Problems with "Quiet-Times?"

I've personally experienced a lot of struggles over the years when it comes to finding consistency and fulfillment from a daily quiet-time with God. Yes, as a pastor, I'm confessing that quiet-times as I was taught to do them just don't work for me. Often times, I haven't even been motivated to do one either. I've went in spurts of being consistent in the routine of quiet-times throughout my entire journey with Christ, but I've finally reached a place where I'm experiencing an abundantly satisfying walk with God unlike ever before. What changed? I had to realize two things that actually go against much of what I was taught about having quiet-times with God...

#1: I can't put God in a box an expect to truly experience Him.
Here's the problem with quiet-times as we typically teach them: They are often disconnected from a continual, rhythmic interaction with God... The Holy Spirit's movement in our life can't be restricted to a certain "quiet-time/set aside" moment of our day. God is to be experienced and interacted with all day long.

For those of you who are married, think about this... Can you imagine if you told your spouse that each day you'd try to give them 15-minutes (or 30 if you're really good), but as for the remaining 1,400+ minutes throughout the day, you probably won't pay much attention to them. I don't know about you, but I'd be building my own dog house in the backyard. (I'd have to build it because we don't have a dog).

God wants your entire life, not just your quiet-time. This is what Paul's referring to in 1 Thessalonians 5:17 when he says, "Pray without ceasing." Our conversation and communion with God should be happening all the time. At work, in the car, playing with our kids, etc. While our times of solitude are important and essential, the stereotypical "quiet-time" can be very misleading and disappointing if we think this is our good deed or act of obedience for God.

#2: My "quiet-times" were self-centered.
I'm a selfish person. I don't know about you, but it's just my nature even with spiritual things. I'd open God's Word thinking "What can I take from this?" I'd pray my prayers according to how I felt. Lately though, God's been showing me that these times of solitude have to be all about Him and what He wants to say. I've had to learn to be still and know that He is God. Instead of having a preset agenda, I'm learning to listen to the Holy Spirit.

What does this look like? Well, typically throughout my day I'm living with the expectation that God wants to speak to me. After all, He is my Father. He is not the author of confusion. He wants me to know Him and His desires, so I'm eagerly anticipating Him speaking to me. When He does, I'm trying to listen and process. I want to learn and allow Him to adjust my behavior to be more in line with who He is and what He desires.

In response to this, my "quiet-time" is then a time of solitude where I can further process through what He's already been speaking to me about. Sometimes this leads to praise, comfort, and joy, but other times it leads me to repentance. I noticed when I'm setting the agenda for my quiet-time (or some pre-planned devotion is doing it for me) I tend to do very little repenting.

These two realizations have brought and continue to bring an abundance to my walk with God that I've never experienced before. I hope you'll take a few minutes to wrestle with what I'm saying because God wants you to experience Him in a non-structure, natural, intimate, way! Don't miss out any longer!

Has God Been Rejecting Our Sunday Worship?

People often leave the Sunday service and say something like, "Worship was good today!" but what do we mean by this? Typically, this means we thought the music was good or that something spoke to us or that we enjoyed it, but do you notice the recurring theme here? Each of the statements are reflections of our opinions. It's as if we are the judge of worship. Shouldn't we be asking, "God, were you pleased with our worship today?"

A couple Sundays ago, I challenged our gathering to wrestle with the concept of biblical worship. I asked the question, "Could God be rejecting our so called worship every Sunday just as He often rejected the sacrifices of the Israelites in the Old Testament?"

In the OT, the people had the routine of sacrifices down pretty good. However, what they continued to miss,  just as we still do today, is that God ultimately isn't after our acts of obedience and religious routines; He wants our lives. He wants our hearts. Because of this, He often rejected their sacrifices, asked them to stop giving them, and even asked the priests to close the doors to the temples. Check out these passages... Isaiah 1:13-19, Malachi 1:10-11

Fast forward to the New Testament. Read what Jesus says in John 4:19-24 and what Paul says in Romans 12:1. What about the reference to our bodies being the temple/place of worship in 1 Corinthians 6:19-20? What do these passages mean? Essentially, they reveal to us that if we aren't worshiping God throughout the rhythms of our daily lives, our worship on Sunday means nothing because it's not even biblical worship.

Now, let's think about this from the positive perspective. What if we truly began to worship God throughout our week? What if His presence in our lives was a daily experience? Can you imagine then what our Sunday gatherings would be like? Instead of waiting until Sunday to "worship," we would be gathering together to collectively continue the worship we've been experiencing all week.

Evaluate your worship by His standards, and let's stop assuming we're doing what God wants simply because this is what our American church culture has trained us to do!