SERIES
Sojourn: Toward an Enduring City
2017-01-29T11:00:00-06:00
90:1 Lord, you have been our dwelling place
in all generations.
2 Before the mountains were brought forth,
or ever you had formed the earth and the world,
from everlasting to everlasting you are God.
3 You return man to dust
and say, “Return, O children of man!”
4 For a thousand years in your sight
are but as yesterday when it is past,
or as a watch in the night.
5 You sweep them away as with a flood; they are like a dream,
like grass that is renewed in the morning:
6 in the morning it flourishes and is renewed;
in the evening it fades and withers.
7 For we are brought to an end by your anger;
by your wrath we are dismayed.
8 You have set our iniquities before you,
our secret sins in the light of your presence.
9 For all our days pass away under your wrath;
we bring our years to an end like a sigh.
10 The years of our life are seventy,
or even by reason of strength eighty;
yet their span is but toil and trouble;
they are soon gone, and we fly away.
11 Who considers the power of your anger,
and your wrath according to the fear of you?
12 So teach us to number our days
that we may get a heart of wisdom.
13 Return, O LORD! How long?
Have pity on your servants!
14 Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love,
that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.
15 Make us glad for as many days as you have afflicted us,
and for as many years as we have seen evil.
16 Let your work be shown to your servants,
and your glorious power to their children.
17 Let the favor of the Lord our God be upon us,
and establish the work of our hands upon us;
yes, establish the work of our hands!
The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright (c)2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. http://www.esv.org
Imagine the scene.
The disciples’ truest friend and greatest teacher had miraculously lifted up from the ground next to them. Jesus rose higher and higher, His body appearing smaller and smaller until it faded completely into cloud and sky. It was an incredible sight to behold, and their minds must have been reeling as they struggled to comprehend what they had just seen. As they continued staring into the sky, their hearts began to ache. Jesus was gone, and it felt like He left too soon. God’s world was still broken, God’s enemies were still in power, and so many of God’s people still doubted Jesus’ resurrection. Why would He leave us?
Into the disciples’ motionless confusion, two angels appeared. They rebuked the disciples saying, “Why do you stand looking into heaven (Acts 1:11)?” What was wrong with standing and looking? It was the opposite of what Jesus had charged them to do: “You will be My witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8).” By calling them, “My witnesses,” Jesus clarified their identity and mission; they were to be His witnesses, witnessing about Him. Jesus had called them to go and proclaim, not to stand and look. Now roused and reminded of their commission, the disciples returned to Jerusalem with worship and joy (Luke 24:23-24). New life and energy surged through them, and a new and massive responsibility lay before them.
With all of this momentum pushing them into the world, their first act seems incredibly strange. They did not rush to the temple to preach and heal, nor did they burst into conversations about recruitment, strategy, and theology. Those things would come soon enough. Instead, their first act was to retreat together and pray. To many of us, prayer feels like a delay of progress at best, and an enemy of progress at worst. In a collection of essays entitled, How Prayer Impacts Lives, Heather Holdsworth expresses this reluctance by saying, “[Prayer] seems a call to inaction. ‘Be still.’ ‘Wait.’ ‘Abide.’ The instructed pause on our lives of purpose; can we seriously afford the time?” Despite such nagging doubts, the disciples committed themselves to pray together before anything else. And it was to prayer that they returned time after time throughout the book of Acts, whether in preparing themselves for ministry (Acts 1:12-14), making strategic ministry decisions (Acts 1:24), celebrating God’s mighty deeds (Acts 4:31), planting new churches (Acts 14:23), seeking hope in times of persecution (Acts 16:25), or seeking rescue in times of danger (Acts 27:29).
Like the disciples, God has called us into the great identity and mission of being His witnesses. And like the disciples, God brings all kinds of decisions, triumphs, sorrows, and adventures into our lives. In the midst of these things, we are called to think and to act. But before anything else, like the disciples and Jesus before them, we are called to retreat together and pray. May God give us the grace, wisdom, and faith to see that it is through prayer that the great work of the Great Commission moves on, and the great life of discipleship grows up.