21.06 | Continue
Luke 6:12-36
‘In these days he went out to the mountain to pray, and all night he continued in prayer to God.’
Luke 6:12
Yesterday I was in a prayer meeting with some colleagues. We were due to finish at 10am, and, as we reached 10am, I offered a ‘rounding up’ prayer.
If you’ve been in churches long enough, you’ll know the drill. It’s not an inauthentic prayer, but there is a rhythm to this. The rounding up prayer has the tone of, We’re done now; time to move on. The Amen at the end is more decisive, preceded by a longer pause, and occasionally repeated. The room then generally stretches, and we transition into the team meeting.
But yesterday had a different feel. It felt like we’d prayed to the point of a tidy end, but that God was inviting us beyond a tidy ending—that He was inviting us into an expression of hunger beyond the predictable and beyond the normal. That, on this day, praying beyond was important. And in those moments, as we continued in prayer, we prayed deeper and we worshiped more fully. We deprioritised the awaiting tasks and we increased priority upon seeking the Father. Prayers emerged of increased authenticity and longing, of simpler love and worship. At yesterday’s meeting, going further up and going further in looked simply like continuing in prayer.
Today’s passage is momentous. Jesus selects the twelve apostles—each a choice of deep significance. He then gives some of His most famous teaching—words introducing a radical new ethic, a radical new inclusion for the poor, and a radical new way of love and grace and reconciliation.
And He precedes this with prayer.
And not just a quick prayer. Rather we read that He went up the mountain to pray, but then that He continued in prayer. Literally translated, Luke has used a word that suggests a continual action throughout the whole night. Jesus didn’t go up the mountain, pray, and stop. But in this instance, He continued in prayer.
We’ve got to be a little cautious here. Jesus warned that more prayer isn’t necessarily better prayer.1 Measuring quantities of prayer can always be manipulated by the religious parts of our hearts, into slavish duty, and feelings of deficit or pride before a God who has already met us with utter love. It’s not wrong or bad when we finish meetings on time, and it’s ok when our prayer follows more predictable rhythms. Most nights, Jesus also went to bed!
But there is a recognition of the moment that is important. Because sometimes, prayer needs to expand beyond the predictable, the normal, the comfortable, the scheduled—because in this very place of prayerful extravagance we push more deeply into the will and ways of the Father.
I share this, because I see something stirring in our moment. There is a rising tide of hunger in the face of growing disaffection with the ideologies and idols of our age. There is an emerging voice of a generation, longing for answers that only come from heaven and leadership that only comes from Jesus.
And in such moments, of impending significance, there will undoubtedly be those that the Lord invites into a new kind of prayer. Prayer that extends beyond the predictable. Prayer that enters new territory. Prayer that expresses a measure of hunger and devotion that cannot be contained in predictable or tidy. A generation who will continue in prayer.
This may not be your word today. Be free, child of God. You cannot attain His love; you already have it.
But some of you may read this, feeling the burning yearning of the soul, and sensing the call of your rabbi, who has gone before you, inviting you to come, to pray.
And then, to continue.
Reflect:
Bring Him your prayers today.
And then, after you would normally finish, simply continue.
Watch what happens in your soul.
Pray:
Father in heaven,
Teach me to know my season.
Teach me to know the seasons of
Slowing, stopping, resting, retreating—
Where I learn more deeply
The extravagance of unearnable grace.
Teach me to know the seasons of stability,
Where I continue in rhythms
That hold and steady, that form and ferment,
Releasing the steady grace
Of a long obedience.
And teach me, Father,
To learn the seasons where the desires of this heart,
And the yearnings of this moment,
Cannot be contained in the normal rhythms,
But need to explode beyond them
Into expressions of desire
And words of longing
That give this heart space to ache, to expand, to dream, and to ignite.
Father, take this very life here,
And establish it in the endless pursuit of you,
Resting, rhythmic, and relentless
For your glory.
In Jesus’ Name,
Amen
Old Testament:
For those also reading the Old Testament this year, your additional readings are here:
Isaiah 8:11-10:34 | Proverbs 17:1-9
e.g. Matthew 6:7,13; Luke 18:13-14