Praying in the Dark by Ron Wood

“In the early morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the
house, and went away to a secluded place, and was praying there.” Mark
1:35 NAS

In my youth, my first power encounters with God occurred in the dark. I
would shut my bedroom door, turn off the overhead light, bury my face
and muffle my voice in a pillow and cry out to God. To this day, I
still enjoy praying in the dark; no distractions, no interruptions,
alone with the Lord in a solitary place that is suddenly filled with
Presence.

Yesterday’s Anointing
In Mark chapter one, Jesus had just left a powerful meeting. To all
intents and purposes, from every measure of religious expectation, he
was now a success. The inaugural push of his ministry was off to a good
start. Crowds were gathering. Publicity was growing. Spectacular
results were appearing. He had begun healing the sick. Demons were
being dramatically exposed and expelled. Yet to Jesus, that was already
yesterday’s anointing.

The realization that you’re walking in yesterday’s anointing can come
after a decade, after a year, or even after a very short season. For
Jesus, it came early. The power he had walked in yesterday was not
sufficient for today. The fact that he was moving in divine momentum
was irrelevant-- he wanted a fresh touch. He had the ear of the crowds,
but he wanted the ear of his Father. He knew acknowledgment by priests
and had recognition by evil spirits, but the honor of his Father’s
fellowship was superior to people’s accolades.

Yesterday’s anointing is the only anointing we can know because we
can’t write books about tomorrow’s anointing since we haven’t
experienced it yet. It is difficult to describe something we’ve never
seen before. It is difficult to grasp something we may read about even
in the Bible but have not yet seen modeled in wholesome ways or proven
in practice where it can be examined and shown to be effective. The
familiar seems better.

Earlier this year, the Lord spoke to me at a small home gathering where
I met with people hungry for prophetic impartation. He said to me, “You
don’t know what you don’t know, and you’ll never know it unless I
reveal it to you.” How that word humbled me!

Recently, the Lord spoke again to my spirit and said to me, “You don’t
NO what you should NO.” He meant I didn’t fully understand my
transition season, that I had to stop doing some things in order to
make the internal changes of thinking to embrace some new things. We
humans are creatures of habit. We resist change. We carry our past
gifting, our past methods, our past understanding into the present,
beyond the point where God is still blessing them, and thus we limit
our future to more of the past.

Praying in the Dark
Jesus came away from a ministry of public power but knew the secret to
power was secret prayer. Therefore, he went away to a secluded place.
Praying in the dark is more than early morning prayers. It even means
more than seeking God’s face before sunrise.

For some, it may be late at night when you can escape the presence of
people and find the presence of God. It is more than a place; it is a
posture. Praying in the dark means sitting in the Lord’s anteroom
awaiting an appointment in the throne room, waiting with the light from
yesterday now waning, waiting with the remembrance of glory from
previous visitations now lifting, waiting with the words of revelation
from prior holy moments now fading, waiting and wondering what is
coming next and what your role might be.

Praying in the dark means serving God in the little things while you
hope for the big things. Praying in the dark means dealing with the
frustrations of weakness and ignorance and weariness while you seek the
power to press on, the wisdom to know God’s ways, the strength to
prevail over enemies and obstacles and self.

Praying in the dark is more than mere praying words: it is
heart-hungering, longing for communion with the One who is your source
of light, your reason for being, the author and finisher of your faith,
the creator, sustainer, and refresher of your spirit, intellect, flesh
and family. Praying in the dark is seeking a God encounter, not just
seeking what He can do for you. Praying in the dark is touching His
face, not just His hand. Praying in the dark is pushing past what gains
approval from men and finding the still, small voice that says, “You’re
mine and I’m pleased with you and you have nothing to prove.”

Praying in the dark means praying by grace through faith, not sight. If
you can figure it out, then you don’t need faith. Faith only grows when
you don’t feel like fighting, but you stand true anyway. Praying in the
dark is when you are surrounded by an absence of confirming signs yet
you keep on praying because you know God is faithful.

Praying in the dark means praying in the mystery of the Spirit not just
with the light of your understanding. Praying in the dark is when your
mind has no illumination and nothing makes sense and you are perplexed
and stymied. Praying in the dark means continuing to trust that He
knows the way even when you don’t have a clue. You’re not trusting in
your ability to be right, but the Lord’s ability to make you righteous.
You’re not depending on your ability to hear, but on God’s ability to
speak.

Praying in the dark requires humility. It means living as a limited
human being, not knowing everything, not having all the answers,
acknowledging your limitations, respecting your boundaries, knowing
your defined measure or circumscribed sphere, not having to do it all
yourself, but trusting God to give you the resources, the team, the new
level of grace and insight you need so as to succeed in doing His will
tomorrow.

Training Teammates
Jesus wasn’t content to be a mere success. After he prayed in the dark,
he moved from personal success to identifying and equipping his
successors. He did it as an example, then he let them watch him do it,
then they did it while he watched. There is no success without
successors. God’s father-heart insists on bringing many sons to glory.
God gives it away without keeping the good stuff back. The purpose of
life is not to merely survive, but to reproduce. We know we’ve
succeeded when the next generation can do it.

We short-circuit God’s program when we become short-sighted and don’t
discover our part in equipping the next generation. This is a relay
race, not a one-man sprint. David’s crowning moment wasn’t wearing his
crown as king, but when he laid up wealth for his son Solomon to build
the temple. The kingdom of God is multi-generational-- Abraham, Isaac,
and Jacob. The Bible says, a good man leaves an inheritance to his
children’s children. By that definition, many wonderful preachers are
not yet good men. The hand-off to the next generation is often fumbled.
We make no room to bring anyone alongside, as though we might diminish
our special place if we shared it. Truly great leaders know
instinctively when to make room for the next generation.

Jesus didn’t keep all the glory to himself. He reveled in the power of
his kingdom and wanted to share it with others (Luke 10:17-21). He
taught and fought so his kingdom would increase (Matthew 6:10). When
Jesus prayed in the dark, he became a carrier of the light. When he
walked into a church, the light of God exposed demons like cockroaches
on the kitchen floor (Mark 1:21-28). You can’t read Mark’s gospel
without seeing Jesus at war.

Praying for Power
Jesus regularly went to church, not just to worship, but also to wage
war. He didn’t make peace with the spirits contaminating the religious
leaders and controlling the religious institutions of his day. He
expelled the demons that were plaguing the people in the church.
Everyone whom Jesus sent out to preach was instructed to heal people of
spiritual oppression. This is still true. His anointing hasn’t changed
(Acts 10:38), but modern people have become materialistic and oblivious
of the spiritual things. Anytime the focus shifts in church from Christ
and his cross to man and his rights, the formerly holy temple can
become a defiled habitation of foul spirits. Jesus knows how to clean
us up!

Mark’s gospel is typical of Christ’s task as a “termite inspector” and
“evil spirit exterminator” for the temple (Mark 1:23, 39; 3:11, 15, 27;
6:7-13, etc.). Jesus and his disciples dealt with demons. When the
kingdom of God comes in power, we will, too. If we persist in praying
in the dark, the time will come when the darkness will have to flee.

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Praying in the Dark © 2004 by Ron Wood
Touched by Grace Inc., P.O. Box 12749, Wilmington, NC 28405
www.touchedbygrace.org