What are devotions? How do I do them?
By Elizabeth Prata
I’m taking an online course on discipling and mentoring with Harry Walls out of The Master’s Seminary. It’s full of rich truths. Allow me to share what I am learning from Him.
Devotions: Why?
Why should we do devotions? Loving God with all our heart, mind, strength, soul can’t be accomplished without taking TIME, and quality time at that, to get to know Him. Daily time for God alone. Commit to God!
Jesus’ summary of the greatest commandment in the New Testament was to love God with all your soul, strength, mind, and heart. And secondly, to love our neighbor as ourselves. We love God by engaging with Him.
Love is relational. God created man so He would engage in a love relationship with us. Not that He needed to, He was perfectly satisfied with the intra-Trinitarian love among the three Persons of the Godhead. But he wanted to extend that love to humankind.
In return, we take time for God in our devotions, which is our relational time for God alone. Every relationship requires undivided and undistracted time alone with the person we love. In marriage, some spouses prioritize ‘date night’ so they can reconnect and nurture each other. Children always want to have some alone time with their parents, where the parent is focused and connected with them. It’s impossible to develop a loving, relational, thriving relationship without taking time for it.
And He said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ (Matthew 22:37).
The word all in the verse means as we would recognize, whole, complete, entire. Loving God supremely, with our very life.
Devotions: When?
In so doing, we choose our BEST time, the supreme time to be alone with God. For many of us, that means the morning. We are fresher. The mundane, worldly distractions haven’t divided our attention yet. We can be more focused. If we are to love God with all we’ve got, we love Him with the BEST we’ve got. If the time you take isn’t in the morning, then choose the BEST time relationally for you to meet with God alone.
Prioritize that time, protect it. Whether early, late, or midday, your devotional time should be at the same time each day. Carving out a protected time displays intention and value, which in turn shows an intentionality of prioritizing the relationship you’re nurturing.
So set the best time, the same time, and an amount of time. A little is better than nothing. But do it. Missing too many alone times with family or friends, they will let you know they feel undervalued or not prioritized. The relationship will wither.
But don’t just take my word for it. Let’s turn to the scriptures to see our models regarding devotional time spent with God:
Choose a private, quiet, secluded place. As Jesus did,
Yet, “And in the early morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house, and went away to a secluded place, and prayed there for a time. (Mark 1:35).
Luke 4:42, Now when day came, Jesus left and went to a secluded place;
Luke 5:16, But Jesus Himself would often slip away to the wilderness and pray
Slipping away to the wilderness (or other translations, ‘lonely places’) didn’t mean Jesus hopped into his car and comfortably drove to the trails at the park. He walked, hiked, took time before he got to the place where He was going to take time. He went to lengths to ensure that his prayer-devotional life would be undistracted.
Being busy was not an excuse. Jesus was the busiest man alive during His ministry on earth. David was busy. During his life he was either a King or a fugitive. But he prayed (hear my voice) and then ‘watched’ (watching out to see what God would say). Sometimes that time would be early:
Psalm 5:3, In the morning, Lord, You will hear my voice; In the morning I will present my prayer to You and be on the watch.
Sometimes it would be late: When I remember You on my bed,
I meditate on You in the night watches, Psalm 63:6.
Sometimes it was all day long! Psalm 119:97, How I love Your Law!
It is my meditation all the day.
Jesus is our model for humans ought to live. His time for meeting with God was usually before the day started. Job rose early and offered sacrifices. (Job 1:5). Luke 21:38 says the people who wanted to hear Jesus at the temple “would get up very early in the morning to come to Him in the temple to listen to Him.”
It’s not just learning, it’s relating. You need Bible, pen, paper, or journal, place. It is an opportunity to be with the best Person ever. Pursue this with a positive expectation. An encounter with perfection yields satisfaction. Feast on the perfections of our Creator and Savior!
Devotions: What?
What do we do during devotions?
1.Devotional reading. Let God talk about Himself. Relationship is communication. Devotional Bible reading, What does what I read teach me about my God, my Savior, my Friend. He will reveal what he wants to reveal about Himself. Read the scripture for self-revelation. Ask Him to reveal God to you.
1.Daily devotional reading is listening to God talk to you about Himself. Not audibly! Do not expect that. As you read devotionally, keep asking, “God what are you revealing to me about Yourself?” For example, in the scene in Genesis 14:17-24, Melchizedek, Abram, Cherdorlaomer (Kerd-or-lay-omer), you see the term “Most High several times. And Abram said he would not take booty from Cherdorlaomer, not a whisker of it. And he gave a tenth to Melchizedek. So in a devotional reading of this passage you could pray, ‘O Lord, you are most high and most deserving. High and lifted up you are, and worth all my devotion, attention, and love. Let not one iota of pollution enter into my mind, let nothing unworthy be mixed in with worship…’ and so on
2.Respond-Talk to God about what He has revealed to you. This is devotional praying. Pray back in praise and worship.
3.Let God talk to you for you and about you. Not audibly! Do not expect that. It’s reading for inspiration, direction, for transformation. ‘God, please feed my soul with fresh bread, more necessary that my food’. Look for personal encouragement from God’s word. As you read the Bible, look for affirming and encouraging words for your soul. ‘Soul food’ nourishment.
4.Look for life guidance from God too. Not just inspiration, not just encouragement and affirmation, but direction in life. Proverbs 8 speaks about wisdom, acquiring it and using it. Wisdom from God will guide us in life. His wisdom is in His book- the Bible. Wisdom for life guidance from other people is fine, but it’s filtered through a finite mind. Wisdom from God is gained from His word and the Spirit’s application and illumination of it to us. God will guide us- from His word.
Meet with Him daily.
I’m not super spiritual. I fail at this myself. I’m home on school break, I have no family nearby, no children, no work tasks, no appointments, and no intrusions. I still fail sometimes to meet with God in the ways described above! I read the Bible, but sometimes distractedly. I pray, but sometimes not for long. I meditate on God, but not praying God’s promises or scriptures. This just goes to show me that our flesh is indeed strong. We still mutiny against meeting with God in prayer, His word, and private meditations.
Even though God is the best person anywhere, even though it’s always profitable to meet with Him, even though it reaps glorious benefits, even though it’s our chief end in life to glorify Him and enjoy Him forever, we still don’t love Him with all our heart, mind, soul and strength.
Let’s make a pact, sister, for you and me to do our best to apply the devotional principles outlined above, summarized from the good teacher Harry Walls from The Master’s Seminary, and do our utmost to love Jesus as He deserves – AND as He has commanded.
Further Resources
Devotionals the produce aren’t the same as doing devotional Bible reading. But here are some great devotionals for feasting on during your day:
The Valley of Vision. A selection of petitions and meditations in the Puritan tradition.
Love Came Down at Christmas: Daily Readings for Advent by Sinclair Ferguson
The Dawn of Redeeming Grace: A Daily Advent Devotional by Sinclair Ferguson
A Basket of Summer Fruit: Sweet vignettes and Bible expositions bearing the author’s love for Christ, by Susannah Spurgeon
Drawing Near: Daily Readings for a Deeper Faith by John MacArthur
Doing devotions with your family:
Press On, article at Ligonier
The Private Key to Heaven, by Thomas Brooks. Book presents twenty arguments for private prayer. Drawing from examples in Scripture and history, Brooks exhorts God’s people to more faithfulness in this spiritual discipline and means of grace. His application is filled with poignant rebuke, specific directions, and refutation of objections to private prayer. FREE at Chapel Library as ebook, snail mail freely sent to you, or download.
