Weekly Devotional - Jennifer Belinsky
Matthew 14:22-23. Immediately, Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowd. After he had dismissed them, he went up on the mountainside by himself to pray.
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On the heels of a fantastic feat of the miraculous (feeding the 5,000), there was an action with an unspoken exclamation point: "immediately.” What a word! It sounds like the opposite of “I’ll get to that later” or “I want to do this or that.” The original translation conveys an urgency or rapid action. It calls us to make a choice, follow through, and stop waiting. Unlike human instinct, Jesus didn’t linger in the spectacular wonder He just performed. He, with urgency, directed the world to stop around Him and pursued time with His Father.
The first thing He did was make His followers go ahead of Him. The term "followers" can look different for everyone. Maybe it’s individuals we are mentoring, people that pop over to visit. It could mean family, those we are raising and sharing life with, or friends. Whomever those individuals close to our hearts are, according to scripture, it is okay to say, “I need some space for a moment.”
The second thing Jesus did was "dismiss the crowd". What defines a crowd? A group of people, opinions, voices, noise, distraction, space-filling, resource and energy-consuming, or thought-distracting...With that in mind, what could the "crowd" in our life be? Let’s just state the obvious first: -social media-. There is also music, TV, books, podcasts (even Christian ones), and really anything that invades the silence.
And then Jesus did one last thing, He "went" somewhere secluded. He physically left the place He was at and found a solitude that was so quiet He could hear the wind brush against the leaves and His own natural breath. Most importantly, in that quiet, undisturbed space, He could hear His heartbeat and hear the heart of His Father. And that was worth the immediate.
This passage truly encourages introspection: What do we want? Like, actually stop and think about it. Do we want a convenient, comfortable, and incomplete version of the Gospel, or are we really going to do this and pursue God with all our heart and strength and being, no matter the cost. Who are the individuals in our lives that we need to send on ahead for a minute? Who or what are the crowds that need to be dismissed? And lastly, where is that spot we can go and hide away? Where is that mountain silence where we can hear our heartbeat and the heart of the Father, that place where everything becomes clear.
When those questions are answered, we will know what to do.
Go do it - immediately!
-Jennifer
______________________________________________________________________
On the heels of a fantastic feat of the miraculous (feeding the 5,000), there was an action with an unspoken exclamation point: "immediately.” What a word! It sounds like the opposite of “I’ll get to that later” or “I want to do this or that.” The original translation conveys an urgency or rapid action. It calls us to make a choice, follow through, and stop waiting. Unlike human instinct, Jesus didn’t linger in the spectacular wonder He just performed. He, with urgency, directed the world to stop around Him and pursued time with His Father.
The first thing He did was make His followers go ahead of Him. The term "followers" can look different for everyone. Maybe it’s individuals we are mentoring, people that pop over to visit. It could mean family, those we are raising and sharing life with, or friends. Whomever those individuals close to our hearts are, according to scripture, it is okay to say, “I need some space for a moment.”
The second thing Jesus did was "dismiss the crowd". What defines a crowd? A group of people, opinions, voices, noise, distraction, space-filling, resource and energy-consuming, or thought-distracting...With that in mind, what could the "crowd" in our life be? Let’s just state the obvious first: -social media-. There is also music, TV, books, podcasts (even Christian ones), and really anything that invades the silence.
And then Jesus did one last thing, He "went" somewhere secluded. He physically left the place He was at and found a solitude that was so quiet He could hear the wind brush against the leaves and His own natural breath. Most importantly, in that quiet, undisturbed space, He could hear His heartbeat and hear the heart of His Father. And that was worth the immediate.
This passage truly encourages introspection: What do we want? Like, actually stop and think about it. Do we want a convenient, comfortable, and incomplete version of the Gospel, or are we really going to do this and pursue God with all our heart and strength and being, no matter the cost. Who are the individuals in our lives that we need to send on ahead for a minute? Who or what are the crowds that need to be dismissed? And lastly, where is that spot we can go and hide away? Where is that mountain silence where we can hear our heartbeat and the heart of the Father, that place where everything becomes clear.
When those questions are answered, we will know what to do.
Go do it - immediately!
-Jennifer
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