Friday 14th January - Luke 10

Today’s chapter is Luke 10, you can read it here

Tom writes:

We are pretty much halfway through Luke now and he has laid out ample evidence of Jesus’ personality (birth, baptism, miracles, transfiguration) and his plan (Luke 4 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me..., sending out of the 12). We must mark as read that Jesus is the Humble Empowered One who empowers people to humbly spread all the fruit of his salvation all across the globe. Assuming that case has been made, Luke begins to expose the key distinctives Christians need to cling to if we are indeed to fulfill Jesus’ plan in a way that reflects Jesus’ personality. We have already noted Jesus’ penchant for people who persevere; for people who don’t easily take their hand off the plough of showing mercy to others. Part-time practitioners need not apply. In this chapter (and leaking into the next) we find Jesus going on about the one thing that is needed; the distinctive behind all the distinctives. And, thank the Lord, it is not the house-work (in saying this, Jesus declared all housework unclean… or at least that’s my take on it). With the anecdote about Martha and Mary Jesus elevates the call to intimacy with God above pretty much everything else. Luke shows Jesus repeatedly popping off to pray and then, in Acts, Luke shows the church repeatedly stopping everything to pray.

Every time I read these passages I make a promise to myself to get better at choosing what is better and then a few days later I find myself worried and upset about many things. I trust, though, that if I persevere in this pursuit of a life of intimacy with God, if I do not take my hand off the plough of prayer then God will not take it away from me. What more is there to say about this? Jesus prayed with intimacy and dependence and Jesus wants his followers to pray with intimacy and dependence. Scratch that; it’s too general and easy to wriggle away from. Jesus wants me to pray with intimacy and dependence; he wants me to learn to choose the better thing and to live free from distraction. He wants that to be the distinctive of my life, even as I try to follow his plan. Oh God, please teach me to pray

Question for reflection

What simple, achievable step could you take to upgrade your prayer life and grow in intimacy with God?