Rhythms: The Rhythms of Jesus

Luke 5:12-16

12 While Jesus was in one of the towns, a man came along who was covered with leprosy. When he saw Jesus, he fell with his face to the ground and begged him, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.” 13 Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!” And immediately the leprosy left him. 14 Then Jesus ordered him, “Don’t tell anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer the sacrifices that Moses commanded for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.” 15 Yet the news about him spread all the more, so that crowds of people came to hear him and to be healed of their sicknesses. 16 But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.

We are beginning a new series looking at Rhythms, finding different ways we can create Godly rhythms in our lives. Finding chances to create more room for God in our routines. It is rather apt that we are looking at rhythms at New Year. But it is also rather apt that we are looking at it, after what for many of us has just been a period of rest. 

This is because Godly rhythms don’t start with what we can do but instead start with God himself. Anything we take up or let go of for that matter should start with God and be decided through a lens of scripture, focusing on the example that Jesus set. With that in mind let's get straight into our passage.

Jesus is in one of the cities when a leper comes up to him and says “If you chose - you can make me clean”. Jesus does exactly that, saying Yes I do, be made clean, then asks the ex-leper not to tell anyone. Of course he does, how does anyone keep something like that so amazing a secret. He goes and tells people and then the crowds keep coming, but Jesus doesn’t keep going. Instead Jesus goes to deserted places to pray. 

Doesn’t that seem counterintuitive, Jesus is early on in his ministry he’s got a job to do and souls to save? Surely he doesn’t need a break, surely he has it in him to keep going a little bit longer? Well he’s God so logically the answer to that is yes, but Jesus whilst here on earth was also fully human, meaning he faced the same constrictions we do and is therefore as already mentioned the ideal example to follow.

So in essence Jesus had rhythms and so must we! Simple I could stop there but I’m not going to because the reality is that whilst it is that simple life and personalities get in the way and complicate things. Throughout this series we will be guided through rhythms, which encourage us to take something up or give something, or to like Jesus did withdraw. 

Because Jesus couldn’t keep giving out and curing the sick without spending time in prayer to refill and we cannot achieve whatever it is we try to achieve without spending time in prayer and refilling too. Now I admit this is one of those moments where I have one finger pointed at the community in front of me and three pointed back at myself. But it’s true we as society are sometimes terrible at balancing life. Some of us are better than others I’ll admit and there are moments where the scales will need to tip in favour of something else. But the question for all of us is where is your balance? How much energy is going into work, how much hobbies, how much goes to God, how much goes into your communities and how much of that energy are you retaining and getting back?

Jesus didn’t withdraw because he didn’t like people, he withdrew and prayed because he recognised that the power and the glory belongs to the father. NT Wright when he talks about Mark’s account of this story says…

“Jesus knew his need for a God-given sense of direction and inner strength, both to build on the apparent success of the previous day and to take things forward in the right way.”

God is the source of Jesus’s power and authority to heal people and God is the source of it all for us too. John 1:1-3 says this - “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God and the word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him and without him not one thing came into being.” Even those verses breathe rhythm. 

We are being given an opportunity over the next few instalments to withdraw, reflect and look at scripture, understand our rhythms, God’s rhythms and how they can become one. 

This is not a new year, new you rhetoric but a chance to get on board with the you, God has created you to be, to be God’s version of you at work, at home, with the people you meet. A chance to practise and grow in these different Godly rhythms, to spend time with God following different rhythms in a pattern of living as Jesus did.

Immy Rush