Spending Time With God

When I promised God that I would try to spend at least an hour a day with Him, if I had stopped to try to find an additional hour in my day, I probably would have given up before I got started. My intentions were sincere, it was all or nothing at this point--but living them out was another issue. At that particular time in my life, I was working between 60 to 80 hours a week. . . plus I had family obligations, friends to spend time with, a tennis game to keep up, and down time for myself. . . finding an additional hour a day was nearly impossible! It quickly became evident, that if I didn’t set aside a specific block of time each day, this new endeavor was not going to be.

I found it was best to have my time with God at the beginning of each day when nothing would interrupt it -- no phone calls, no salespeople, no late appointments. That meant I had to get up at 5:30AM. The first couple of mornings went without a glitch. . .

The alarm clock went off. . .
I popped out of bed. . .
made some coffee (ok, strong coffee). . .
and had my time with God.

But, after all of 3 mornings, I found myself hitting the snooze button on my alarm instead of eagerly jumping out of bed. Being a notorious “snooze button” hitter, an hour elapsed before I finally pulled myself out of bed. There was no time for God. Refusing to give in to failure so quickly, a radical rearrangement of my schedule was needed. To be out of bed by 5:30AM, meant getting into bed no later than 10:30PM.

Early morning proved to be a good time to meet with God and after a couple of months of this routine, the habit was formed. For years I have continued to keep an appointment with God early each morning. I am still convinced of 2 things: 1) I desperately still need time with my Heavenly Father, and 2) If I don't set aside a chunk of time in advance, I don't spend any time with God during the day.