Prayer for a Solitary Place

Lord Jesus, while it was still dark you rose and went to a solitary place to pray. You had every reason to stay: the town was at the door and the work was good. Yet you went to your Father first. Teach us to do the same.

We confess that we often let the demands of the day set our course, and we call it faithfulness when it is only momentum. Give us the discipline to withdraw, and the humility to admit that we cannot tell the crowd's voice from the Father's unless we have been listening in the quiet.

Father, meet us in the solitary place. Speak to us there. Show us which of the many things asked of us are truly ours, and give us courage to leave what is comfortable for what you have sent us to do. Keep our lives from being hollow and busy. Fill them instead with your presence, so that whatever we do in public flows from what you have given us in secret. In Jesus' name we pray, Amen.