Finding A Quiet Place

Mark 6: 30 – 34 / Finding A Quiet Place

Intro: I would be willing to bet that the majority of you sitting here today are really sick! Let me describe some of the symptoms of your illness: 1) You complain you don’t have enough hours in the day, 2) at a stoplight, you get into the lane with the fewest cars and if they don’t move the second the light turns green, you “lay on the horn.” 3) You always go faster than the posted speed limit because that is only a suggestion. 4) You choose the shortest line in the grocery store only to get behind someone who needs a “price check.” 5) You have become a master of Multi-tasking: while driving you put on makeup, eat, drink, shave or talk on the phone. I’ve even seen people read the newspaper. These symptoms all manifest themselves because you feel you don’t have enough time. If you see yourself in any of these situations, then, you are sick! You have hurry sickness!

I. Is there a cure for “hurry sickness?” Actually, what we feel we need is a “day stretcher.” We thank God and the wisdom of our society that invented “daylight savings time.”

A. Vs. 31a is the cure for Hurry Sickness! “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.”

B. Let’s be honest. How many of you are sitting here thinking about what you’re going to do after church? --- It takes time to be holy. All you have to do is listen! I have to talk! O course, many people believe that a Pastor only works one cay a week anyway.

C. A Greek legend about Aesop. He was in Athens playing with a groups of children. --- Person criticized him. Picked up a bow, loosened the string and put it on the ground. --- “Tell me what the unstrung bow implies.” - “It you keep a bow always strung and bent, it will eventually break; but if you let it go clack, it will be more fit for use when you want it.”

II. In the 1960’s when I was in high school and college, I remember reading articles about how in the next century the main problem would be for people to decide how to spend the leisure time the computer was going to provide.

A. Vs. 31b sounds like a comment on OUR time and OUR place. “For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat.”

B. I’d like to know what happened to all that leisure time. I have two computers, a cell phone, a personal data assistant and I still can’t seem to get things done. It just seems that “the faster I go, the behinder I get!”

C. I have been to Europe on numerous occasions and one thing I have noticed when I land in the airport, it is quiet. There is no music and very little noise. The same is true in restaurants and cafes. In fact, you see people sitting at sidewalk cafes passing the time of day. No one ever seems to be in a hurry accept the cab drivers. Why is that so?

III. Jesus calls us to come away to a deserted place. Vs. 34 – “As he went ashore, he saw a great drowd; and he had compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd.”

A. We need to experience the “compassion” of Christ Jesus even though we may not be sheep without a shepherd, we are certainly like “chickens with our heads cut off.”

B. That image is very vivid for me. I remember my grandmother slaughtering chickens for dinner. She would cut off their heads and they would furiously run around the yard flapping their wings until they dropped dead. I used to feel sorry for those chickens and now I really feel like one!

C. But Jesus has compassion on us! --- In verses 53 – 56 we see that compassion in action. COMPASSION = SYMPATHETIC PITY AND CONCERN FOR THE SUFFERINGS OR MISFORTUNES OF OTHERS.

Conclu: Christ Jesus knew the frustration of having many demands placed upon him. Yet, he managed to strike a balance between activity and solitude. The deserted place can be found in the middle of a crowded room. It is a state of mind where we can go to be with God and experience the compassion and love of Christ. --- If Christ had compassion on the crowds, what are we to do? “It is because the trees are still that the birds come to them.” Each of us has the potential to bring to the world a unique perspective and wisdom gained from spending time in our quiet place.