Don’t think Jesus is some kind of esoteric teacher who spent His life solely in contemplation. If Jesus ministered in the flesh today, He’d get more emails than any of us. He would have people and the media clamoring for His attention. Jesus did not float above the fray, untouched by the pressures of normal human existence. Jesus was tempted in every way that we are, yet without sin (Heb. 4:15). And that includes the temptation to be sinfully busy. 

For years, this passage from Mark has boggled my mind:

And rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed. And Simon and those who were with him searched for him, and they found him and said to him, “Everyone is looking for you.” And he said to them, “Let us go on to the next towns, that I may preach there also, for that is why I came out.” And he went throughout all Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and casting out demons. (Mark 1:35–39)

Jesus amazes me. His incarnation, His resurrection, His ascension, His exaltation—these defy description. But I’m also amazed by the more mundane things about Jesus’ life, like the fact that He never uttered a thoughtless word, never spent a wasted day, never strayed from His Father’s plan. I have often marveled to think that Jesus was so terrifically busy, but only with the things He was supposed to be doing.

Many of us are so familiar with the Gospels that we fail to see the obvious: Jesus was a very busy man. One of Mark’s favorite words is “immediately.” For three years, Jesus and His band of disciples were a whirlwind of activity. One event immediately follows another. In Mark 1, Jesus begins His public ministry by teaching in the synagogue, rebuking an unclean spirit, caring for Simon’s mother-in-law, and then staying up late into the night healing many who were sick with various diseases and casting out many demons (1:14–34).

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