Alone Time

We watched the recent Australian movie, Tracks, a true story about Robyn Davidson, a young lady who journeyed – alone – with camels from central Australia to the western coast in 1977. The movie is wonderful; the tale itself is extraordinary.

When interviewed recently, Davidson remarked that the same journey would be impossible now, with the advent of satellite phones and the ubiquitous reach of technology. In this world, she commented, you are never truly alone.

This is the barometer for the distress in our community: the client, customer and employer can still contact you outside work; the bully can still hunt their victim in their home; we leave our phones on, in case the text, or tweet, or email might pop up, so that we are never truly relaxed, never truly alone.

This is not the effort of a conspiracy theorist (although I do have some ideas…), but a reflection of my own life as much as those around me.

I am aware that in this week’s Gospel story, Mark tells us that Jesus finally got away, before dawn, to find some alone time. (The word Mark uses is the origin of our word “hermit”.) Jesus wants to pray.

Sometimes prayer is kneeling and crying, or singing, out. There can be a list of grievances, or concerns, or hopes and we find our way through. My image of this story is Jesus, in silence, attending to the one he loved more than life. In the silence, he can listen.

Then the mobile rings.

The disciples, Mark tells us, are “hunting” for him. I feel a moment of despair for Jesus; not only do they find him, but tell him “Everyone is looking for you”. And they are.

I need to find myself alone, more often, to pray. There will always be a reason not to find the time; the list of things to be accomplished is rarely empty, and its contents are usually important.

I can always think of someone who needs my time, so that I don’t create the space for prayer. I can always make the prayer one where I talk enough so that listening doesn’t seem necessary.

When I do create the time, I usually have to talk aloud for a while, just to clear a space in my head, and then I make the effort to listen.

It’s not enough to turn my phone (& notebook & radio) off, I need to stop flicking my eyes and then my brain towards them. So, if I hope to pray for five minutes, I need at least five more quietening myself to listen. Praying for longer requires some intervals to refresh and restore the silence.

Perhaps the fact that Jesus walked away in the darkness helped to clear the space?

Does any of this sound like your life? Physical aloneness and auditory silence is no guarantee; we have to take ourselves away in order to listen to God and to pray. If we are to fulfil what God has called us to enact, we need to pray.

We pray to refresh ourselves and our relationship with God. We pray to discern our call and to remind ourselves that we are called. We pray for healing, for justice, for hope, for resurrection – for others and then, perhaps, for ourselves.

We pray because Jesus did and commands us to act likewise. We pray because we need to.

May you find the silence – and the words – to pray.