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The miracle of Jesus’ healing Simon’s mother-in-law spread rapidly throughout the entire city of Capernaum. All the hearers of such great news brought the sick and the demon-possessed to Simon’s home. In the evening, a long queue stood at the door of Simon’s house, waiting to see such great doctor. Jesus has not let down anyone who came to him for healing. He took the trouble to cure them of all kinds of diseases and “cast out many devils” free of charge. To be sure, he loved to help the needy and solved all their health problems with all the efforts he could ever afford. This is the mindset of the "son of man” coming down to minister mankind.
After one whole evening of curing diseases and driving out demons, Jesus should have spent more time resting himself for next day’s tasks. Yet he never wastes time. Before dawn, he rose up much earlier than everyone to find a quiet place to pray (1:35). Why? Just because he restores spiritual energy from having fellowship with the Father.
The busier our daily lives, the more precious for us to find a moment of quiet time with our Father. Spiritual strength many a time comes from our personal time with our Father, be it prayer, meditation or devotion. The busier we are, the more excuses we have not to do so. But if we deem it more important to have quiet time with God in our busy lives, we will insist on squeezing out time to do so like Jesus our Lord. Even the Son of God needs quiet time with the Father; how much more does our fragile life need it?!
Everyone is seeking Jesus. Of course, he has healed so many people in the city. If he keeps on staying in Capernaum, he will not have time to do anything else but healing. However, he insists on going to other towns and avoids the crowd of people there. Not that he is tired of serving the people there, only that he reminds himself that he has more important task to do—preaching. And this is his primary task in his life, as his name “Jesus” reminds himself (“he shall save his people from their sins” Matt 1:21). This is proven by his response to Simon: “for therefore came I forth.” (NRSV, ‘for that is what I came out to do’) (v38)
What’s more, the Son of God is given only very limited time to work on earth—3.5 years! How come the Father doesn’t give him more time on earth to do it? God knows. All we know is that his time is far less than the apostles like Peter, John and Paul. They were given at least 20 to 30 years to spread the gospel after Jesus died. Since he is aware of the time limit given him to work in the area of Israel, he puts preaching his top priority. All the other kinds of service are supplementary only compared with the task of saving the souls.
Ephe 5:16-17 says, “Redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is.” When we know which tasks are what the Lord desires for us to do, we will know what tasks to give higher priority. If we are occupying most of our time with other tasks, we are simply wasting our time on earth. We ought to sense the urgency of the time and put God’s will in first priority. This is something that a wise man will consider seriously, but the unwise simply won’t care about wasting his lifetime on earthly tasks that carry no eternal value.