Based on Mark 1:9-11
MEMORY TEXT: “In my distress I called upon the Lord, and cried unto my God: He heard my voice out of His temple, and my cry came before Him, even into His ears” (Psalm 18:6).
When the news arrived in Nazareth that John the wilderness preacher was baptizing in the Jordan river not far away, Jesus hung up His carpenter’s apron for the last time and joined the crowd that was hurrying to see him.
It touches my heart to realize that Jesus, as a man, learned who He was and what He was going to do from His study of Scripture. He had read the prophecies and now recognized His mission. He was following a plan that was laid our before the world was made and was careful to follow it to the letter. He could not miss a step. He must fulfill every prophecy.
It is safe to say that Jesus lived by faith. He Himself said that He did whatever His Father told Him to do. His daily concern was that He not take matters into His own hands. We will never really understand how God and man were united in one person. But on a daily basis Jesus lived as a man whose mission it was to reveal His Father by doing His will.
His day-to-day life could not have been programmed; otherwise, He would not have had to spend entire nights in prayer. Prayer was Jesus’ contact with His Father. From prayer He received strength to fulfill the mission that was prophesied of the Messiah.
Often we wonder why we so often fail in the Christian life and consequently fall short of the glory of God. This is due to two things, both of which were indispensible to Jesus. One is that we often don’t know the will of our Heavenly Father because we do not go to His Word, through which He through the Holy Spirit talks to us. The other reason is that we don’t pray as we should, which is our way of talking with Him.
I am sure that sometimes Jesus may have felt that His Father was a long way off. Sometimes we feel the same. Jesus’ life teaches us that, though it may seem our God is far away, He really isn’t. He is as close as His Word and as our prayers.
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