One Thing that Changed My Quiet Time

Me and my little guy

I have this vision of what my quiet time should look like every day. Here is what I envision:

I’m sitting on my comfy couch in my den. It is the wee hours of the morning, still dark–the moon is still in the sky– and I’m reading by lamp light, with a creamy cup of joe (yes, my favorite Vanilla Latte) in hand. My Bible lies open on my lap. God will speak to me quite clearly. I will listen, and it will change my day. In perfect timing, just as my time with God comes to a close, my family will all begin to wake up. Then, the day will be perfect.

I don’t know about you, but that is a dream. I have had it happen like that…maybe once. But as a work-at-home, homeschooling mom of two children under the age of six, this is most often an impossibility.  No matter how early I rise, someone is always up within minutes of my rising. And I am quite sure I am not the only one. Am I?

Let me share with you what my quiet time is actually like, not a pretty picture, and I am not proud of it.

Wake up later than I planned, sun is already up, and I am scrambling to get my coffee ready. With my Bible in hand, I creep through the house (so I don’t wake anyone up).  Then, just when I am completely settled, and I have opened my Bible…someone pops around the corner with a big smile, saying “Good morning, Mommy!”

I am so ashamed to say, I don’t smile back, in fact I scowl, anger starts boiling up inside of me, and I am just plain irritated. Not only with my son, but with God.  My internal conversation with God goes something like this…

“You say you want us to spend quiet time with You. Why didn’t You just let me have a few quiet moments with You before the day started?  I really need it, more than anyone You know I need it. You know that, it is how You created me! It is what You request of me.”

I send my son back to his room using my stern and angry voice. He turns around and runs to his room crying, then begins to absolutely wail.  Which, by the way, makes it quite impossible to focus. Turning to open my Bible, I try to concentrate, get into a quiet calm and start my “time with God.” hmm…What is wrong with this picture?

Do you know it took me quite a while to realize that God was giving me quiet time? It just wasn’t exactly what I had envisioned. Sometime after this episode repeated for a while, I felt God calling me to lighten up a bit. Imagine that?

To quit putting my quiet time with Him in a box, quit putting Him in a box.

Here is what my quiet time looks like now:

I sit down as before, Bible in hand, coffee ready, and my little man comes running in…just as I sit down.  He looks at me from the door, beaming. “Good morning, Mommy!” he says, giving me the biggest, sweetest smile. Then he jumps in my lap and hugs me so tightly I can hardly breathe. Beside me he sits, holding his little Bible story book, as he looks at me and says, “Mommy, I am going to have quiet time with you!”

But this time…

I smile, tell him good morning, sit and read my Bible for a while (yes, a very short while),  read him a story and pray with him for his day.

God gave me yet another opportunity for quiet time today. At naptime, we did something fun and special.  I set him up to “camp out” for his nap time. We got a sleeping bag and his favorite animals on the floor, and he laid down to rest. Now, you must know that this is my work time.  Typically when he goes down, my first impulse is to head to the computer and get some things crossed off my “to-do” list.

Today was different, like many other days, he again asked me to lie down with him. Already tired from being up the night before (he had been sick and throwing up all night) I “gave in” and cuddled in beside him. He grabbed my arm, pulled it over his side and held my hand. While we laid there, he turned over and looked me in the eyes and said “Mommy, I love you so much, I love snuggling with you!” Then he leaned over, and while we snuggled he kept lightly squeezing my fingers. Like he was letting me know again, “I love you.”

In that moment, I thought back to all the days he had asked me to lie down with him. Look what I had been missing! Instead of listening to what the Lord was trying to say to me, I was determined to do things the way I wanted to. I wasn’t trusting that He had authored my day. That all would be just as He had planned it. Not me.

Guess what? I still had time with my God that day. It was just a little different than I had planned.

In fact it was far better.

Better than I could have ever planned or imagined. Only God could author the sweet and special time I had.

I learned something.

God wanted me to model quiet time with Him for my son. Yes, He wants me to give Him my time, to be with Him, to talk to Him. But, it isn’t going to look like what I envision. In fact, it will look much better. He is giving me a special opportunity to minister to my sweet son, to not tell him about quiet time, but to show him how it looks.

I learned something else.

When I am in obedience with the Father, He also blesses me abundantly — far more than I will ever deserve. By my being open to change what my afternoon looked like, to get down and love on my son, I was greatly blessed. I had a memory I will never forget. I got to create a memory he will never forget.

God gave me the opportunity to do what He calls us all to do all throughout the Bible. The Greatest Commandment.

To love.

And then when I finally obeyed, boy, did I get to see His blessings.

What does your quiet time look like?  What do you want it to look like?  What does it actually look like?  I would love to hear your thoughts on how you allow God to mold your time with Him.