What I Bring to My Quiet Time

Today, if you hear His voice do not harden your hearts…
Nicole Schrader

I have a marvelous, imaginative, hilarious, three-year-old grandson. He is full of wonder and loves every new adventure. I adore him.
Recently, my daughter gave him a directive and when he began to negotiate, she said he should obey her. He responded, “I don’t want to obey. Mommy—you obey me!” 
Isn’t that just like all of us? We are not so different from three-year-olds.
Given a garden, we choose the one forbidden fruit. (Genesis 3)
One moment we’re delivered through the Red Sea, and the next we’re worshiping a golden calf. (Exodus 14, 32)
God calls us to go to Nineveh, and we board a ship for Tarshish. (Jonah 1)
In faith, we slay a giant, and in idleness, we take something that belongs to another. (II Samuel 11)
You don’t have to have children to acknowledge our natural bent toward disobedience to God. Paul clarifies our condition in the first chapter of his letter to the Roman church—
“For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.” Romans 1:19-23 (ESV)
The good news is—
God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus…So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord.  In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. Ephesians 2:4-7,19-22 (ESV)
Even though I’m a devoted follower of Jesus Christ, I’m still conscious of my need for God’s ongoing sanctification and guidance. I don’t believe my salvation can be lost, but I do acknowledge the deceptive nature of sin and my own weakness. Recognizing my need for Christ’s truth and strength to overcome temptation, I approach my quiet time bearing the following heart posture. 

What do I bring to my quiet time?

• An attitude of prayer—I ask Jesus to help me to watch and pray that I might not enter into temptation.
  Jesus told Peter, “Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” Matthew 26:41 (ESV)
  

• A mind open to the guidance of the Holy Spirit—The word of God is active and living and I need the Holy Spirit’s help to understand it.
  For who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. I Corinthians 2:11-13 (ESV)
  
  
• A willingness to acknowledge sin—I know my mind has been strongly influenced by a culture that does not acknowledge God and the transformation I need begins with the renewal of my mind.
  Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. Romans 12:2 (ESV)
  
  
• A humble heart—I need the constant reminder that it is God who is at work building his kingdom, I’m not the one doing the building.
  So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. Ephesians 2:19-22 (ESV)
  Wow! God is building us—together—into a dwelling place for His presence!
  

• A desire to know what God wants me to do—Each day I have choices, and I need God’s discernment to know how best to use my time and resources.
  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. Ephesians 2:10 (ESV)
  

• Ears attuned to the voice of God—Jesus says his sheep hear his voice and follow him. (John 10:27) Praise God! I have heard his voice.
  Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker! For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts… Psalm 95:6-8a (ESV)

A heart-attitude of honest humility and dependence on God’s sufficiency, and not our own, is the foundational prerequisite for quiet time. 

O to grace how great a debtor
daily I’m constrained to be!
Let that grace now, like a fetter,
bind my wandering heart to thee.

Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
prone to leave the God I love;
here’s my heart; O take and seal it;
seal it for thy courts above.

Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing, Hymnary.Org

Nicole Schrader is a retired homeschool mother who loves to travel, bake bread, read, and spend time with her kids and grandkids. For more of her work visit www.nicolelisamaria.com.