Exploring My Strange Bible - Practicing Faith Part 1: Solitude & Community

Episode Date: September 11, 2017

This teaching is called “Solitude & Community”. In the New Testament, "church" is the gathering of Jesus' followers into a community of support and worship. But in the life of Jesus, that communal practice is also matched by the habit of regular solitude. What is this practice all about, and why was it so important to Jesus?

Tim Mackey, Jr. utterly amazing and worth following with everything that you have. On this podcast, I'm putting together the last 10 years worth of lectures and sermons where I've been exploring the strange and wonderful story of the Bible and how it invites us into the mission of Jesus and the journey of faith. And I hope this can be helpful for you too. I also help start this thing called The Bible Project. We make animated videos and podcasts about all kinds of topics in Bible and theology. You can find those resources at thebibleproject.com. With all that said, let's dive into the episode for this week. All right, well, this is a three-part series that represent teachings I did a number of years ago on key practices that have marked the lives of followers of Jesus throughout history

and also in all different traditions of the church. And that's because these are life habits and practices that we find advocated and practiced by Jesus and the apostles going back to the earliest roots of the Christian movement. And so, this last life habit, the teaching is called solitude and community. Most people are familiar with the practice of, if I'm a follower of Jesus, it's important that I should be connected to a group of people who are also trying to follow Jesus. It's called church or community. But also in the New Testament, we find advocated a commitment both to being with other people in a church community, but also it's opposite to regular rhythms being alone and having times of solitude. So what is that practice all about and why is it? And this teaching particularly focuses on Jesus's own habit of having times of solitude to

get away for prayer and reflection. And so maybe you've seen, if you've ever read the stories about Jesus, you know that this was a regular practice that he did. So I put all those passages together, we kind of read them and think about how many times it's mentioned in the stories of Jesus that he withdrew from the crowds and went away to be by himself for a period of time before re-engaging. So what's that about? What value did Jesus find in times of solitude? And what value has this habit served in the lives of followers of Jesus, you know, all across the globe and all throughout history? followers of Jesus, you know, all across the globe and all throughout history. So this message,

for the most part, focuses on the solitude habit of this balanced pair of solitude and community. I hope this teaching is helpful for you. It surely was for me in helping me form some new life habits of having a practice of solitude more often in my life. So anyway, I hope this is helpful. Let's just dive in and explore together. This series called Spiritual Symmetry is about the practice of the biblical and historic habits and practices that have marked the lives of God's people in a journey of growth and transformation and maturity. And so you may be familiar with this tradition. You know, they're called spiritual disciplines or spiritual practices or habits, but that's what this series is all about. And it has a couple sources of inspiration. And it's a passage from Paul's

first letter to Timothy. And the way it talks about being a follower of Jesus is language that many of us wouldn't often use. He writes this to Timothy. He says, in godliness. For while physical training is of some value, godliness is valuable in every way because it holds promise for both the present life and the life to come. This saying is sure. It's worthy of full acceptance. This is why we labor and strive because we have set our hope on the living God who's the Savior of all people, especially those who believe. There's a whole bunch of things to unpack here. I just want to put on the table again what Josh put on the table last week. In other words, what Paul's writing to Timothy is that growing and transforming as a Christian isn't just going to happen to you. It won't just

happen. You actually have to put some thought and intention and actual effort. He uses the word exercise, you know, like what people do in gyms to train their bodies. And he talks about that it's actually not going to be simple. It's going to require a serious sense of commitment. It's like labor and it's striving. Real practical reasons of doing a series like this is generated from a question that you would ask from this. It's like labor and it's striving. Real practical reasons of doing a series like this is generated from a question that you would ask from this. It's a question like, why is it that in any period of church history and even at the present, why is it a door of hope?

That there are many people who say they're Christians, but if you actually look at how they live, you look at the choices that they make and the way they treat people and their relationships and their work ethic and their daily habits and so on. You actually look at that and you're like, oh, like that really doesn't reflect Jesus very much at all. And it doesn't seem like this person is changing, yet they are very insistent that they're a Christian. Like, what's going on? Why does that happen? And that happens for a lot of different reasons. One of them is that apparently becoming a Christian is a lot more involved than just a mental activity, like I look to Jesus and I get the get out of jail free card, and then it's like over or whatever.

And then it's just kind of like grin and bear it for the rest of your life or something like that. There's something a whole lot more involved. And the reason why many people who say they're Christians don't end up growing or changing is because apparently they just simply don't intend to. There was actually never a plan or an intention to follow Jesus in the first place. Or maybe there was an intention, but it got lost pretty quickly, and you see there's no intention to follow Jesus over the long haul. And notice the motivation. And what's the whole purpose? Why would we even seek to train and to labor and to strive? And look at the last

sentence right there. It's because we've set our hope on the living God who is the Savior. It's precisely a response to this great salvation offered to me in Jesus that I look towards Jesus, I give my faith towards Him, and then I get to work. I get to work, not to make the baby Jesus smile upon me, but precisely because the baby Jesus has smiled upon me and a whole lot more. He hasn't just smiled at me, he's actually gone to die my death on my behalf and to be raised on my behalf too. And so this is a very practical reason. Many of us don't grow because we actually, if we think about it, we don't intend to. We don't have an intention of overhauling our lives over the next few decades so that I actually begin to experience the empowerment and presence and life of Jesus

more in my day-to-day life. Another inspiration, the book on what this whole series is about, I think that Josh read it a number of years ago, and that I read in preparation to kind of get my mind going. It's by a guy named Dallas Willard. Have you guys heard of Dallas Willard before? He was actually a professor of philosophy at University of Southern California. And like in his late 70s and 80s, he just started writing about his reflections on the practice of following Jesus in day-to-day life. And he was one of these great figures where, you know, no one knew about him through like his most productive years of his life. And it's precisely in his retirement years, right, the latter end of his life, that he ended up having a huge impact on the church and in the kingdom. And he has written what I think is one

of the most accessible, compelling, thoughtful books on this whole area of spiritual practices and spiritual disciplines. And so, of course, shameless plug, we're selling them at the book cart. I can't recommend it more highly because I've been so personally challenged. Actually, when Josh first pitched the idea of this series to me, I was really nervous about it because, I'll be relentlessly honest yet again for another week. So, you know, teaching a series like this, like Josh and I are going to do on the classic spiritual practices, because we're teaching them, it might create the illusion that we actually like have arrived, right, in these areas of our lives. And so like, let's just dispel that notion really quick. Like I need to grow in many of these things

that we're going to explore over the next month and a half as well. And just speaking personally, this book has been a huge kick in the seat of my pants to really, not get me to just think, but to actually begin a plan for how I'm going to attack this. And so Willard gives a great illustration right at the very beginning about this whole thing of how many people say they're Christians, but they don't actually intend to follow Jesus and he uses this example of looking at someone who's an expert or has become like a star performer in their field so just think with me you know an example like say you're going some of you it's Sunday night in Portland there's always a good show or two going on on Sunday nights in Portland there's some concert some of you are

going to a concert tonight and you're going because you know about this person's music or you know there's going to be someone there that you want to be around. That's a whole other topic of conversation, right? But there's a show or there's a concert and you're going there. There's a musician, there's a group or there's one, you know, this guitar player and he or she is this virtuoso and like you love their music and you've been listening to it and you're going to watch them in person. And it's this inspiring, some of you have been to shows like this. It's just mesmerizing and they're full of intrigue and they're incredible and they have all the skill. And you are so moved by the experience

that you walk away going, I have to start playing the guitar. Like, how can I not start playing the guitar? At least, like, I need to attempt and try. And so tomorrow, one of you might, like, go to the guitar store or whatever, and you, like, get your kind of, like, training wheels guitar, and this is what I'm going to use. And the next two weeks, you're, like, all into your chord charts or whatever, and you learn, you know, Sweet Child of Mine riff and this kind of thing or whatever. So you do that whole thing, and then you're so inspired, You're like, maybe you have a rental house or you have a little

courtyard in your apartment. I'm going to do a house show to like share with my friends all the stuff that I'm learning. And so two weeks from now, you hold a house show. And how is this going to go for you? This is Willard's example. I'm fudging it a bit. But so how's this house show going to go for you? It's going to be a total flop. It's going to be a complete flop. If you have kind friends, they're going to humor you and be like, oh, you know, that's a good try. You know, it's noble. We're glad you're finally doing something with your time or something like that. But, you know, so it might be noble or whatever, but it's a flop. And Willard says, what's going on there? It's a simple kind of thing. It seems silly. He thinks that that's no different than how many of us think

about what it means to be a Christian. We're inspired by Jesus. We're moved by Him. We think that there's something compelling that He has to offer, that He's a model or an example. And so then we look to what we call His moral teachings or His ethical teachings, and we think, yes, that's what it means to follow Jesus. I'm going to, like, I've got the supervisor at work who barks at me all the time, and I'm going to start forgiving them and, like, praying for them, and instead of, like, barking back at them, I'm going to, like, be really nice to them or something like that and, you know, whatever, be generous to them. And so Willard's whole point is, like, yeah, good luck with that, right? Good luck with that. You might be moved and inspired to do that

like for a week or two. But what we're talking about is an issue of your deep character. You didn't come to be someone who like snaps back at mean people quickly overnight. You all are, we're decades in the making. The current state of our character and our values and our commitments and how we think about relationships, that's decades in the making. And the moment or the season or process through which I give my allegiance and place my faith in Jesus as the one who saves me and who's making me new, that can happen in a short or over a condensed period of time. But there is some season where there's a transition of change. But don't think that the reshaping of your character is going to happen overnight.

It wasn't made overnight. And what you're committing yourself to is this long-haul process. And so what Willard equates these moments of loving those who hate you or being crazy generous or forgiving people when there's no rational reason for doing so. He likens these to moments on the stage. These are moments that are relatively few in our day-to-day life, and they're moments where there's the crucial decision, and what matters is what has gone into the making of your character over the hours and the days and the years that lead you up into these moments. It's

what you should have been doing and why you should have put off the house show for two years. Because what you needed to do was train your muscle memory and develop new muscles in your fingers and forearms to be able to do that on the guitar. You need to learn your chord charts or whatever you need to develop, calluses, and you need to have a plan for doing so. You don't just become a guitar virtuoso because somebody bonked you on the head or something, or because you had very noble intentions and were inspired at a concert. It happens because you're inspired, and then you actually set in motion a plan. And it seems to me like that's exactly what Paul is talking about here. You don't just happen to train yourself. You train yourself because you have a vision and a goal

and then a source of power to actually like do a plan. And what is that plan? What is it? Loving your enemy is not a plan. Loving your enemy is something that will happen naturally as a result of your life going into a whole new set of training and habits different from the training it had before you were a Christian. That's the whole point here. That seems to be Paul's point. That's Dallas Willard's point, and that's what we're exploring in this series. So what we're going to do is explore half a dozen, six practices or habits that are

pervasive throughout the Scriptures, through the lives of Jesus, and historically throughout the history of the church. And the six, we'll just kind of throw them out today. The rest of today, we're going to be talking about solitude and community, serving and being served, fasting and feasting, resting and working, praying and acting, giving and receiving. And we've called the series Spiritual Symmetry because these are all practices, but you notice some of them are in tension with each other. So like, am I supposed

to have like celebratory feasts and have food with my friends, or am I supposed to not eat any food at all? Well, it depends on the season of life that you're in. It takes wisdom to know whether to fast or to feast. And the fact is that hardly any of us fast anyway. And so what's going on with why don't we do that? It's both about balance and recognizing we need to train ourselves into new ways of living. Learning is one way of growing as a follower of Jesus, but it is not the only way. We're mind and body. It's all entwined and we need to grow as holistic human beings. So that Josh gave, you know, a whole message sales pitch. That's my like 10 minute sales pitch at the beginning of the series here. Solitude and community is what we're going to explore with the rest of our time. And just to put it out there, as I kind of thought and talked with people about it,

I'm exploring more the theme, the practice of solitude today, because I'm pretty sure that's the one that more of us are lacking in our lives. Why don't you grab a Bible and turn with me to the Gospel of Luke, the third book in the New Testament, the Gospel of Luke, chapter 4. All of the Gospels are telling the story of the life, and specifically the last few years of the life of Jesus, his entry onto the public stage, his ministry and mission, his death and his resurrection. And each of the four Gospels highlights different themes about the life and the story of Jesus. And a really interesting one specific to the Gospel of Luke

is a constant highlighting of Jesus's practice of solitude. And it begins right here in chapter 4. Chapter 4 comes right after a story that we looked at a few times in the previous series of Jesus's baptism, which is kind of his entrance onto the public scene. And it's the whole thing with the voice of the Father from heaven and the Holy Spirit as the dove. and he's declared to be the Son of God for everyone around. What's the first thing that Jesus does as he moves into this new season of his life? There's this very public moment, and he's about to go into this mission of announcing and bringing the kingdom of God into being. What's the first thing he does? Chapter 4. Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, he left the Jordan, and he was led by the Spirit into the wilderness,

which you might think desert and sand dunes or whatever. The wilderness in the Bible is primarily defined by the fact that nobody lives there. It's the place where nobody lives or can sustain normal life. So he goes utter isolation in the wilderness, and for 40 days, he was tempted or tested, some of your translations have, by the devil. He ate nothing during those days. And at the end of them, he was hungry, right? Like, of course, it's a long time of not eating. Now, there's a number of things going on here. We're going to explore fasting in a couple weeks together.

But pay attention to this. The first thing Jesus does, he doesn't like go out to Jerusalem and announce his vocation and who he is. Instead, he withdraws from everybody, and he goes to be by himself for what seems like a really long time. Like, this is really intense. We would think if your friend did this, you would be really concerned about them. You know what I'm saying? You'd be like, it's weird. And you would call their family and maybe some professionals and so on if they went off to the desert for 40 days.

This is really intense. And it's what Jesus does. He cuts himself off from everybody. And in this place of isolation and solitude, he has this very intense confrontation with the personal presence of evil. What the personal presence of evil as the devil comes to him is it gets him to begin to doubt and plants these questions that doubt his vocation and identity and who he is, what he came to do. The whole point is that he enters into this intentionally, led by the Holy Spirit. Turn the page to chapter 5. He comes back

from the desert and he begins announcing the kingdom. chapter 5. He comes back from the desert, and he begins announcing the kingdom. He's bringing God's healing into the lives of people. He's beginning to teach, and in this case, in chapter 5, he heals a man whose skin is riddled with disease, and because of it, the news spreads. Look down at verse 15 of chapter 5. It says, the news about him spread all the more so that crowds of people came to hear him and they came to be healed. All this momentum, people are traveling from long distances. And what is Jesus' response? He often withdrew to lonely places and he prayed. Now again, this is another practice we're going to explore in a few weeks too, the practice of prayer. But notice how all of these are combined here, solitude, fasting,

and prayer. They're kind of this matrix that's connected with each other. But just again, the same pattern here. We have a very public moment in Jesus' life, and his response is to get out of there, is to withdraw. Now we know it's not just because he doesn't like people. We know he really loves people. And somehow these times of solitude, how often do you go into solitary places? A silly question. It says often. So often. This was a regular practice. That's what Luke's telling us here. This was something that marked Jesus and that people noticed about him. He's out there. He's doing all these incredible things. But but then like just when you would think the momentum's going and there's all these people, he like pulls out and he just disappears for a while. And then he comes back. And when Jesus

comes back, and as you read through the Gospel of Luke, whenever he comes back, something momentous and significant always happens, right, afterwards. In this case, it's forgiving another man in a really big controversy he has with the religious leaders. Flip the page again, chapter 6. Chapter 6 begins with Jesus in another controversy with the religious leaders and the Pharisees. And they are so ticked at him, they begin to realize they need to put together a plan to do away with this guy. Look at verse 11 of chapter 6. The Pharisees and teachers of the law, they were furious with Jesus, and they began to discuss with one another

what they might do to Jesus. So he is now realizing there's a target on his head or on his back. So what do you do when you receive your first death threat, right, in the mail? You know, what's your response? And Jesus' response is, on one of those days after that controversy, he went out to a mountainside to pray. He spent the whole night praying to God. And then what's the next thing that he does is he comes back from that, apparently with some kind of discernment about the next thing that he should do. And what he does is he appoints the 12 disciples, and they become this extension of his ministry out into Israel. So Jesus,

he withdrew regularly, and we see that these are key places where there's something really important happening here for Jesus in these moments. They seem to sustain him and empower him. And here, this is a time where Jesus is even processing through what to do in light of these circumstances, and he leads him to make this new decision of appointing the twelve. Turn forward again a few pages to chapter 9 with me. Chapter 9 has the well-known story of Jesus feeding a whole crowd, a few thousand people from a really small amount of food. And in verse 18, what does Jesus do? After this huge public event, everybody's like, holy cow, Jesus, this guy's

incredible. In verse 18, right after that, we're told once when Jesus was praying in private, again, he's in private after these public moments, but his disciples are with him. And so he asked them a question, but even just think about that. So he has this regular practice of just being totally by himself, but apparently he's also developed this practice of being by himself with other people, of being alone together. So whether they're going as a group to an isolated place and then they're praying like separate from each other or maybe together, probably both are happening. And then what happens? He asked them, who do the crowds say that I am? This moment in the story is one of these key moments where Peter begins to really say out loud what everybody's thinking. Namely, holy cow, you're the Messiah, you're the Son of God.

It's this really important conversation that happens right after another night in prayer. Do you see the point? Do you see the pattern here? Luke is trying to tell us that this is a crucially important part of Jesus's own practice. Now, you might be thinking, well, yeah, like he's Jesus. So he does stuff like that. You know, Jesus prays a lot. I'm not learning anything right now, you know? So, and of course, like, what does that tell me about me? That whatever, I'm lame because I don't pray a lot. I'm not learning anything right now, you know? So, and of course, like, what does that tell me about me? That whatever, I'm lame because I don't pray a lot, but I'm not Jesus. And so, but no, so stop it. Stop it. Once again, because what you're doing is you're equating, oh, what it means to follow Jesus is to follow his ethical teachings. But Jesus envisioned that

people could become the kind of people who could emulate the new humanity that he made possible, people could become the kind of people who could emulate the new humanity that he made possible, but not just by following those, but by actually following the pattern of his whole way of life. That's why he's inviting his disciples to come do this with him. He actually said as much. He actually expected and taught that his disciples or people who say that they're Christians would actually adopt this practice themselves. Look at Matthew chapter 6, and he just says it straight up to his disciples. He says, when you all pray, don't be like the hypocrites. They love to pray, standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly, I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door, and pray to your Father who is unseen. So Jesus has in mind that his followers are also adopting, you could put it in different ways,

but they're adopting his spiritual practices, the kinds of habits that he engaged in that empowered and sustained the kind of spirit-empowered life that he was living. Now, he was doing it on our behalf, yes, in a way that you and I will always be a flawed and kind of failed imitation of, but that doesn't mean we're not supposed to train ourselves to actually begin to do it. Somehow, we have it in our minds that like, oh, Jesus is incredible. He did what I could never do for myself. Therefore, I'm never even going to try. And that's just completely wrongheaded. Because Paul says, train yourself into this new way of life

because of the hope that you have set on the living God, who is your Savior. He saved you into this whole new way of living. That's how Jesus seems to envision things. And so Jesus totally expects that his followers are going to engage in this kind of regular practice of solitude. Now, what is Jesus doing when he's by himself? And what is it that his followers, like, pray? So you go in, you close your eyes, and you just talk all night long in your head, out loud. Like, how is that supposed to work? So we'll talk about that in a few minutes. But the point is there. Are you guys with me here? So for one reason or another,

if I don't sense the presence of Jesus in my life, if I don't have a sense of any kind of vital connection to him that's informing how I make my day-to-day choices and how I treat people and what's wrong, like what's going on here. I have conversations like this with lots of you and I've had seasons like that in myself. And about the first question, let's just save an initial cup of coffee. One of the first questions that I'm going to ask you is like, oh, where are you at in this practice of intentionally withdrawing from other people to sit and do something that cultivates a relational connection with you and Jesus. And if your answer to that is, oh, like I've never done anything like

that or I don't do anything like that, then, you know, I'll at least just say, okay, well, try. I mean, try. Jesus apparently thought this was so central. I mean, Luke just tells us over and over and over again. And he said it was so central that he actually like told us that this is a crucially important part of the shaping of our character. You will actually find it nearly impossible to follow Jesus. Apparently, Jesus thinks if you don't have some practice of getting by yourself and having the only input and focus of that moment be something to do with Jesus. We'll talk about what that something is, but you guys with me here? I'm just trying to make it as clear as possible. And so, again, some of us think, well, why should it have to

be about a ritual or a practice? Isn't Christianity about the erasing of rituals and so on? Apparently not. Apparently not. So, if by ritual you mean some kind of lifeless practice that you do that ceases to have any meaning for you whatsoever, then that's clearly not what's going on here. But the whole point is humans, we're habitual creatures. We are shaped by our habits. You have a whole bunch of habits and you just don't know it because they're just normal to you. And if following Jesus is going to become second nature, a new nature, it's also going to be by the adoption of new habits in our lives. For some of us, I know this is a hard sell, you know, or it's like you will agree with me mentally, just like I have agreed with this practice many times, but you don't actually do

it because sleep is just too precious to you, you know, or whatever. So like what's the value of this? If you read the story of Jesus, what does it seem like happening in Jesus? If you read the book of Acts and Paul's letters, Paul talks about this practice in his life. If you read the stories of these people, like what is it that they seem to have found by this practice? There's two things at least that I can discern in the Gospels and in Paul's letters that I'll just kind of riff on for a minute. And I will say, as I mentioned earlier, like just because I'm teaching on this, don't assume that I've arrived. I will say probably in the last five years of my life, I've had probably one of the biggest personal transformations in my own

journey of following Jesus in precisely this area. It's been a game changer in my own life, which is why I was excited to talk about it. There's something about getting by yourself that's about focus. And this is very intuitive. Like this won't be, I don't think, very difficult for us to understand. So think of a situation that you've been in before, probably. Let's say you're driving. How many of you have been driving before? So let's say you're really in an engaged conversation. You're in a super engaged conversation while you're driving and you miss your key turn. Anybody?

Right? You've done this before. What's happening right there? And this is very simple, but it's really important to pause and reflect on what it means to be a human being, right? So what's happening is you have this acoustic stimulation, right? You have this conversation and your brain is interpreting, literally, your brain is interpreting this energy coming in through the vibrations on your eardrum

and that's how, remember, that's how sound works and so on. And so your brain's active and it's giving resources to interpreting that. But then all of a sudden you need to focus on this visual stimulation and interpreting the five corners at 20th and division and which one am I supposed to take and so on. And how is it, so you have this new visual information and stimulation and then you have acoustic stimulation, your eyes and your ears. Now how are they connected to each other?

We're not learning anything right now, but just remember, they're connected to each other through your brain. And this, I was reminded of recently, there's something funky that went on with my neck, and I learned a whole bunch about the nervous system. So we have these five senses, sight, touch, taste, smell, and hearing, and so on, and they're all giving information to our brain through this thing we call the nervous system.

And the nervous system is a limited capacity highway. It's an information highway. It's like where I-5 meets I-84 down here, right? Given the population of the city, it's a ridiculously constricted and limited-sized road. And that's what our nervous system is. We have a finite number of resources that our brain can give to paying attention to anything at any given moment. This is why, I'm just full of them today, this is why if you go, when it's on one of these 80 degree days this week, if you go into your freezer and you get

an ice cube and you go into a quiet room and you just hold the ice cube. Have you ever held an ice cube in your hand? It's terribly painful. It's terribly painful, right? And you just like quiet room and you just stare at the ice cube melting in your hand. It's nearly unbearable after about 30 seconds. But no joke, seriously, if you go, if you have three friends with you, all of you grab an ice cube, and then you go out and walk around the block together, like talking vigorously, it will actually hurt less. It will hurt less. You won't feel it nearly as much. What's going on there? The ice cube didn't get warmer. It didn't get warmer. The highway is jam-packed, right? It's like parking lot on your nervous system. And so your brain actually can't interpret as much pain as it would as if you were solely focused on the ice cube. You guys with me here?

It's a silly illustration. Well, no, it's not a silly illustration. It's reality. It's accepting the fact that you and I have a limited amount of things that we can focus on in our lives and in any given moment. It's just true. And some of us live as if that's not true. And you're trying your personality. You're just going to be a burnt out 75-year-old by the time never having focused on anything. If you're going to say yes to becoming a guitar virtuoso, you end up having to say no to all kinds of different things because you have a plan of how you're going to get there. And that doesn't include this and this because I need to give my time to this. And it's absolutely no different. This is about creating moments in our lives on a regular basis where you have absolutely no stimulation whatsoever coming your direction so that you can discern the presence

and the person and the reality of Jesus in your life somehow. It's just creating a space of quiet. Apparently, if I can't do that, it's going to be nearly impossible for me to grow as a follower of Jesus, according to Jesus, right? It's just part of what you do as following him. And paradoxically, here's the thing is, so you're focusing, you're saying no here's the thing is, so you're focusing, you're saying no to a whole bunch, but at the same time, this practice of solitude gives an enormous amount of freedom because here's what happens. When you're by yourself, you're just sitting there unadorned. You don't have to impress anybody. A huge amount of what we say or do when we're around other people is that we're saying certain things, we're acting a

certain way, we're dressing a certain way, precisely to manage the perceptions of other people. And this is just how we live our days. I'm constantly kind of managing what you think about me, and I'll say this, because they'll think I'm competent, and I'll say this, because then people think I'm a funny, nice person to be around. And this is how we act. We're constantly under these social pressures to be and do certain things so that people will see and think certain things about us. And solitude frees you from that. It's creating a space in your life where you actually don't have to be or do anything. You're just with Jesus. And your sole goal in that moment is to be freed from the noise of whatever in your life and to focus on Jesus. These have been enormously helpful, at least for me, motivators in understanding

what I'm doing and why I'm going to get less sleep tonight because I'm going to wake up and do this. And paradoxically, it's a way to become more human is by saying no to any other kind of human interaction at regular intervals of our lives. And that might seem weird to you because you're like, well, I love to be around people. Well, exactly. Probably exactly why you need to do this, right? Because there's probably a whole bunch of stuff happening inside of you and me because why is it that you feel like you have to be around people all the time? Is being alone scary for you? And what's going on with that? And why is it that you feel scared to be alone by yourself, especially if you believe that you're in the presence of Jesus? What's going on?

There's something really significant there if you're scared to be alone with Jesus. And there might be some of you who are on the opposite end. You're kind of introverts and you like to be alone a whole bunch. And so this is about being alone, but with a whole new and different kind of purpose. So if this is its purpose, free myself from noise and interference and to create a space where I don't have to be anything for anybody. I'm just with Jesus. What am I doing? What was Jesus doing with this time? And this is where the Gospels just give us tiny little hints. One of the hints is that in a number of these prayer moments, specifically the practice of solitude, if you read the Gospel of Matthew, you'll notice that in those moments sometimes

he'll come out and he'll have a conversation with his disciples, and he'll just speak lines from the book of Psalms. And actually, if you just read through any of the Gospels, you'll notice how much Jesus constantly quotes from and has the book of Psalms, like, clearly in the back of his mind. Clearly, he had the whole thing memorized. Absolutely. And this was standard practice in Jewish education and so on, is to memorize huge amounts of the Scriptures. But the book of Psalms was the prayer book of Judaism in Jesus's day. And it actually has been the prayer book of the church historically from Jesus for centuries since. It's actually only in recent centuries that the book of Psalms has had a much lower role to play in Christian worship gatherings and so on. And so what was Jesus doing?

And I think what Jesus was doing was what all Jews did when they prayed, and it was a form of prayerful meditation on the scriptures themselves. It wasn't reading the Bible, and it wasn't simply just praying, although I think probably at times it involved both, but it's a form of scripture-inspired prayer. How do I know this? Because the Jewish handbook of prayer that we call the book of Psalms begins with a user manual. The first poem in the book of Psalms is a user manual about what to do with the book of Psalms and how to use this thing. And if you look in the first paragraph, this surely depicts the kind of thing that Jesus was doing regularly. Look at how it begins. It says,

How blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked, or stand in the way that sinners take, or sit in the company of mockers? So the first thing we're told is about this person called the blessed person. And this person somehow has this resolve and commitment to make really principled, difficult, moral, and ethical decisions. Here's all of these things I'm not going to do. You're like, wow, that's intense. What could sustain that? What would drive or motivate that kind of choice? And that's exactly what follows. Here's what they don't do, because here's what they are doing. Whose delight is in the law of the Lord, referring to the scriptures, and who meditates on his law day and night. It's this regular patterned practice

of doing this, whatever that means, with the scriptures day and night. And what's the result? This is a really powerful metaphor. This person is like a tree planted by streams of water. It's like someone who is receiving this source of life from outside themselves. And it yields fruit. It actually, it matures into, you know, in the poetry, interpret fruit, whatever you want. These actions, these are things that this person is regularly producing in their lives because of this source that they're connected to and whose leaf doesn't wither. They're able to withstand really difficult seasons because of this practice. Now, what is this meditate? All clear? It's just very clear what that means in English, right? Meditate. That's

not a clear word in English at all because it's a word that has been picked up to describe the kinds of practices or spiritual practices in many different kinds of religious traditions. So what does it mean in the biblical tradition, in the Jewish and Christian tradition? And of course, I have to teach you the Hebrew word because that's what I do. So it's a really good one. It's the word haggah. so it's a really good one. It's the word haggah, haggah. Now, haggah is used a handful of times in Hebrew, in biblical Hebrew, and actually the majority of times that you see this word used, it's not referring to people. It's referring to animals who are doing this. So in Isaiah, a lion haggahs, and it's particularly a lion who has just shredded a lamb to pieces and is like sitting there over the meat and the fur and stuff and like beginning to eat it. And that lion is

said to be hagga-ing over its prey. There's a number, actually the most of the passages in the Bible that use this word are describing doves and what doves do. Actually, what English word would you use to describe the lion doing that over the slaughtered little lambie? What's that? Fierce. No, no. To describe what he's doing. The lion haggas over its prey. What would you say? Like growl. It's talking about the sound it's making. It's moaning, growling, is talking about the sound it's making. It's moaning, growling, growling, growling, growling, this kind of thing. What does it mean for a dove to haggah?

What English word do we use? In other words, this is a word that means to mumble, or to whisper, or to speak silently or softly. And so a lion haggahs over a little slaughtered lambie. Doves haggah when they're up on the power lines making noise to themselves. And humans haggas when they have the scriptures in front of them in these quiet moments that they have patterned to regularly happen throughout the day and night of their lives. So what does that mean?

Does this mean just like read the Bible? Read your Bible and pray. This is something in between reading your Bible and then like praying and making your request known to God. It's this form of relational interaction with God and the Scriptures as the medium. The Scriptures, as I read them aloud to myself, slowly, carefully, prayerfully, and they become this way that I have an interaction with Jesus. That's what Psalm 1 is referring to, and this is a way of engaging the Scriptures that's actually mentioned quite a number of times in the Scriptures themselves. And it seems to me this is surely one of the things, I think

even one of the main things, that Jesus was doing in these moments. We are called to pray and to read the Bible and to haggah, and that this is part of the regular practice. So that it's not just like you sit by yourself. How many of you have tried to pray and you just get utterly lost in your own thoughts, you know? And you're just like, whoa, what just happened to me, you know? Like somehow I train of association. So this to me has been one of the greatest gifts is learning and adopting this practice because you're actually focusing on something that's not your own thoughts. You're focusing on the scriptures, but you're engaging with them not to learn something. So that's why the book of Psalms, I think, has formed the prayer book for this practice for so many millennia now.

It's because once you pray through it a number of times, it becomes familiar to you. And then it becomes the way for you to use these prayers of the book of Psalms, but to become your own prayers in some way. Now, there's a whole other step of practice here that I don't have time to get into. But historically, in historic Christianity, this developed into a practice called, in Latin, Lectio Divina, or spiritual reading, divine reading of the Scriptures. But this is about this experiential engagement with the Scriptures. So I would say, go to the book of Psalms, but go to a passage that you already are familiar with, because the point is not learning.

The point is to read this text slowly and aloud to yourself, and then to engage in the second step that's called meditatio, or meditation, which is, the point is not to get far. The point is to focus in on some key words, key ideas, key themes in this particular passage. And then when there's something that strikes you or that resonates you, this is important to stop. The point is not progress. And the point is that begin to reflect on this and say, why is this significant right now? What does this word tell me about Jesus' character? How does this word illuminate some area in my own life or area in my own flaws or character failures or something like that? What does this word or concept mean for the things that are ahead of me that I know are coming later today? What is the significance of this in light

of what Jesus did for me on the cross? I have a whole bunch of questions like that on the handout. And then the next step is not to keep on reading your Bible. It's to stop and actually use the very words from the particular passage and to turn that into a prayer that uses the same words that you just read and reflected on and to turn that into your own prayer to God. And then contemplatio is basically then go live your life. But go live your life shaped by the reflections and meditations that you've done from the day. And for a while, you know, at least for me, it took time.

You know, it kind of felt like go through the steps. But, you know, after a while of doing it, it just becomes a pretty, sometimes even brief, but meaningful practice of a daily prayerful engagement with the Scriptures. And I'm certain that this is exactly the kind of thing that Jesus is doing. And it's precisely the kind of thing that Jesus called his followers to be doing. It's this, it's meditating, It's haggahing on the scriptures. Not to learn something and not just to tell God what I need, but to stop and focus and not feel the need to have to do or say anything, but just reflect on the scriptures and how they lead me into this engagement with

the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially those who believe, as Paul said. Now, let me just conclude. Train yourself. Strive and labor. Here we are. It's a Sunday gathering. Hurrah! We're going to go do this, you know? And then, like, let's have a conversation in a month, you know? And, like, you're tired because you, like, lost some sleep because you woke up earlier or whatever. And then you're like, is it really worth it? And I don't know. And then I went to a concert on Sunday and it was too early to wake up and then whatever. And then a month from now, you're just like, this never even happened. You know what I'm saying? So that's true of all of us. Again, the question is, how do you gain the motivation to see that I need this? And it's not just a

matter of like feeling guilty or like Jesus did it so I need to do it power up it's about a change of my desires and affections it's about me coming to actually believe that I I can't live adequately if I don't have this practice in my life I need it and I want it so that I'm going to focus in on it and say no to other things that are going to get in the way of that. And how do you get there? I don't know how you get there. Let me share with you one way that has gotten me there over the last few years. Turn to Luke 22 with me.

It's the last moment of Jesus' private prayer that's mentioned in the Gospel of Luke. We looked at a whole bunch already, but in Luke 22, it's where it begins with Judas going out to betray Jesus and get the soldiers, hire them. Most of Luke 22 is the last supper. It's the last Passover meal between Jesus and his followers. Right as the meal concludes and they leave, look at verse 39 of Luke 22. It says, Jesus went out as usual to the Mount of Olives, and his disciples followed him. On reaching the place, he said to them,

Pray that you will not fall into temptation. Jesus knows that a moment, he knows within 12 hours he's going to be hanging on the Roman cross and he says pray the moment of decision the ultimate moment of decision you guys of your allegiance to me it's coming pray that you don't fall

and then he withdrew as he always did about a stone's throw beyond them he knelt down and he prayed Father if you're willing take this cup from me, yet not my will, but yours be done. This is a moment of agonized solitude. An angel from heaven appeared to him, strengthening him. Being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly. His sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground. When he rose from prayer,

he went back to the disciples, and he finds them doing what? So Jesus, he's utterly alone now. He has only the Father's presence with him that he's aware of, but he is in utter solitude, even though he has his circle of disciples around him. They're exhausted from sorrow. And so here you have this last moment of Jesus' prayer life, this side of the cross and resurrection. And it's a moment where his solitude, he actually wasn't trying to be alone. He went a stone's throw away, but the whole point is that they would be with him in mutual support, and he finds himself completely isolated. Only the presence of the Father that he's wrestling with

in an agonized prayer. The last moments of Jesus, right, where he had his will to do what he thought he should be doing, were moments of solitary prayer, but they were also moments of abandonment of those who were closest to him. To me, this is profound because that, in a way, solitude, this is profound because that, in a way, solitude, choosing to cut yourself off from any input and relationship as a part of your regular practice, that's a form of self-denial. So for some of us, it's very difficult to do this. It's a form of death almost. It's cutting yourself off so that you identify with Jesus in his final moment of solitude. And so Jesus goes into this moment of solitude in agonizing prayer because He knows that the cross is ahead of Him, this moment where He's going to absorb into Himself the cumulative effects and His and the Father's own judgment

on human failure and sin and selfishness, in his own death on the cross. And it's this moment of agonizing solitude. Why did he go and do that? Why did he do that? And the witness of all of the New Testament scriptures is that he did that as an act of love for you and for me. Jesus went into the moment of complete abandonment and solitude precisely as an act of love and commitment to those who would look to him in faith so that in their moment of solitude and death, they would have the promise of never being abandoned.

And so in these acts of solitude that we place ourselves into, it's a pure response to the one who is completely abandoned and isolated for me and my behalf as an act of love and in my better moments which aren't that many my heart is melted into a desire to want to be in solitude with my savior that's how i get there i don't know how you need to get there. But it seems to me that it's only going to happen when we see that we need this practice. We need it in our lives to actually fully function as human beings and as followers of Jesus. All right, you guys, that wraps up this three-part series. All right, you guys, that wraps up this three-part series.

In the next episode, we'll open a new series, explore all kinds of new things from my strange Bible and your strange Bible. You guys, thanks for listening to the podcast, and I hope these are helpful for you. They're so, so helpful for me personally. It's such a privilege to be able to both learn and prepare for all these teachings and then to release them out into the body of Jesus' followers. So if they're helpful for you, feel free to spread the word about this podcast. Share it with your friends. You can share a review on iTunes. And cheers. We'll see you next time.