasks when praying together in the Parlor (our “chapel” setting) seems the most important and best thing we can do.
Prayer Times will begin again on Wednesday, November 9 at 9 AM and at 5 PM at First Christian Church in Trenton, Missouri. If you can't be there, pray with us where you are. Come when you can, leave when you must, but come aside with us to pray, in the in-between times. You may discover that they are the most important times of all!
I look forward to greeting you in the places where we pray and minister together,
Pastor Paul
