My plan was to begin writing about being intentional in my faith
and relationship with God weeks ago; but each time that I sat down to begin I
didn’t know how! This area of
intentional living is probably the most important aspect of all; I believe that
it is the foundation for every other area in our lives in which we can begin to
live with intention and purpose. Because
I feel such a burden and passion about this I have had about a million thoughts
and ideas running through my head over the past month as I’ve thought, prayed
and soul searched what I wanted to share with all of you about having an
intentional faith in the Lord. I’ve
finally decided just to start at the beginning of my journey and go from there,
because it has been a journey…..a
journey of daily walking with Him.
This
journey of faith is different for each one of us. Some of us walk towards God dragging our
feet, digging our heals in, resisting Him for years until something in our life
brings us to our knees before Him. For
some we run…..we run hard…..in the opposite direction! And then maybe someone comes into our life
and introduces us to The One that desperately wants us to stop running away from Him and instead run to Him.
Maybe some of you are still running and are not at all convinced that
you need or want God in your life; or maybe you are running because you don’t believe
that God can ever truly love you because of the messiness that defines your
life.
And then for some of us the journey is a
gradual walking towards Him, trusting and following Him without too much
difficulty. I think that when we decide
to trust in Jesus when we are younger it’s an easier journey because we have
the simple faith of a child; it doesn’t take a whole lot to convince us that
God is there, that Jesus is real and that He loves us and has a plan for us. I don’t remember a time when I didn’t love
Jesus, when I didn’t believe in Him. And
yet there were plenty of years when I believed but didn’t give Him the proper authority
in my life. I believed and worshipped
and loved the Lord….when it was convenient for me…..Like on Sunday mornings….but
then the rest of the week belonged to me.
And then in my early 20’s life got real for me…..I felt real
discouragement and real disappointment and real shame and real fear. All of a sudden I needed Jesus in my life
more than just on Sunday mornings when I was sitting in a pew in church. I needed Him desperately to show me which
path I was supposed to take, who I was in Him and who He was supposed to be in
my life. I needed Him to be in my life
every day, every minute of the day. I
needed Him to be real and I needed to be real with Him.
This
was a turning point in my journey with the Lord. This was when I realized that a relationship
with Him required attention and intention…..not just once a week but every day
for a lifetime. I am so blessed to have
a mother who has built a “Quiet Time” into her days. Growing up I remember Mom getting up before
the sun and sitting in her favorite chair, with just one light on and her
Bible. A box that holds her Bible,
notebooks and a journal has been a constant in my parent’s home no matter where
they have lived. I watched as she made
this chunk of time that she spent with the Lord a priority in her life. As I grew older I remember many days spent
doing chores, feeding cattle, riding horseback or cleaning the house where our
conversations turned to what she had gleaned from that morning’s Quiet Time. She shared with me once that on the days when
she missed this time spent with the Lord her entire day was completely off
kilter. She taught me that it was hard
to trust in Someone that we didn’t know, and the only way to know Him was to
spend time with Him. My mother instilled
in me a strong sense of the importance of spending time with God in His Word
every day. But not until that point in my early 20’s did I choose to make it a
priority for myself. And now I can say
with my mom…..if my day doesn’t start with the Lord, my day doesn’t start off
right!
Some of
you may be wondering “what in the world is she talking about? What does she mean by a ‘Quiet Time’?” All that I mean by “Quiet Time” is time
carved out of your day dedicated to and spent with the Lord. I joke all the time that I am refreshed, rejuvenated,
and ready to face my day as I spend that hour to hour and a half with the Lord
in the morning…….I can face anything and anyone as I sit at my kitchen table
after spending time with God……that is until my family wakes up and I actually
have to put into practice whatever I learned during my Quiet time…..that’s when
it gets difficult! But that is a joke….the
time that I spend with God first thing in the morning is what sets the mood and
my focus for the entire day. Depending
on how early I wake up (anywhere from 4:00 to 5:00 in the morning) I spend time
praying, reading from either the Old Testament or New Testament and the Psalms
or Proverbs in the Bible, I generally have one or two devotions that I read
(Our Daily Bread, Streams in the Desert, My Utmost For His Highest, and In
Touch are some of my favorites), and then I journal for about 15 to 30
minutes. Sometimes I spend the entire time
in prayer, sometimes I spend the entire time in His word. Each day I come ready for Him to reveal
something to me.
When I
first began reading the Bible I bought a Student Bible and wondered where in
the world to start, and I wondered if I was going to get bored quick……after all
this was the Bible, how interesting was it going to be?? But then I discovered the truth of Psalm 119:
103, “How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth!” God’s word has proven to be true and life
giving and comforting and full of wisdom and love and grace and peace…..His
Word is full of adventure and real life trials and pain and victories; however His
Word has never once proven to be boring!
The more that I have read it the more that I have desired to be in His
Word every day, His word to me is sweeter than honey……I learn something new
each time that I read it.
Now, I
have to be honest and tell you all that I am naturally a morning person. My favorite time of the day is early in the
morning, when the stars are still out and everyone is still in bed. It probably has something to do with my ranch
upbringing, but getting up before the sun is not a hardship for me, it is the
time of day when I am at my best, my mind is clear and I am ready to start. But I realize that for a lot of you it is not
that easy…..you wake up with more of a fuzzy mind than a clear one, you can’t
focus enough to see the coffee pot much less your Bible. I know so many women who become discouraged
with the thought of having a consistent Quiet Time because we tend to correlate
“Quiet Time” with “Early Morning Time”.
Or maybe you are in a phase of life when your
kids are little and having any kind of “quiet” seems completely out of the
question. I know what that’s like! Trust me, when Kade was a baby to about 3
years old I had to get real creative on getting that Quiet Time into my day. With Hannah it was easy; she seemed to have
been born with an innate sense of my need for this early morning quiet time. But with my second child I was not so
fortunate. For three years this boy
could hear me the second I got out of bed….he had an innate sense of me being
awake and then it was “early morning Kade time”! Having ten minutes to myself in the bathroom
in order to read a devotion or listening to a sermon online while cooking
dinner was sometimes as good as it got during those years. Some of my most precious memories are of
praying as I was nursing my children in the middle of the night or early in the
morning. Yes, I know what it’s like
during those years when our children are tiny and oh so needy….and God knows
even more so! He recognizes and appreciates how our lives are consumed with
those little humans; and yet He still wants us to give Him the best part of our
days. In God’s economy, if we are
willing to give him the best and the first part of our days, He is able to
supply for the remainder of our hours!
If you
are in this phase of life, or if you just aren’t a morning person, then
maybe you simply need to get creative in how you spend time with Him. I’m not talking about giving Him your leftovers,
but rather look for opportunities to spend time with Him. Maybe you have a commute to and from work;
there are so many great podcasts or sermons online that you can download and
listen to on your drive. Or spend your
drive praying! When Hannah was a baby
until she was two years old I had about an hour on the road as I drove from
Meeteetse Wyoming to my aunt’s house 15 minutes outside of Cody Wyoming where I
worked. I spent that hour in the morning
praying for everyone that God brought to mind.
I honestly don’t know if I’ve ever had that deep of a time for prayer
since. I have friends who have a real
struggle with sleep at night, so they use that opportunity to read the Bible or
pray, figuring that if they are losing sleep they might as well give that time
to the Lord! If you aren’t a morning
bird like me, but are more of a night owl like many of my friends, then carve
out a Quiet Time with Him after your kids have gone to bed and you can enjoy
the solitude of the evening. I don’t
think that God is as concerned with what time you give to Him, as long as you
are intentional about giving Him time in your day.
That
being said, I would like to encourage you to choose one or two mornings a week,
or even once a month, to sacrifice sleep and get up before the sun and your
family. There truly is something about
early mornings spent with the Lord, pouring out our hearts and expectations and
concerns to Him. If we are able to do
that first thing in our day, and then give the rest of it to Him, we are then
able to have a proper focus for whatever the rest of the day has in store for
us! Psalm 5:3 says, “In the morning,
Lord, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait
expectantly.” If we intentionally choose
to go to God in those early morning hours, He will meet us there and it will
set the tone for the rest of the day.
However
you choose to spend “Quiet Time” with God, I just encourage you to begin to
carve time out of your busy schedule and give it to Him. Make an intentional decision to put Him first
in your day…..giving Him your schedule, your time, your energy and your talents
to use to glorify Him and build up His Kingdom.
God bless you as you intentionally draw closer to the One who has called
you by name (Isaiah 43:1).
