Distractions. We all feel them throughout our day. We tell ourselves every morning that we’re going to stay focused, to stay on the task at hand. However, by the end of the day, we’re beating ourselves up knowing that we haven’t ticked off one thing on our to-do list because something got to our attention before we even finished our first cup of coffee. But have you noticed something about Jesus? Whenever He needed to refuel His mind, body, and soul, He went away and found a quiet place. It was within the solitude of these moments that He could discover what the Father wanted Him to do next. 

Back in the 1950s, the futurists predicted that we’d all be driving around in flying cars by the year 2021. A future that was run by Artificial Intelligence and women wore trousers on a daily basis. Imagine that! You may smile, but these predictions didn’t predict the loneliness and isolation many of us are feeling because of all this technology. Don’t get me wrong, I am glad that we have progressed from taking a whole week to wash our bedsheets to them now being washed, pressed, and folded within an hour. Nevertheless, we’re finding our lives being pushed around by more gadgets that notify us with bleeps, bells, tings, and whistles than we know what to do with, we’re struggling to find the time to join God in the quiet place.   

I believe Jesus found that by being in a quiet place, He learned to listen with His eyes. By that I mean He knew which town to take His disciples to next, He knew who to talk to and He knew who needed healing. Unless He’d spent time with the Father, in a quiet place, He would not have known things. Jeremiah 33:3 reveals how important a quiet place is. “Call to Me, and I will answer you. I will tell you of great things, things beyond what you can imagine, things you could never have known.” If we don’t find a quiet place to let God show us great things, we’re going to be pulled in every direction life takes us and wind-up feeling burned out. 

Matthew 14:25 we find Jesus meeting the disciples by walking on the water towards their fishing boat. The key sentence is, ‘when He had concluded His prayers’. Jesus sought refreshment and solitude before engaging with His disciples. A quiet place came before the hundred percent human and hundred percent God that was named, Jesus, performed the miracle of walking on water. A quiet place taught Jesus a certain time to do great things. He knew when to bide His time, when it was not quite time, and when the time was just right to shake things up a little. He knew how to interact correctly with Satan, the Pharisees, and the Sadducees. He learned to lean on the Presence in that quiet place, before being present. Ecclesiastes 3:2-8 reminds us that there is a time for everything. It also says that ‘The wise have eyes in their heads, but fools stumble in the darkness.’ (Ecclesiastes 2:14) A quiet place gives you the wisdom of having eyes in your head to see what God wants you to see. 

A quiet place is where our souls become nourished by the Word of God. A gateway to the very throne room itself. Where the burdens of life slip away for a moment and our spiritual eyes focus on Him. I challenge you to count how many times in a day you’ve wanted to pray, read your Bible or just sit still in a quiet place with God, only to find you’re distracted. Go on, chalk it up. Believe me, Satan is. And he isn’t at all worried about the bleeps, tings, and messages that bombard you throughout your day because they stop you from spending time in the quiet place.

The more distractions the better. “The best thing, where it is possible, is to keep the patient from the serious intention of praying altogether” states C.S. Lewis in his brilliant book, The Screwtape Letters. It’s high time we valued our quiet place with God as much as Jesus did, so we learn the great things He so longingly wants to reveal to us. Just think of all the wonderful stuff that can go unnoticed if we don’t protect our quiet place with God. We need to start listening with our eyes and open up the windows of heaven, so it invades this earth by doing the impossible with God. Let’s join in the blueprint of living, that runs like a thread throughout Psalm119:18 and pray that God will ‘let me see clearly so that I may take in the amazing things coming from Your law.’ 

Find a quiet place and let God show you great things that He wants to do in you and through you. 

Wendy xo 

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