We all need to learn from the Lord Jesus to spend time in secret with God privately to pray.
This week in our deeper study of the matter of the development of the kingdom of God in our Christian life and church life we come to the topic of, Living the Kingdom Life by Living a Hidden Life.
In particular today we want to see the pattern of the Lord Jesus who, as a Man in the flesh (who was the first God-man), sought to have much private time with the Father in prayer, and He went many times up on the mountain privately to pray.
When we think of the kingdom of God we may not associate the living of the kingdom with our private time with the Lord, but for us to live the kingdom life today we need to live a hidden life with the Lord.
The kingdom of God is not out in the open for others to see it; the kingdom is not here in its manifestation outwardly but in its reality inwardly. This means that today we enjoy the Lord, experience Him, live Him, and have many experiences with Him mainly inwardly, not for outward manifestation or display.
And for us to live a hidden life with the Lord we need to look at the pattern of the Lord Jesus who, even though He was a God-man and had God living and being manifested in Him, still sought to pray and spend much time in prayer privately with the Father.
As Isa. 37:31 says, we as kingdom people need to send roots downward, spending much time with the Lord intimately and privately, and we will then bear fruit upward. Our bearing fruit and manifesting the works comes out of our spending time inwardly, deeply, privately, and personally with the Lord.
This week we want to see first how the Lord Jesus lived such a hidden life in prayer with the Father, then how we as kingdom people need to live a hidden life in our righteous deeds before men.
Thirdly, we need to realise that our God is a God who hides Himself, and finally, how the kingdom life is a life that can take root downward and bear fruit upward.
May we open to the Lord and be released from any religious and natural thought concerning the kingdom of God so that we may learn from the pattern of the Lord Jesus to live a hidden life with the Lord by spending much time privately and personally with the Lord.
Learning from the Pattern of the Lord Living a Hidden Life in going up the Mountain Privately to Pray
In Matt. 14:23, after the Lord Jesus fed the five thousand men (not counting the women and the children), He did not remain in the issue or glory of this miracle but rather, He sent the disciples across the sea, He sent the crowds away, and He went to pray.
We need to learn from the pattern of the Lord Jesus living a hidden life in His going up to the mountain privately to pray (Matt. 14:23; Luke 6:12).
In order for us to live in the kingdom of God the life of a God-man we need to have private times with the Lord, times which no one knows about or sees, and we need to pray to our heavenly Father who is in secret; we need to have a secret life with the Father.
The Lord didn’t remain in the issue of the miracle He just did, but He went away from them privately to be with the Father on the mountain in prayer (Matt. 14:14-23).
If we were the ones who just performed a miracle, we might have basked in the glory of this miracle and ask others to testify what God has done for them…but the Lord compelled His disciples to step into the boat and go before Him on the other side, while He sent the crowds away.
Then, He went up to the mountain to pray, and when night fell, He was there alone.
The Lord Jesus compelled (a strong word, indicating that He wanted them to leave so that He might do something privately) the disciples to leave Him in order that He might have more time to pray privately to the Father.
The Lord Jesus, the God-man, needed to have private time with the Father. He didn’t come merely to teach or perform miracles – He came to establish a pattern of a Man of prayer, a Man who spent much time secretly and privately with the Father in prayer.
Do we have that desire to have more time with the Lord personally and privately? If the Lord had such a desire, and He is in us, we should tell the Lord,
![The Lord did not remain in the issue of the miracle with the crowds but went away from them to be with the Father privately on the mountain in prayer. If we go to a certain place and have a great success, would we leave right away, or would we remain in this big success to enjoy it? We need to see and follow the pattern of the Lord Jesus. He did not remain in the issue of the great miracle that He performed. Instead, He went up to the mountain privately to pray. The word privately is very meaningful. This means He did not let the people know that He was going to pray. Otherwise, they would have followed Him. He went away from them to be with the Father privately in prayer. I like these three phrases: to be with the Father, on the mountain, and in prayer. We should learn from the Lord’s pattern here by exercising to be with Him on the mountain in prayer. His looking up to heaven [Matt. 14:19] means that He had no trust in Himself. His going up to the mountain means that He wanted to be with the Father in prayer. W. Lee, The God-man Living, ch. 14](https://i0.wp.com/agodman.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/The-Lord-did-not-remain-in-the-issue-of-the-miracle-683x1024.jpg?resize=450%2C674&ssl=1 "The Lord did not remain in the issue of the miracle with the crowds but went away from them to be with the Father privately on the mountain in prayer. If we go to a certain place and have a great success, would we leave right away, or would we remain in this big success to enjoy it? We need to see and follow the pattern of the Lord Jesus. He did not remain in the issue of the great miracle that He performed. Instead, He went up to the mountain privately to pray. The word privately is very meaningful. This means He did not let the people know that He was going to pray. Otherwise, they would have followed Him. He went away from them to be with the Father privately in prayer. I like these three phrases: to be with the Father, on the mountain, and in prayer. We should learn from the Lord’s pattern here by exercising to be with Him on the mountain in prayer. His looking up to heaven [Matt. 14:19] means that He had no trust in Himself. His going up to the mountain means that He wanted to be with the Father in prayer. W. Lee, The God-man Living, ch. 14")
Lord, I want to have more time to pray privately to You not for my own spirituality but so that I take root downward and bear fruit upward for my growth in life, for our growth in life, for the growth and building up of the Body of Christ, so that the Father may be glorified! Amen, Lord, we need to take more time to pray privately to the Father!
The Lord Jesus needed to pray privately to His Father who was in the heavens so that He might be one with the Father and so that He may have the Father in whatever He did on earth for the establishing of the kingdom of the heavens.
The Lord wanted to be one with the Father in bringing in the kingdom of God, and He lived out the kingdom by living a hidden life with the Father.
He didn’t go away to a deserted place but on the mountain, leaving all the people – even His disciples – so that He might be alone to contact the Father.
We all should learn from the Lord to leave other people in the sense of setting time aside to spend with the Lord.
We need to “go up to the mountain”, be alone with God in prayer, and contact the Lord personally and privately.
Lord Jesus, we want to learn from Your pattern to take much time to spend with the Father in prayer. Save us from remaining in the success of our work for You or being disheartened by our failures; draw us, Lord, to spend more time with You. May we be those who go up the mountain and pray, spending much time in secret with Jesus alone. Lord, we need to spend more time with You. We need to have a private time with the Lord so that we may take root downward and bear fruit upward for the glorification of the Father in the church!
Learning to Spend much Time in Secret with God Privately to Pray and Fellowship with Him
We need to learn from the pattern of the Lord Jesus, the One who lived the God-man life and who also lives in us, to be with the Father, to go up on the mountain, and to spend time in prayer, thus living a hidden life for the kingdom of God.
It is good to pray with others, and it is so enjoyable and encouraging to have companions to pursue the Lord with; however, it is good that we often pray by ourselves, spending much time in secret with the Lord privately to pray and fellowship with Him.
When we pray with others, we cannot enjoy the Lord as deeply as when we pray to the Lord privately; it is good to pray corporately, but we need to pray privately to enjoy the Lord.
How much time do we specifically set aside every day to pray privately with the Lord and fellowship with Him?
As kingdom people we must have some experience of praying in our private room, through which we contact our heavenly Father in secret, experience some secret enjoyment of the Father, and receiving some secret answer from the Father.
The Lord Jesus encouraged us that, when we pray, we should enter into our private room, shut the door behind us, and pray to our heavenly Father who is in secret, and our Father who sees in secret will repay us.
Living the kingdom life today means that we live a hidden life with the Lord by spending much time in secret with the Lord privately to pray and fellowship with Him.
When we spend time with the Lord privately, putting away any distraction (including our phone), we will have the sensation of how intimate He is to us and close we are to Him.
We all have to learn to “leave the crowds” by leaving our family, our friends, and even the saints in the church to go to a higher level on a “high mountain” to spend much time in secret with the Lord privately to pray and fellowship.
This doesn’t mean that we should separate ourselves from everyone and “it’s just us and the Lord”; rather, we need to learn from the Lord Jesus to regularly take time privately to pray to the Father.
We need to go higher, far away from the earthly things, separated from the crowd, to be with our God and Father privately and secretly to have intimate fellowship with Him.
The Bible doesn’t tell us what the Lord prayed for when He went up to the mountain with the Father, but it does tell us that the Lord had a habit of doing this.
We may love to get on the phone and have morning watch with someone or pray with our companions, but what about spending private time with the Lord to pray?
As we learn to live in the reality of the kingdom of the heavens, we need to have a private place and a private time with the Lord, a place where we can go and be with the Lord privately, allowing Him to infuse us with Himself so that we may infuse others with Him.
John Wesley, for example, when he built his house, he made sure he built a private room so that he may go in that room and spend time with God personally and privately.
We may not have a private room in our house, but we can find a place where we can be private and intimate with Him, and we can open to Him, pray, call on His name, and allow Him to speak to us.
How much time should we spend with the Lord? Five minutes may not be enough; it is good to spend fifteen minutes, twenty minutes, thirty minutes, and even one hour with the Lord. We should endeavour to spend at least thirty minutes privately with the Lord, opening our being to Him to be filled in spirit, and praying over the word of God.
Of course, we should spend every minute of every day in His presence and learning to pray unceasingly, but we should specifically set time for prayer and fellowship with the Lord privately daily.
Lord Jesus, we want to learn to spend time in secret with You privately to pray and fellowship. Save us from merely relying on meeting with the saints or praying with others to contact You. May we have a private place where we take time to spend with You personally and intimately to be infused with You and filled with Your Spirit. Amen, Lord, we want to live in the reality of the kingdom today by leaving the crowds (our family, our friends, and the saints) and go on a higher level on a high mountain, spending time privately with the Father to have intimate fellowship with Him!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by bro. Ed Marks for this week, and portions from, The God-man Living, ch. 14 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Development of the Kingdom of God in the Church Life and the Christian Life (2019 spring ITERO), week 2, Living the Kingdom Life by Living a Hidden Life.
- Hymns on this topic:
# Take time to behold Him, / The world rushes on; / Spend much time in secret / With Jesus alone. / By looking to Jesus / Like Him thou shalt be; / Thy friends, in thy conduct, / His likeness shall see. (Hymns #643)
# Take time to inhale Him—His Word we may breathe; / By breathing it, God’s very life we receive— / He breathes Himself out so that we may breathe in / The life, the reality, fullness of Him. (Song on, Take time to absorb Him)
# Father with Thee in secret I would meet, / Closed to the world with all its dark deceit, / Only the fragrance of Thy lovely Son / Passing between us, He our rest becomes. (Song on, Father with Thee in secret I would be)
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