The time for God

Often times people feel like they need to take time out to focus on God. Most Christians feel guilty at times and feel like they've been focusing so much on their daily lives that they need to separate time out of their busy schedules and focus on God. Many very strong Christians may encourage you to do this, and I wouldn't argue against any time one takes to focus on God, but perhaps the problem here is perspective.

Let's look at the example of the competing athlete. She's in the stretch run, trying hard to make the playoffs, and it seems like every waking hour she spends is devoted to finding whatever edge it takes to get to the postseason goal. When she gets home at the end of the day, opening the Bible and reading is so hard that she finds herself looking at the words but not comprehending them due to exhaustion. She resolves to take 15 minutes at the beginning of the day to read her Bible, and focus on God. This works for a while, but after a while it becomes 12 minutes before she rushes out the door. Then 10 minutes over breakfast. Then 5 minutes while brushing her teeth. Then every other day she fits it in. It's obvious every day that it's just a chore she puts herself through, but she feels justified by the routine, and so she sticks with it.

If you're anything like the above gal, then maybe you need to focus on living out God in a broad scale. Your prayers should be focused on God giving you direction, mission, and clarity. If your goals in life that you work towards are for the benefit of God, then you won't have the need to set aside time for God simply out of necessity. By all means, continue waking up in the morning and reading, praying before sleep, and praying before every meal, but don't let that be your daily God fix. Live God in your actions, job, work, competitions, practices, and relationships and he'll give you all the fulfillment you'll need.

for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose. -- Philippians 2:13

Let's face it--we stink. Trying to schedule God into our lives is backwards and mostly ineffective. God didn't save us in order to have the portion of our lives that it's convenient to allow him. God saved us so that he could use our whole lives for him, and so that we can delight and rejoice in his plans for us.