Turning Away

Most of us live under some measure of guilt.  There is always more to get done.  My do list is never empty; my desk never clean.  There are emails to write, people to call, kids and grandkids with which to play, books that need to be read, and studies that need to be finished.

The kicker is I am not all that important.

Christ was.

Nine times in Mark Christ turns away from the crowds.  What?  Didn’t He want to reach the world?  Why did He do that?  It seems counter intuitive.  Rather than turn away shouldn’t He have put the pedal to the metal, implemented a strategic plan, doubled and redoubled His efforts?

He did not do that.  Reading Mark in places He tried to sneak in undetected.

After the busiest day we have on record He gets up early and goes out to be by Himself and pray, Mark 1:35.  In his book The Spirit of the Disciplines, Dallas Willard points out that if we want to be like Christ we should probably be doing what He did.

He did not do everything He was asked to do.  He did not heal everyone.  He did not speak to everyone He saw.  He left the crowds to get time alone with His Father and to invest in 12 men.

There are a lot of things, a lot of good things that demand our time.  If we follow Christ’s lead, we will turn away from some of those demands.