Disciples Find Hidden Places

Jesus snuck away often to be alone with God and pray. He practiced and prioritized silence and solitude. This is more important than ever in a world of ubiquitous connection, entertainment and information. It is not about adding things to your day, but subtracting to make space. Sneak away to pray: Win the Day. How and when will you sneak away to spend time with God? How will you teach your disciples to do so? 

Long Time, No See

I have a few lifelong friends from California. Jeremiah Owen, my “oldest” friend, grew up in church together, see each other once in a blue moon.

Lucas Rowell, grew up going to camps, then church together. Played a ton of Disc Golf and Risk together… you’ve heard some stories.

Good friends, great dudes, we have so many memories and stories together.

I haven’t seen either of them in years. Years and years. Now I expect when I see them again, we will be able to pick right up, catch up, connect… and even get to some real talk. Maybe some deep stuff. “How are you really doing, man?”

But it’s been years since we have had a real talk. More than a quick text back and forth. The relationship isn’t over, the friendship isn’t over…

But how much has our relationship grown in these years?

Not. Zip. Zero. We haven’t grown in knowledge of one another, in connnection… no new inside jokes or adventures. It isn’t that the relationship is gone… but it is stalled. And what would move it forward again?

Time. Time together. Could be in person, could be a phone call, a text chain, could go old school and write long-form letters. Many ways to do it… but it would take intentional time together to connect and build our friendship.

Just being in the same location wouldn’t be enough. I “saw” Jeremiah at Conference a few years ago, but he was crazy busy running the show and opportunities to connect were few and far between. It has to be TIME, intentional, ideally 1-1.

How’s your friendship with God?

When and where do y’all hang out?

Do y’all stay in touch? How often? How regularly? How intentionally?

You might answer things like “I go to church once a week, I’m good.” Or even, building on last week “I Sabbath every week.” And that is good and wonderful and beautiful and a GREAT time to build your relationship with God. Love it.

And.

We are learning the habits of Jesus. His Way. His Yoke. We call him Master so we learn to do as He does, be as He is. And Jesus’ Sabbath’d, every week of his life built to the Sabbath and then he Rested and Worshiped on the Sabbath.

And he did some other things too:

Starting in the Wilderness

Coming from Jesus’ baptism:

Luke 3:21–23 ESV

21 Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heavens were opened, 22 and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.” 23 Jesus, when he began his ministry, was about thirty years of age, being the son (as was supposed) of Joseph, the son of Heli,

What a cool way to start the ministry. A voice from heaven, baptism from the most famous preacher of the day. Luke then gives Jesus’ genealogy, his credentials… and so Jesus starts the natural way.

Luke 4:1–2 ESV

1 And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness 2 for forty days, being tempted by the devil. And he ate nothing during those days. And when they were ended, he was hungry.

Now we tend to hyper focus on the fasting. 40 days without food. That’s a miracle. And he would be hungry after. Not shocking.

We focus on the temptation by the devil, how he twists truth to mislead and tempt but Jesus answers with Truth straight out of Scripture and resists the temptations to safety, security, satisfaction.

But look at this first part, why did Jesus go to the wilderness… and what is the wilderness?

“full of the Holy Spirit… led by the Spirit… isn’t that redundant? When Scripture says it twice, consider it in bold.

This is an intentional Holy Spirit move, a launching point, a mission-critical first step to Jesus’ ministry. Not an accident, a purposeful choice. Maybe to prepare, to seek clarity? Certainly to wage this spiritual battle. Modeling for us not only in the fasting and response to temptation, but also in the step into the wilderness.

Now, literally, this “wilderness” (erenos) is likely the slopes of the Judean mountains. Stony rocky mountains where not very much grows. A place to be alone, no reason for anyone else to go there. Wilderness. Desolate Places. Hidden Places.

But this was not a one time practice for Jesus. Once for a big retreat, 40 days, but many gospel writers make a point to describe Jesus engaging in a regular practice of “eramos”.

Slipping Away to the Wilderness

Mark 1:35 ESV

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.

A day in the life of Jesus, just finished his first full day of ministry in Capernaum.

While it was still dark. Of course he was able to sneak away at that time, who wants to get up before dawn?

Now this is not Jesus giving up on sleep necessarily. Israel is fairly equatorial, most folks are going to sleep shortly after sundown because candles or fuel for fire are expensive.

But it is Jesus prioritizing prayer. And not just prayer, prayer in a desolate place. Any

Eremos

Desolate places, secluded, deserts, wilderness, unpopulated, open pasture… all the same words. Quiet hidden places… the key is away from people. Alone.

Jesus sought those places out… and he prayed.

Luke 5:16 ESV

16 But he would withdraw to desolate places and pray.

Imperfect tense, indicating an ongoing, repeated, or habitual action in the past. The NASB captures this by emphasizing the frequency:

Luke 5:16 NASB95

16 But Jesus Himself would often slip away to the wilderness and pray.

This is the launching of Jesus’ ministry. The first 11 verses of chapter 5 is “Jesus Calls the First Disciples” and then he heals a Leper.

Next he will heal a Paralytic “rise, pick up your bed and go home”… and call Matthew the Tax Collector.

So this is a rising star, a Rabbi launching his ministry, an itinerant preacher just making a name for himself, a leader assembling his team, a healer engaged in life giving work. WAY too much to do, WAY too little time to do it. Maybe already counting down the days and years he has left on earth… and it isn’t many, and it won’t feel like nearly enough.

And yet, he prioritizes this prayer time in desolate places.

The Priority of the Wilderness

But wait, this is Jesus, right? One with the Father, filled with the Holy Spirit, the perfect man, our model for how to be human and in perfect relationship with God. Surely Jesus can pray as he goes. Surely he has reached the “level” where his intimacy with God is such that he doesn’t need this, go without, skip the training wheels.

This is beginner stuff, right?

Jesus, in the very launching point of his ministry, the most mission critical time and perhaps the “busiest” time of his earthly life, this is the time the gospel writers stress Jesus’ spiritual discipline here.

We call it the Discipline of Silence and Solitude… but to be clear the emphasis here is on the Solitude. Desolate places. Wilderness. The activity Jesus engages in is simply called “prayer.” Talking to God, hearing from him, relational time… but it is time alone with God.

Now it could be that Jesus just did this for us, to model for us… but I don’t think so. There are times where the disciples don’t even know where he is. And when he does this in other places, like the Garden of Gethsemane, it is clearly heartfelt prayer to the Father, real requests and not anything like empty ritual for the sake of appearance or modeling.

If Jesus prioritized silence and solitude… could it be important for us?

Maybe even mission critical?

Henri Nouwen said it this way:

We do not take spiritual life seriously if we do not set aside some time to be with God and listen to him

I am preaching to myself here. Tomorrow morning, I open my eyes.

I’ll be frank, by default my first reach is for my phone. It’s right there by my bed. It was the last thing I looked at before I fell asleep, reading a book for me. And the first thing I reach for when I wake up.

I have the opportunity to start my day with the news, get all fired up from the latest tragedy… or the latest stupid. It’s mostly rage bait to win my attention.

I have the opportunity to start my day with distraction, a game or (for me) an entertaining story.

For many it is the socials, doom scrolling or endless memes. Just another algorithm fighting for your attention, selling you as a product to advertisers.

Or… I have the opportunity to win the day… and start the day with God.

“Silence and Solitude” may sound fancy, it’s an ancient practice, and we have dug into it a few times under that name. Maybe you’ve heard a more modern practice simply called having a “quiet time with God.”

Sneak Away: Win the Day

Quiet Time Guilt

This is not about feeling guilty

This is not about feeling guilty. Or shameful. Or lesser than the “super Christian” next to you. It is certainly not about being the super Christian so you can be holier in comparison to them!

Let’s together repent of any hint of that. “Behavior modification through guilt manipulation” is a false gospel, up and down, always.

Whenever and wherever that comes up, answer with the real gospel. I am saved and sanctified, worthy because He has called me worthy… and then we listen to his invitation into life abundant.

And that’s what this practice is: a daily invitation into the good life. An invitation to win the day. Just as Sabbath does this in a big 24-hour way every week, this is a regular as-needed, at least daily orientation of our life to God.

If you don’t come away for a while, you will come apart after a while.

And this one, also from Dallas Willard: Don’t feel guilty and so you try harder:

Don’t try, Train.

This is a beautiful answer to the guilt economy.

Spiritual disciplines are like physical disciplines. You can’t lift 500 pounds today, so you train what you can today… so that tomorrow you can do what you can’t today.

You might have this vision of hours alone in silence and solitude, just beautiful time with God… and you can’t do it. You can’t carve out the time, and if you try you are focused on all the things you aren’t doing, and you get bored and distracted, and it’s awful, and you hate it… but you feel guilt about NOT doing it, so you just don’t do it and feel bad. Awesome, sounds great!

It’s the spiritual equivalent of spazzing your back out trying to lift 500 lbs. Don’t try, train.

Start with 5 minutes. Start a timer. Get a streak going, get a rhythm. Then add 5 minutes.

Do reps. Don’t increase until you’re ready. Don’t do it because you feel guilty, do it because you know and believe it is valuable. That He is valuable and worth spending intentional time with.

Try it, taste and see that the Lord is good.

How do we do it?

How to Silence

External and Internal silence.

The external part is easy. Quiet the noise. Not a podcast, no music, or at least no music with lyrics.

The internal silence is harder. It’s the noise of all the thoughts, all the TODOs, all the worries. And here is the practice, the training: hand it over to the Father. Each thing as it comes up. Richard Foster teaches doing this in physical posture. This worry comes up, I acknowledge it, I recognize it, I physically hand it up to God and let go. I am not even praying about it… though that’s fine too. But my prayer is mostly wordless, or maybe something like “God, would you hold this so we can just be?”

Silence externally, silence internally. But that is nearly impossible unless I carve out some solitude:

How to Solitude

In order to Silence well… solitude is needed. You have to carve out, make time and space, sneak away to “desolate places.” So where and when is your wilderness?

Early morning, I have a chair and a cup of coffee with my name on it. But it is all too often stolen. Not by anyone else, by sleepy morning Dusty. Or not sleep, but I picked up my phone first thing after opening my eyes and got lost in updates and emails or my book… and there went my morning.

Or the snooze button, that’s real.

Instead, whether it’s first thing in the morning, a reserved time on my work calendar and a desolate place there… or an evening walk or run. You have to prioritize this. Make it real and make it regular… or it simply won’t happen. The enemy will pull out all the stops to keep you from this time and place. He will tempt you in the wilderness, sure, but he would really prefer to keep you out of the wilderness all together. Fill your life with the marketplace, with the town center, with busy and noise and… hurry.

The Spirit leads us into the wilderness in the footsteps of Jesus to pray with the Father.

Disciples find Hidden Places.

And as we disciple others, this is part of our Way because it is Jesus’ Way. We teach folks to find hidden places.

Sneak Away: Win the Day

Jesus snuck away often to be alone with God and pray. He practiced and prioritized silence and solitude. This is more important than ever in a world of ubiquitous connection, entertainment and information.