Prayer: the Jesus Way part 2
Abiding in Prayer (Scripture – Matthew 14, 1 Kings 18: 44-46, Luke 9: 28-29)
Today we will look at Matthew 14 as we continue to see how to abide in prayer by looking at what Jesus did. Some of the things we can see by looking at Jesus through this passage is that it is natural for Jesus to pray in all circumstances, in any environment. Western schedules have a demand that everything needs to be planned out, so we must carve out all our time. However, we can release those times, and can take it to the Father.
Matthew 14: 13-21 We see Jesus, while in the middle of this event, begin to pray. Even though this specific passage doesn’t give much detail, we see how natural it was for Jesus to pray in all circumstances. Something we should strive for.
We also see in scripture, including Matthew 14, that Jesus often separated himself to go to the mountaintops to spend time in prayer. When he did this, it wasn’t 30 minutes or a couple hours. It was often hours on end. Matthew 14:22-23 after sending everyone home post feeding the 5,000 and sending the disciples on the boat. Jesus went alone to be in prayer with God, a deep conversational prayer. A prayer that lasted for hours as it says He joined the disciples at dawn. He often removed himself for hours and hours to be in deep conversational prayer with God.
The Abiding life of Jesus is a thriving spiritual life. It is amazing what our bodies can do with a thriving spiritual life. He would be out all-day teaching and preaching with disciples and people., then he would remove himself and pray all night. It wasn’t just to another room; it was often up on a mountain top. However, we see Him spend a lot of time in prayer with God.
In this world, anxiety, stress, emergencies, etc. All those things that zap our energy. The solution to these come in the vitality we have walking with God moment by moment. We are talking about the God of the universe, the God that created everything, including the human body. We see in the wilderness, Jesus fasted for 40 days and nights, and He was sustained the entire time. We see it with Elijah that the ‘Hand of the Lord’ was with him, and he outran King Ahab who was on a chariot. God sustained him to do something we don’t see as a possibility physically. 1 King 18: 44-46. God can sustain our bodies.
How do we abide in prayer?
It’s our ‘go to’. It is not about what you pray, it is that you pray. That it isn’t a halfhearted 5 second prayer once a day or twice a day, but a deep conversational time with God. Try carving out a time, maybe in the evening after the kids go to sleep, where you can go into a deep prayer time with God. It isn’t about suggesting a set time, or schedule, just that prayer is as natural as a heartbeat in your life. That we pray and enter conversation with the One who matters the most, God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, just as natural as a heartbeat. Just as Jesus did.
