Learn from the Lord to Live a Hidden Life and Pray Privately to the Father in Secret

We believers in Christ need to learn from the pattern of the Lord Jesus living a hidden life in His going up to the mountain privately to pray; He sent the crowds away and prayed privately to the Father to be one with the Father in all things He did and said.

Lord Jesus, may we be those who spend time with our Father in secret, even on a high mountain in our spirit! Amen, Lord, save us from merely praying with others or in public; may we have much prayer privately with our Father who sees in secret. May we leave the others and not remain in any success or failure but contact You in spirit, privately and personally! Amen!

On the one hand, we believers in Christ need to express Christ, and our daily living needs to express Him and manifest Him.

On the other hand, everything we do is not in and of ourselves, nor is it ourselves perfecting ourselves to look more like Jesus and speak more like Him. Rather, we need to spend much time with the Lord in secret, privately, so that we may be infused with Him and allow Him to work Himself into us.

We need to practice living a hidden life. However, this is not possible in our natural life.

Our natural life wants to let everyone know what we are doing, especially if we are doing something good or we do something for God. We can live a hidden life in secret with the Lord only by the divine life.

God is a God who hides Himself; He is not eager to show what He is, who He is, and what He can do, but He does things and hides Himself, not making Himself known in an ostentatious way.

This is why we need to seek Him in secret, have secret experiences with Him, receive some secret answers from Him to our problems, and open to Him about all things in our private time with Him.

Our natural life likes to make a show, or at least let others know what it does in a good way. But we, the kingdom people, are learning to live by the hidden life of our Father.

Our Father God has begotten us to be children of God. We are now not only men in the image of God but even more, we are children of God, those who are born of God with His life and nature.

We are learning to live by this another life, the divine life of our Father in our spirit.

This life is hidden and secret, and the more we live by this life, the more we will love our Lord and we will be with Him in secret.

Learn from the Pattern of the Lord Living a Hidden Life in His Going up to the Mountain Privately to Pray

In Matthew 14:23 we see the pattern of the Lord Jesus living a hidden life in His going up to the mountain privately to pray (Luke 6:12).

He had just performed the miracle of feeding five thousand men, besides the women and the children, and instead of remaining there and enjoying this wonderful miracle, He urged the crowds to go away, and He went to spend time with the Father privately on the mountain.

If we had such a success, or even a smaller success, we would remain in the glory and enjoyment of this success, and we would probably have some testimonies from those who were touched by God in this time.

But the Lord Jesus, as our pattern, did not do this. He left the success, He left the crowds, and He left even the disciples so that He would go up to the mountain privately to pray.

First, before doing the miracle, He blessed the bread and the fish by looking up to heaven, acknowledging the Father as the source of all blessings.

He realised that it was the Father who sent Him that was the source of blessing. The Father is the source, and the Son takes the Father as the source.

This was not something performative; this was the reality of His living and being, for He trusted the Father and was one with the Father to do this.

Therefore, after the miracle, the Lord went to the mountain privately to pray, spending time with the Father. He even spent the whole night in prayer to God.

The Lord did not remain in the issue of the miracle with the crowds (the miracle of feeding five thousand men, apart from women and children), but He went away from them to be with the Father privately on the mountain in prayer (Matt. 14:14-23).

Even more, we can see why He went to the mountain to pray; on the one hand, He went to spend time with the Father in prayer, and on the other hand, He wanted to teach His disciples to work for the food that abides forever, not the physical food.

We see this in John 6:27, where the Lord said that we should not work for the food which perishes, but for the food which abides unto eternal life, which the Son of Man gives us.

The Lord meets our needs; He sees that we are hungry, and He may even make a miracle to feed us all.

But what He wants is not that we would come to Him only for our daily bread, but that we would come to Him to eat Him as the food coming out of heaven (John 6:33, 35, 41, 48, 50-51, 57, 63).

We need to know the Lord not only as the One who cares for our needs and feeds us but go further than this, see beyond any miracle that He performs for us, and come to Him as the One who can give us food that is of eternal life.

For the Lord to explain this and bring His disciples into this reality, He spent time with the Father privately the whole night in prayer.

The Lord Jesus, as our pattern, was the first God-man, and He spent much time privately before the Father and with the Father in prayer.

He needed to pray privately to His Father who was in the heavens so that He might be one with His Father and have the Father with Him in whatever He did on the earth for the establishment of the kingdom of the heavens.

He did this not in the deserted place but on the mountain, leaving all the people, even His disciples, so that He might be alone to contact the Father.

He is our pattern. We are learning from Him. If Christ, as the One who is God incarnated in the flesh, needed to spend time privately with the Father to pray so that He may be one with the Father in all things, so much more we need to spend time in prayer privately before our God and Father!

Lord Jesus, we want to learn from Your pattern living a hidden life in Your going up to the mountain privately to pray. We open to You today. We come to You as we are. Oh Lord, we look to You for all things. You are the One who provides us with everything we need. Thank You for Your care for us. We want to come up to You on the mountain to pray. We come to You in our private room, shut our door, and spend time with You in prayer, for we want to know You intimately and be infused with You! Save us from remaining in any success or failure in the past; we just leave everything and everyone else aside and we come to You privately to pray! Amen, Lord, may we pray privately to our Father who is in the heavens so that we may be one with You in all things! May we be one with You in our speaking and in our doing. May our actions, speaking, and work be for the bringing in of the kingdom of the heavens today. Oh Lord, we love spending time with You in secret, even privately, to pray!

Leave all else aside and go on a High Mountain to Pray Privately to our Father in Secret

These three phrases are so wonderful: to be with the Father, on the mountain, and, in prayer.

This is what the Lord Jesus did often. Many times His disciples were even looking for Him, for they didn’t know where He went; He went to spend time with the Father to pray privately.

You would think that, since Jesus is God, He was one with the Father all the time, and you would be right in thinking this. However, oneness with God needs to be maintained, and the way is prayer.

We need to learn from the Lord Jesus to leave all else aside and just go on a high mountain to pray privately to our Father in secret.

To pray with others is good and very enjoyable, but we need to often pray by ourselves.

When we pray with others, we cannot enjoy the Lord as deeply as when we pray to the Lord privately.

Even as the Lord Jesus left the crowds and even His disciples, so that He would spend time with the Father, so we need to leave the crowds, our family, our friends, and the saints in the church to go on a higher level on a “high mountain.”

May we go higher, far away from any earthly things that are on a lower level, to spend time with the Father to pray privately and have intimate fellowship with Him.

This is to enter into our private room, shut the door, and pray to the Father who sees in secret (Matt. 6:6).

Many times, we rely on the corporate aspect of prayer, and it is good to pray with others; prayer builds us up together and, through our corporate prayer in one accord, God can carry out His economy.

It is good to come together to meet, to pray, and to read the word. But how about our personal prayer life? Did we neglect our personal prayer life with the Lord?

Sometimes we are so busy with our personal life, family life, and the activities in the church life, that we don’t have time to pray privately to our Father in secret!

No private time of prayer can replace the corporate time; the blessing, help, and life that we receive in the meetings cannot be found elsewhere.

Nevertheless, we need to remember that in the things pertaining to life, there are always two aspects in the Christian life: the individual side and the corporate side, and neither can replace the other – we need to have both.

And these two sides need to be balanced. We may have a wonderful corporate life with the saints, but we may neglect our personal prayer life, even our time with our dear Father privately to pray (Mark 1:35; Luke 6:12; Matt. 14:23; Luke 5:16). Oh Lord!

If we do not have personal time with the Lord in prayer, our growth in life will be frustrated.

It is in this time of private prayer with the Lord that He can shine on us, He can grant us some secret answers to our questions, and he can expose the dirt and filthiness in our past, our conscience, our mind, emotion, and will (1 John 1:7, 9).

As we dig all the things in our being away under the Lord’s light, we will be filled with the Lord personally, and this will also contribute to us bringing Christ to the meeting and praying with the saints.

Personal prayer is more effective in the matter of digging away the dirt than corporate prayer.

If we want to have an intimate and direct fellowship with the Lord, we need to have private personal prayer so that the Lord can have deeper dealings with us.

Even the Lord Jesus told us that, when we pray, we should enter into our private room and shut our door and pray to our Father who sees in secret.

Then, we will have the sensation of how intimate He is to us and how close we are to Him.

May we all learn to leave the crowds, our family, our friends, and the saints in the church to go on a higher level on a “high mountain.”

May we be separated from the crowd and the earthly things so that we may be with the Father privately and secretly to have intimate fellowship with Him.

May we ask the Lord to take us higher up the mountain and give us fellowship with Him, so that in His light we may see the fountain of life and partake of Him as the bread of life.

May we minister not just to the house of God but even more, minister to God Himself.

It is easy to be involved in so many things related to the Lord’s work, the church life, and the Lord’s move, and it is easy to neglect our personal prayer life, thus ministering to God’s house yet not ministering to God.

May we come to the Lord again and again, even spend time with Him in our private room often.

Lord Jesus, we treasure our personal, intimate, private, and spiritual time with You in prayer. Oh Lord, we want to be with our Father privately on the mountain to pray! Save us from merely praying with others and contacting You in the meetings yet not having a personal prayer life before You! May we enjoy You more deeply by praying privately to the Father in secret. Shine on us, Lord, in our time with You. Expose the dirt and filthiness in our being. We say Amen to Your shining and we want to cooperate with Your light. May we often enter into our private room and shut our door and pray to the Father who sees in secret. Amen, Lord, we love having the sensation of how intimate You are to us and how close we are to You! May we learn to leave the crowds, our family, our friends, and the saints in the church to go to a higher level on a high mountain! Lead us, Saviour, up the mountain! Grant us fellowship with You! In Your light we see the fountain of life, and Your blood cleanses us! We love You, Lord!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by the brothers on this topic, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1994–1997, vol. 3, “The God-man Living,” ch. 14, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crucial Aspects of Matthew 5 through 7 (2025 September ITERO), week 5, The Kingdom People having the Experience of Praying in Private to Contact their Heavenly Father in Secret and have some Secret Enjoyment of Him – day 3.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – Lord, teach us how to pray, / Not as the nations do in vain, / But turn us from our way, / And cause us, Lord, to call on You each day— / Lord Jesus, grow in us. / Lord, You’re the seed of life; / You’ve sown Yourself into our heart, / And now You have a start; / So day by day more life to us impart— / Lord Jesus, grow in us. (Hymns #1132 stanzas 1-2)
  – Savior, lead me up the mountain, / Where the Lord alone is seen, / Where we hear the voice from heaven, / Where the air is pure and clean. / Lead me higher up the mountain, / Give me fellowship with Thee; / In Thy light I see the fountain, / And the blood it cleanses me. (Hymns #378 stanza 1 and chorus)
  – Pray to fellowship with Jesus, / List’ning earnestly to Him; / Be impressed with His intentions, / Yielding to Him from within. / Pray to fellowship with Jesus, / Bathing in His countenance; / Saturated with His beauty, / Radiate His excellence. (Hymns #784 stanzas 5-6)