3 Practices of the Kingdom

Tonight, we're in Mark 1.35-39, and we'll be considering three practices, three practices of Jesus for a fruitful life in the kingdom of God.

A few weeks ago, we were looking at chapter 1, verse 14 and 15, and we read in chapter 1.15 that Jesus said, the time has come, the kingdom of God is at hand.

And we talked about what is the kingdom of God, and one way to understand the kingdom of God is this definition, the range of God's effective will.

We also said that it was the realm of God's eternal reign, but when Jesus says that the kingdom of God is at hand, the power of the kingdom is here, he was saying, the range of God's effective will is covering you because Jesus is the king of the kingdom and he was there.

So, we're observing from Mark's Gospel tonight.

What did Jesus do to stay in the range of God's effective will in his life?

Have a think about that line and try to make sense of it.

What did Jesus do as a practice, multiple things he did, to allow him to stay in the power of the kingdom, which is the range of God's effective will in his life?

As we've been working through this first chapter, we've seen that Jesus is pretty busy.

He waited, I guess, around 30 years and then it launched his ministry and he was busy preaching and casting out demons.

You look at chapter one, he's taking on the kingdom domain of the evil one.

He has been setting captives free and he's been healing lots of people, as Ben mentioned this morning, up until the passage just before this one.

He hadn't healed anyone from diseases that we were told about, but he certainly has by verse 35.

In chapter one, 34, it says evening, that evening after sunset, the people brought to Jesus all the sick and demon possessed, the whole town gathered at the door and Jesus healed many who had various diseases.

The whole town gathered at the door.

Well, this is a busy start, isn't it?

It's a busy start to his ministry.

But it's exciting.

I don't know if you've ever been on what we call in the Christian world a short term mission trip.

Anyone been on like a short term mission trip?

They have probably become a little bit less frequent in churches, I think.

In the 70s and 80s, they were sort of all the rage.

And certainly, I started going on shorter term a couple of weeks, very small length of time mission trips.

In the early 90s, I went to India.

And there's a lot to be said about the opportunity to go and meet with brothers and sisters from another part of the world.

Often, they're from a poorer country and you learn so much.

But unfortunately, that's not often the way a trip is organised.

That's the best way you can do a mission trip.

You go in as a learner and you go, I just want to learn from you, because you're living out your faith in often really hard circumstances.

So, just come as a learner.

Often, we don't do it like that.

We sort of go in as classic Westerners with all the answers and we sort of bring in a crowd and we shoot out the Gospel, not really understanding much of their culture.

Not that God can't do things that are amazing and he does.

But sometimes, we have a bit to answer for in our mode of doing short-term mission trips.

All that aside, as a little caveat, we have to be careful that we come in humility.

But the trip I did, we went out into, it was Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh in the middle of India, and we would go every night in our little van and we would preach the Gospel to mainly Hindus, and we understood basically nothing about the Gospel.

We'd had an interpreter and we would preach, and in the 20 of us would all get ready to pray for the sick.

And you know what?

We had dozens, if not hundreds of people would line up to be prayed for.

These are desperate people, and so they're coming just hoping something could happen.

And sometimes we saw what seemed like people getting healed.

Like really, it's hard to know, but honestly, it seemed like it happened.

Certainly seen people get healed in other parts of the world too.

And I guess I want to testify there's an adrenaline rush when you're part of that.

There just is, like it's just amazing.

You feel like, whoa, this is the real deal.

We're out there in the middle of nowhere preaching the Gospel to people, and they're getting set free from stuff.

It's an adrenaline rush, it really is.

And I'm thinking this is probably what's happening here.

It's just started, the disciples are like, wow, what's going on here?

Our Jesus, normal Jesus, we know he's got authority, but wow, look at what he's doing.

And so there's a lot of excitement happening, and I would put it to you even for Jesus.

What do you reckon?

He's been waiting 30 years, and he's sort of like, his dad says, go for it son, pin your ears back, let's go.

Kingdoms, let it go, let him have it.

Preach the Gospel, heal the sick.

And so Jesus is out there, and yet, for him to accomplish all the faster, that the father had called him to do, his father, God, he did some stuff, and we might call them practices, disciplines.

And I want to look at at least three, three tonight, but there are more than three practices that he did, to stay in the effective range of God's will and reign, the kingdom.

Jesus practices solitude, limits, and work.

He practices what we might call the discipline of solitude, the discipline of limits, and the discipline of work.

Let's look at verse 35, which is our main text.

Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house, and went off to a solitary place where he prayed.

What do we learn from the text?

Well, it's very early, it's pre-dawn, Jesus got up, no one else got up for him.

Very important point.

No one else was praying for him.

He got up and left the house.

He intentionally went somewhere.

In fact, he went to a particular place, a solitary place, and in this place, he prayed.

Now, Jesus, we know, is God in human flesh.

We don't know it quite yet here in Mark, but we know it from the rest of the New Testament.

He is eternal.

He lacks nothing.

Amen?

He needs nothing.

He understands everything, but as our memory verse has been telling us, Jesus made himself nothing in becoming human, taking the very nature of a human being.

He emptied himself of what?

The cut the corner in life option.

He emptied himself of, I'm going to pull the God card and take away the hard stuff.

He emptied himself of that.

Just because he was God, Philippians 2 tells us, he didn't always act like God could act, right?

Solved the problem easily.

He was fully human in every way.

And so, as a needy human being, living out the will of the Father, living what ends up to be a really full and fruitful life, not a long life, but certainly a fruitful life, he shows us the need for solitude with the Father.

Solitude.

Now, you might immediately think, didn't it say that he just prayed?

Why would you say that he had solitude?

Well, I choose the word solitude because the word prayer, I think, connotates all sorts of ideas for us in the 21st century, those of us who are used to Christian things, people writing out prayers, like Alex.

Or we think of bringing a sort of a shopping list to God.

But prayer is far more nuanced than that, and I know many of us know that.

Solitude encompasses prayer and much more.

Jesus spent unhurried, uninterrupted time with God alone.

I think it would be fair to say that he was quite social.

Like he hangs out with people a lot.

I think it's very relational, Jesus.

Yet he got up when others were asleep, still dark, and he went to a place of focus, where he could connect with his father.

I think we need to do that too.

Especially when we're really busy and fruitful in the kingdom of God.

The ancient practice of solitude, some of us are more familiar with this idea than others.

It certainly comes in and out of, I guess, vogue of Christians and what they're reading and listening to.

But it's often coupled with silence and stillness, solitude.

It sometimes involves study, studying the Bible, and very frequently it involves prayer.

But solitude is the practice of setting aside time to simply stop.

And I think that's what Jesus was doing.

In the midst of all the busyness, the craziness, the adrenaline, he stole away when it was quiet, and he stopped so that he would be with his father.

And you know what else?

I think he was being with himself, just stopping, listening to what was going on in his heart as it all started to unfold, this new, exciting ministry that was moving towards a cross.

He was alone with his father and also his thoughts.

It's been said that the ultimate challenge of life is to manage consciousness.

Now, stay with me, please.

I'm not going to get too carried away.

I think the ultimate challenge in life is to deal with the sin that will cause you to not live forever.

I think that is the ultimate challenge in life.

You've got to deal with sin.

If you don't deal with sin, the Bible says you will die.

The soul that sins will die.

So we need, as Rachel said, the answer to the kids at school is, you need to know Jesus.

You need to know what he did for you on the cross.

He defeated death.

He rose again for you in your place, so that you, by faith in him, could live forever.

That absolutely is the biggest challenge in life that you need to find the answer to.

But I think, I think this is a subsequent challenge to manage the flow of thoughts that happens in every human being's brain.

In your body.

I know that sounds a little bit mystical, but think about it.

Our thoughts don't stop.

They're just constantly flowing, this stream of consciousness.

And what you think about will dictate the type of life you live.

In fact, I'd say to you that life is that flow.

It is that flow.

It's the more you're thinking about that which is joyful and loving and holy and good, your life will head in that direction.

The more that we think about a constant flow of that which lacks joy, which is bitter, lustful, greedy, filled with anxiety, our thought life becomes our life, because it is us, it is us.

It's sometimes said that the unaided mind tends toward chaos.

What do you reckon about that comment?

The unaided mind, what that's saying is, if you don't steer your mind somewhere, it doesn't just go to good, happy places by itself.

The unaided mind tends towards chaos and disorder.

The Bible teaches that we should renew our minds.

We often quote it, Romans 12.

I think this is why Jesus spends so much time, and if you track his life, he does this multiple times.

He spends time in solitude with his father.

He's renewing his mind.

And in doing so, he's renewing his soul.

Now, it's really important to know and remember, you don't have a soul.

You are a soul.

And that's it.

It's a unique and important difference.

The idea of nephesh in the Old Testament is soul.

It's life itself.

I am a soul and you are a soul.

It's not that you are a human with a soul.

You are a soul.

And Jesus as a soul was being renewed when he spent time with his father.

I read this quote this week and I thought it was great.

And I am interested to see what you think.

This management of our thoughts, managing of the health of our soul, takes effort.

But what's happened with the digital revolution and this phone that we have, we outsource the management of the stuff going on in our consciousness to the screen.

So you're feeling down, you're feeling a bit tired, maybe, you're feeling a whole lot of stuff.

Has anyone gone to their screen to just feel better?

Anyone in the room do that?

Not do that, I meant to say.

Of course we do that.

We outsource the management of my stuff to this screen.

And the screen sort of promises it will make you feel better.

And it maybe does for a little bit, but the screen honestly, we know, it just can't provide what it promises.

They distract us.

They don't bring us replenishment and healing.

And that's why this idea of stealing away to be with the God who made us in solitude and prayer and silence with him, with his spirit, it's just so hard to do because I've got my phone here.

Hello, hello, hello.

It's like that, isn't it?

The phone is always there.

And then even if you try to go and have some solitude, it's like, pull that.

I'm going to take notes in solitude with you, Lord.

The ancient practice of solitude takes a person to a quiet place, often with natural sounds and natural views, and we stop, and we breathe, and we listen to our mind and our heart, and most of all, we listen to God.

We talk to Him and listen to Him.

And in solitude, we learn this incredible need to put space between stimulus and response.

Like, I've read that recently, and again, I'm reading a lot, hey?

But I thought that's such a beautiful way to describe godliness.

The distance between stimulus and response.

And solitude helps give you a gap.

Solitude helps you understand what's going on in me that makes me so needy to respond to the triggers that take hold of me and make me act in ways that are not the way I want to live.

You don't have to be a Christian to feel this.

We all do.

This is what's happening.

And solitude is a practice, and we call them spiritual disciplines.

And the spiritual disciplines are means of grace, of accessing God's goodness that we would learn to be the type of people Jesus said we could be.

It takes time.

And I would just put it to you that Jesus is doing this because he needed to do it.

He needed solitude with the Father.

And I know I just want to sort of tease you with that, because I hope someone would say, He didn't need anything.

He's God.

He's perfect.

Yeah, you're right.

He is perfect.

I mean, no disrespect to the Lord of Glory.

But I think he did lots of things because he needed to, not just even to show us a good way.

Amen?

He needed to because he's human.

He needed solitude with his father in the midst of the busyness.

And I would put it to you and myself, who are we to think that we don't need to steal away?

He practiced the discipline of solitude by practicing the discipline of limits.

The world God created exists within limits.

Day, unless you're living in Norway in certain parts of the year, day will finish with night, right?

There are limits to nights and days, and we need that.

Those of us who are in the long night of the soul, there are limits to those experiences.

What are some of the other limits we see?

Well, gravity provides limits.

There is work and there is rest.

There is water and land.

It's right there in Genesis.

The world is created with limits.

So, verse 36, Simon and his companions went to look for him.

That's Jesus.

And when they found him, they exclaimed, everyone's looking for you.

Everyone's looking for you.

The actual Greek text says the companions went on a manhunt.

They went on a manhunt.

So they've woken up early morning, where's Jesus?

Have you seen Jesus?

Where is he?

Where is he?

They're all, the people want him.

Manhunt.

Poor Jesus.

They're going, oh, thank you, Lord.

Oh, the serenity.

Where did it go?

It was like me here.

I was doing some of this, trying to put in the practice from about quarter past three until about ten to four, when my beautiful solitude was broken by Ben up there with the light on and Trotty walked in and he's doing his exercises and doing stuff, and I'm just sitting over there going.

And then you could feel him like he's walking and he's going, something's on my, someone's watching me.

Shanksy, what are you doing?

That was my experience.

That was my experience.

My experience of solitude was like, you ruined my perfect serenity with the Lord.

But that's what's happened, right, with Jesus.

He's got this beautiful time in the midst of all the busyness with his father, and the disciples don't understand that's what he's doing.

He's doing something to allow the Spirit of God to fill him again with what he needs.

He's not available 24-7 because he's set limits, amen?

He has a discipline of limits.

He knows the best version of himself is on the other side of certain limits, the other side of certain boundaries.

We have a limited supply of willpower.

We do, we have a limited supply of willpower.

Sometimes it's said, habits eat willpower for breakfast.

What do you reckon that means?

Does anyone want to explain that?

Habits eat willpower for breakfast.

You have a limited amount of willpower.

You're depressing me.

You're not with me at all.

What's the answer?

How do you explain that?

Habits eat willpower for breakfast.

You can decide to do all sorts of things, and I can decide, and I'm going to put my best willpower at that.

But habits will eat that for breakfast.

If you have a bodily, automated habit, it's going to win.

You might win for a little while with willpower, but you've got to train yourself to do the things you want to do.

Training, not trying.

Like, we need to learn the habits.

And my point is, he's not living his life just on willpower, Jesus.

He's not just saying, I'm going to be this type of person.

He's setting limits because he knows habits are more powerful than willpower, and we're going to get to something else that's even more powerful than habits, and that is the habit of surrender.

That's the one part, that's the one aspect of the will that never runs out.

Have you blocked that one away?

Surrender.

Surrender.

When Jesus, who has the greatest willpower on earth, surely he's the greatest human, when he gets to the end of his life just before the greatest test, and he's about to go to the cross, and he's so scared, and he's so just overwhelmed, what does he say?

He doesn't say, come on Jesus, you can do this, you've done everything, you've made it all this way 33 years, you can do it, you can do it.

What does he do with his will?

He surrenders it.

He surrenders it.

That's the most powerful thing we can ever do with our will.

We surrender it, and we surrender it because of the discipline of limits.

We go, there is a limit to the power of my will.

So I'm going to go to that limit, and then I'm going to surrender in the arms of a loving God.

Amen?

That's really powerful stuff.

It really is.

The first three steps of AA say basically, I am powerless and my life has become unmanageable.

I can't do this.

And then the second step is, I believe a power greater than myself can restore me to moral sanity.

And the third step is, I turn my life over to this greater power.

In essence, it's, I can't.

I know the limit.

I can't.

He can.

I think I'll let him.

I can't.

He can.

I think I'll let him.

Jesus understood his limits, even the limits of his own willpower.

He also understood the power of surrender.

So what are you thinking, just a little bit of application, what do you need to say no to?

We've been asking this question a lot in this series, in order that you could say yes to what you really need to do.

To spend time in solitude, we need what we need for soul health.

We need to say no to something else, don't we?

One thing about solitude, and I've sort of learnt this stuff in the 90s, I reckon, in my life.

I have struggled to put this into practice.

I really have.

So I don't think it's easy to steal away, not just to study, not just sort of to pray, but to just stop and be with God, be with yourself, and allow the stuff that's in you to come out, and then God to actually minister to you in that place.

It's a challenging thing to do, but it takes intentionality to spend the time.

It takes limits.

You have to say, I'm not doing that because I'm going to do this.

Jesus didn't let the disciples set his agenda.

He set limits, and that's how he achieved so much.

And Jesus didn't just sort of hug trees, did he?

He worked.

Solitude, limits, work.

Jesus replied after setting the limits, after spending the time in solitude.

Jesus said, let us go somewhere else to the nearby villages so I can preach there also.

That's why I've come.

So he traveled throughout Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and driving out demons.

Jesus was a hard worker.

Amen?

Jesus was a hard worker.

He got about the work of the kingdom.

He preached.

This is not easy stuff that he is doing.

He healed the sick.

He set people free from demons.

He had time to be focused.

And as Ben was saying this morning, connecting with people, not just sort of cut, launch, heal them all.

He would be there connecting because he's love.

So important, isn't it, to remember that work wasn't part of the fall, per se.

Work, hard work was in the garden.

Adam and Eve were meant to tend and care for it, to work hard.

I think solitude for Jesus enabled him to work hard.

It enabled him to be fruitful.

Solitude helped him do the work of surrender.

His calling was to be a sacrificial, servant-hearted leader.

His calling was to do what he taught his disciples to do, things like loving enemies.

This is hard work, to turn the other cheek, to walk the extra mile.

All behaviours that Jesus taught and modelled, and it was work to do it, but I think his limits and his solitude enabled him to be the person who could do it.

What do you think?

It just can't be random, his life.

He did these things because even he needed to.

Again, I just want to leave that with you as a probing question.

Do you think he could have been...

He had to be sinless to go to the cross to die for our sin.

Could he have done the job of sinless perfection without doing some of these practices?

We don't know the answer to that for sure, do we?

But it's powerful to think he was human and Hebrews says he was tempted in every way.

If he could not have sinned, it's a weird idea of his sinless perfection.

And I know he was God and I want to say he could never have sinned, but there's this tension that he was our genuine representative, so he could have fallen when the devil tempted him in the desert.

Hey, so I find that fascinating, challenging, like, exciting, that my master, that I'm apprenticed to, for him to be perfect, he needed to do some of this stuff, right?

He needed to steal away.

How about you?

You need to set the limits?

Or are you like, I got this one, Lord, I got this, it's okay.

And I think Jesus goes, that's why you guys are sinners.

You don't follow.

Now, you don't earn.

We don't earn his grace.

His grace is given as a gift.

But to become the type of people that model the life of Jesus, we have to follow what he did.

Receive his grace, we're made right as a gift.

Our identity is we're found in Christ, we're forgiven.

But it's a process to learn how he lived and take that on.

We're told to take off the old life and to put on the new.

And part of the putting on the new is this stuff.

Surrender limits work.

I don't know if you're blessed to own your own home in Sydney.

As I look around, I see lots of people that I don't think you do.

It's like you might own a little...

Anyway, however it works.

Whether you own a unit or a...

Well done if you own something.

Because it's hard, right?

It's hard.

And we didn't get to own our home still, but we sort of had a mortgage and it was ours.

A house in our mid-30s.

And one of my great joys in life was mowing that lawn.

Not just, as you know, if you know me, not just mowing the lawn, doing the edges.

Making those edges pop.

Something godly about edges being right.

And obsessive compulsive or something.

Weird for me as well, but.

But I share that because we have this stewardship of our soul.

And we're meant to work at things that we're given to look after.

It is work.

If you own a home, I was talking to someone who's recently bought a home, and they had some issues, and had some issues with it.

And they're like, oh, it's sort of buyer's remorse.

It's like it's so bad.

I'm like, guys, it's owning a home.

You've just got to fix problems.

They're never ending.

You've got to paint stuff.

You've got to fix drainage issues.

You've got to clean out gutters.

You've got to climb up ladders, and there's just lots of things to do.

If you're so blessed to have something to look after, it takes work.

And we are called in our lives to find a job to do that I think, that's not in the Bible, but I think it's pretty great.

Autonomy, complexity, reward.

Find those three things in a job, and you will be happy.

Autonomy, complexity, reward.

Do something that you can glorify God in the work.

That's a great place to start.

But I just want to encourage us, let's work hard, because Jesus worked hard.

He said to his disciples, let's keep moving.

I've got to go to nearby villages so I can get on with the work of the kingdom.

So, what a wonderful example he sets us.

Solitude, limits, work, three practices that Jesus used for a productive life in the kingdom.

We have a tendency to forget about the limits and solitude and just get to work, don't we?

I was once part of a church and we were, we were digging up concrete in an old factory to put in a kitchen, sort of like that industrial kitchen.

So it's a heap of stuff we had to dig up, had to go a certain depth, and I'm the pastor, one of the pastors at church, and so I get given this big, by the building coordinator, this big jackhammer, and he's like, you know, this is where you need to do it.

And so I jackhammered all afternoon, about four hours, and it was a nightmare.

I just didn't get much out of the way, but I'm like, I'm not, no, I've got this, I'm just, leave it to me.

I'm setting the example, suffering servant, you know.

And then John comes back, and he's like, mate, what have you been doing?

You've hardly done anything.

Seriously, you've hardly done anything.

I'm like, I've been going as hard as I could all afternoon.

He said, you did change the tool bit, didn't you?

I told you it was blunt.

I'm like, you never told me it was blunt.

He said, I told you it was blunt.

There it is, there, the sharp tool bit.

But it's like the old, that's the true story, it's like the old sermon illustration, sharpen your axe.

But it's the truth.

This idea of limits and solitude sharpens us, makes us effective in the life we've been called to live for the glory of God.

One thing to finish with is a really cool insight about some of the original words.

The same word describes Eremos, describes where Jesus went into the wilderness, where he was tempted by the devil.

That same word is the word that describes where he went as that special place in the dark of that morning when he was going to be renewed.

What does that tell you?

The same place that Jesus went to fight off the devil, the same desert word that means desert, that means place of attack, place of vulnerability, was the word that Mark used for where he went to his quiet place to meet with his father.

To me, that says, that's so true, isn't it?

This idea of solitude, in one way, is lovely and just calm and just peaceful and tranquil, but other times, the same place is a place of warfare, don't you reckon?

For us, when we go there, it's like, Lord, I don't want to listen to what you're saying about my heart.

I'm ticked off.

I don't want to listen to you.

And there's a battle going on.

And sometimes it's just not that you've sinned per se, but you're just so disappointed that God's being too slow in answering your prayers.

You've got no prayers left.

Sometimes it's just that you're feeling so much stuff.

Well, I just want to encourage you, if Jesus is our example, this seeking time with God in a secret place, the solitary place.

Sometimes it's a war zone, but it's where you have to go because God's there.

Amen?

To work through what you need to work through, to accomplish what you've been called to accomplish.

Some of the most powerful times we will meet with God will be in solitude.

And it's hard.

It's hard to do, but it's worth it.

So can I encourage us that we are called, if we are, certainly if we're Christians, it's the first thing we need to do, to give our life to Christ and put our faith in Him and His finished work on the cross and in His resurrection, say, I'm in, Lord, I trust you.

Who else could I turn to to show me how to live my life?

Who else could deal with my sin but you?

Once we've done that, can we think about going to the desert place intentionally to meet with God?

Because Jesus did solitude.

Embrace the limits that He has set for your life.

Ask Him what those limits should be.

Talk to people in community about what those limits should be.

And then work hard for His glory.

And as you do, live out with an attitude of surrender.

This life has called you to live.

Lord Jesus, thank you for this incredible example you give us when you walked around on earth.

I thank you as Ben said this morning that you are 3D, you're not 2D, you're not just words on a page.

You're 3D and you are in heaven.

And I was so struck when Alex was praying to you, Lord Jesus, I was just thinking of you at the right hand of the Father.

I remember when Stephen in the Bible looked up and said, Behold, there he is, the Messiah, Jesus at the right hand of the Father, because you're real.

We want to just remember that and acknowledge that and give you all the glory that you are completely 3D.

And more than that, you are resurrected new humanity and you've made a way for us to follow you.

You're the first fruits from among the grave.

Lord Jesus, you are worth it.

You are real.

We want to declare it.

You are real and you are interceding for us before the Father.

You are resurrected humanity in heaven right now.

And Lord God, as a church, we want to acknowledge your Lordship and come under your guidance again as we get ready to go into another full year, coming out of holiday mode and getting into the business of a year ahead.

Lord, would you guide us as to the healthy practices that we need to take on as apprentices to Jesus and followers of the way.

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