How God Time Fuels My Faith

This post is by Karen Bozeman.

I have a friend who saves loose change. Over time, Greg filled a large water jug by steadily saving his spare change. During the recent coin shortage, he decided it was time to put these nickels, dimes, and quarters back into circulation. He had over $600!  By consistently storing his change, Greg was able to make a sizable contribution to his savings account. Greg doesn’t have plans for spending the money, but it is now available to meet a future need.  

Spending time with God is like depositing into a spiritual bank account. For my faith to grow, I need to be with God daily through prayer and Bible study. When I was in college, my student ministry director challenged me weekly to have my own personal time with God. And he was right. Developing the “holy habit” of time with the Father is life-giving and teaches me about the God I serve. Spending time with God each day refocuses my heart to His purpose, direction, and plans for my life.

Meeting with God teaches me vital truths. The first is God loves me. Lamentations 3: 22-23 states: The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. (ESV) God’s love for me is a “steadfast love.” It is not in His character to ever stop loving me. I continue learning how deep His love is for me through reading of His Word each day. 

Through prayer, I discover more and more about His faithfulness.  I’ve spent more years than I want to count and shed more tears than I want to admit over employment for my children. With the job market being so volatile over the past 15 years, my children have had many jobs only to lose them through layoffs. They have moved around the state and the nation seeking work. God is faithful to supply the resources they need. Had I not spent time daily in His Word, I wouldn’t have recognized His faithfulness. It would have been easy to say they got a job because the circumstances were right, or they had the right skills and a stellar resume. If I hadn’t been making daily “deposits” in my relationship with God, I would have missed His hand in the lives of my children. My focus wouldn’t have been on His purpose for them.

My God Time teaches me that I can lean on Him and He will meet my every need. Each day, He extends His loving care to me because I am helpless and often desperate. Despite my humanness, His mercies are “new every morning.” Morning always ends the night and begins a new day! I know the sun is going to come up each morning, but I can be even more confident that God will care for me not because I am good but because He is. His daily mercies give me peace and hope. In 2 Corinthians 12: 9-10, He assures us that His grace is sufficient for all of us and His power is made perfect in our weakness. Who doesn’t want to lean on a God like this? If you haven’t had a quiet time in a while, develop a fresh habit of prayer and Bible reading.  Begin again to make those daily connections with the God whose love for you is rock solid, never-changing, and totally pure. 

I don’t have a Pinterest-worthy prayer journal, a Bible filled with beautiful journal graphics, and a passion planner. Most of the time, I use an inexpensive composition book to record my prayers and a spiral notebook for Bible study notes. Fancy doesn’t fuel my faith. Meeting daily with the God who is steadfast, merciful, and faithful does. Determine to allow Him to make your morning new.

Karen is a retired educator living in East Texas. She and her husband are actively involved in their local church as well as various ministries in the East Texas area. Karen leads Bible study at several of the local women’s ministries in their area, quilts and crochets for new mommies, and writes for Hello Mornings as well as her church’s blog for women. You can connect with her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/mobberlywomenlongview/ where she writes a monthly blog post.

Photo by Michael Longmire on Unsplash