God changes us when we spend time in the Word and cultivate our prayer life.
I was raised in the church and got saved at a young age but always struggled to be consistent in my walk with God. When I was 22 I rededicated my life to Christ and at 23 I was baptized but I still struggled. I had seasons of my adult life where I went to church every Sunday, attended a weekly women’s bible study, & spent time each day in prayer. But I also had seasons when I went weeks or months without attending church, being involved in any type of fellowship & pushing off prayer to “tomorrow” but not following through. Thankfully God has always pursued me and placed it on my heart to get back into a relationship with Him.
What we focus on grows.
What we ignore eventually withers away & dies.
I always have had a desire in my heart to be closer to God but I continually ignored the importance of growing in my relationship with Him. I knew that I needed to make it a daily habit but I struggled with making that habit stick.
A few years ago I read the book Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod and that sparked the desire for me to become intentional with starting my mornings with God. My goal was to read a daily devotional (I started with Jesus Calling since I had started and stopped that daily devotional so many times over the years) and to spend a few minutes praying.
I started and failed many times. I thought I would never get into the consistent habit of starting my day with God. I would go a few days at the most and then skip more days than I was consistent with. I had all the negative thoughts but God kept putting it on my heart to put aside time with Him each day. So I kept praying for Him to help me to be ALL in instead of my consistent half in, half out relationship with Him.
About 2yrs ago I started using IG stories for my coaching business and one of the things I wanted to share was my faith. I thought it would be inspiring & beneficial to others if I shared a photo of my daily devotional or a bible scripture each day. I know it sounds kinda silly and little crazy but knowing that I had to show up in my IG stories made me show up in my walk with God. In the beginning I felt like a fake and a fraud at times because some days I was just going through the motions. Some days I rushed through just to snap a photo and move on with my day. But the more I showed up the more I felt God’s presence in my life. In time I wasn’t rushing into my prayer room to simply go through the motions but instead I found myself taking the time to sit and spend time in the Word & in His presence.
When I started it was just little seeds being planted.
Remember, what we focus on grows.
In time those little seeds blossomed and grew into the relationship with Him that I had always longed for.
Is it perfect, heck no!
I can still occasionally have days I feel like I’m just going through the motions. But all of that time spent with Him has transformed not only my mornings but my life.
He changed me.
My routine has changed over the years and this year I added on meditation. So since I’m often asked what I do during my morning routine I’m going to share just that with you.
I wake up, open my blinds, go pee, put in my contacts & brush my teeth. Then before doing anything else I go right into our guest bedroom (prayer room) that just has 2 Ikea chairs & footstools in it, nothing else. I start with meditation. I’ve been using the app Simple Habits and while some of them are a little “woo-woo” I have found quite a few that I really enjoy. So I spend 1-5 minutes in a guided meditation. I then read scripture from my church’s daily bible reading schedule. Next, I pull out my journal and write out my top 10 goals. I then ready my daily devotional reading. This year I’m reading Joyce Meyers ‘A Confident Woman’ daily devotional. Next I pull out my daily gratitude journal that I got off of Amazon for $6 and write out 3 things from the previous day that I am grateful/thankful for. Sometimes these are big things and other times they are small things. True joy is found in the small, seemingly mundane things of life but if we aren’t intentionally focusing on them it’s easy to miss them. Next I read 1-5 (depends on how much time I have that day) pages of a faith-based book. Right now I’m reading Joyce Meyers ‘Battlefield of the Mind’. Finally I kneel in prayer and bring my thankfulness, confessions, & requests to God.
This takes me on average 30min but when I first started I simply read a page in my daily devotional and prayed, which took me under 5 minutes.
It doesn’t have to be anything grand or big. Start small. 5 minutes. Create the habit. Start your day with intention, rest in His presence and begin to see the fruit of that habit grow in all areas of your life.
