How to Protect Your Time with the Lord

Dannah Gresh: Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth has to fight for time alone with God.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: It's a recurring battle for me, I'll tell you that. But I believe it's a battle worth fighting. The Devil knows that if he can stop me here, I can do all kinds of things for God, but not really be fruitful and not be any threat to the Devil's program.

Dannah: This is Revive Our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, author of A Place of Quiet Rest, for Tuesday, January 4, 2021. I'm Dannah Gresh.

It’s always a good time to start spending time with God in His Word and in prayer, but I think this is an important reminder to begin forming habits here at the start of 2022. Yesterday, Nancy began showing us the incredible busyness of Jesus. Here’s Nancy, continuing in the series, "Discovering the Joy of Daily Devotions."

Nancy: Luke 5 tells us that Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed. He left the crowd and went and got with His Father. In this passage we see in Mark 1 that it was none too soon, because verse 36 tells us that,

Simon and those who were with him searched for him, and they found him and said to him, "Everyone is looking for you."

I was talking to a mom of six children ages sseven and down. She had seven-year-old triplets and then three other children younger than that. She said to me that she was praying that her seven-month-old baby would sleep a little longer than 5 o'clock in the morning. She said, "I'll do anything to get that time with the Lord first thing in the morning." She wants it; she craves it. Because she knows once that little one is up, her day is off and running. And it will be very hard to get a quiet time, a quiet place, and a quiet heart the rest of the day. 

Let me just say to moms, don't put yourself on a guilt trip about this. God knows your heart. He knows if your heart is to seek Him. If you will seek Him with the moments you have, I believe God can and will expand those moments.

But they said, "Everyone is looking for you. [Jesus] said to them, "Let us go on to the next towns" (vv. 36–38). 

Right at the height of His popularity there in Capernaum.

“Let us go on . . .  that I may preach there also, for that is why I came out." He went throughout all Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and casting out demons. (vv. 38–39)

How did He know it was time to go on? Where did He get the wisdom, the direction for His day? Where did He get His to-do list for the day? He got it in that time alone with His heavenly Father.

Let me just touch briefly on some of the purposes of a devotional life. I'm just going to touch on these, but I hope they'll whet your appetite. There are eight of them. Let me give them to you in two sets of four. The first set relates to our inner-life, our inner-walk. The first—and I think the highest and holiest purpose of a devotional life—is communion with God—fellowship with God, friendship with God, and knowing God. We're talking here about a relationship.

In Exodus 29 God gave us the purpose for the tabernacle. It's just a tent. But He said that’s the place where I will meet with you and speak to you. We go to our devotional life to meet with God, to let Him speak to us, and to speak to Him. Moses says to the Lord in Exodus 33, “Teach me your ways so that I may know you” (v. 13 NIV). We read in the passage that we heard about last night, that the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face as a man speaks to his friend.

Listen, we're not talking here about having devotions or doing your devotions like it's something you just check off of your to-do list. "I had my devotions, now I can go on to the next thing." We're talking about devotion. Some of us have had devotions. I've had many days in my life that I had devotions, but I hadn't had devotion. You know the difference? Communion, friendship, and fellowship with God.

The second purpose is purification of my heart and my life. This is where God's Word shines the light on the real me—the dark places of my heart and the hidden places of my heart. This is where I pray, “Lord, search me and know me. Try me. Show me if there's any wicked way in me (see Psalm 139:23). Don't show me what my press reports say, my press releases. Show me what You know.” This is where I confess and say, “Lord, wash me, cleanse me.” Purification.

Number three, restoration of my soul. He restores my soul in this quiet time, this devotional time with the Lord. Listen, you know it, but the world is loud and noisy and busy. It never ceases to press in on us. So many of us today are living with our tongues hanging out. We're distracted and discouraged, and we're distressed. It's time in God's presence that quiets our hearts and restores our souls.

This is where we get replenished. The resources that have been depleted as we've given out to others. This is where we get filled back up. This is where God calms our spirits and settles our hearts. It's where we get renewed strength and power to go back out and do it again. Restoration.

Then number four, in this time we receive instruction in the ways of God. The psalm I’ve been meditating on this week is Psalm 27. The psalmist prays, “Teach me your way, O Lord” (v. 11). Lord, I want to know Your way. I want to know how You think. I want to know what matters to You. I want to know how You work. I don't want to know the world's ways of thinking. I can get that in plenty of places. But I want to know Your ways. Instruct me, O God.

Then, four purposes that relate to our outer-walk, which is the outflow of our inner-heart. The fifth purpose, submission to God and His will. It's in this time alone with the Lord that I get in alignment.

I go sometimes to the chiropractor for my shoulder because of spending so much time on my laptop. My shoulder gets out of alignment and it hurts. I go to the chiropractor. It's weird. He cracks it; he adjusts it. Something is out of alignment. It feels strange. Sometimes it's not all that comfortable. But when he's done, it feels so good to have things back in alignment.

This is where we get our wills aligned to His will. It's where we say, "Not my will but yours be done, O Lord."

This is where I get direction, number six, direction for my life, my relationships, my responsibilities. We hear so many voices today yelling at us about what we're supposed to be doing and what we're supposed to be thinking. We need to be still enough and quiet enough, long enough to hear His voice and get His counsel; to let Him give me His assignments for my day, His priorities for my day.

We're so stressed trying to keep all of those balls up in the air. I think that sometimes we just need to stop and say, “Lord, are these the balls You're wanting me to be juggling right now?” Maybe it's not the season for that ball, for that task. What really matters?

Number seven, intercession on behalf of the needs of others. Intercession is where we take the needs from those that we love before the throne of God's grace. We say, “O Lord, I can't fix this person. I can't change them. I can't help them. I can't meet their need, but You can. O God, would you do it?” Intercession.

Then finally—this is one of my very favorites—transformation into the likeness of Jesus. We all with unveiled faces, 2 Corinthians 3:18 tells us, “with unveiled faces [we] behold as in a mirror the glory of the Lord” (NASB). What did David say he wanted? "To gaze upon the beauty of the Lord" (Ps. 27:4).

What happens as we behold? We are transfigured. Not just changed on the outside, to look like good Christians, but made new on the inside. We are transfigured. We are transformed into His likeness from glory to glory to glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.

I find myself thinking as I look at myself and live with myself, and I think, I have so far to go. I'm so not like Jesus. It's in these areas that you get to be like Jesus. You get to be like the ones you spend the most time with. You don't get to be like Jesus just by going to Bible college. You get to be like Jesus by being with Jesus. That's where He transforms us into His likeness.

Let me spend just a few moments talking about the practice of a daily devotional life. I want to give you general suggestions and then a few specific practical suggestions. The practice of a devotional life. First of all, generally speaking, it needs to be regular. Jesus often withdrew and went to solitary places and prayed (see Mark 1:35).

In the tabernacle, you read in Exodus 30, that the priests would offer sacrifices and incense every morning and every evening. Every morning, every evening. Every morning, every evening. Every morning, every evening. Didn't that get to be like a religious routine? Yes, it did. In fact, that's why Jesus came to put new wine into those wineskins and to get rid of those old wineskins. He said, "Here's new life for that routine."

But I tell you this, I have found that it's a whole lot easier to breathe fresh life into an existing routine than it is to find that fresh life if you don't have any routine at all. So yes, you want to keep it fresh. Yes, you want to guard against it becoming just a routine. But don't throw off the routine just because it's become routine.

There are some days where my quiet time for me feels like I’m trudging through it, and I’m so distracted. It's amazing where my mind goes when I sit down in that quiet time chair. I get a new burden for house cleaning. It's just incredible. But I say, “Body, you are going to sit here.” Some days it just feels like this is so purposeless, this is so meaningless. But in the big picture, in the big scope of things, I look back and I see God shaping, molding, building, growing, and conforming my life because of that time sitting spent in His presence.

D.L. Moody said that "a man can no more take in a supply of grace for the future than he can eat enough for the next six months or take sufficient air into his lungs at one time to sustain life for a week. We must draw upon God's boundless store for grace day to day as we need it."

Number two, it needs to be—I used to be a little sheepish about saying this, because I knew I was going to get some push-back in people's minds. But now that I look at the Word and how many times it emphasizes this, I think it's not something we should be embarrassed to say. I think, ideally, this time we set apart to be alone with the Lord should be early in the day. You say, “How early?” I can't tell you how early, but in Isaiah it says, “He wakens me morning by morning” (50:4 NIV). 

Ask God when He wants to waken you. Then be willing to get up when He does. God said to Moses, “Be ready in the morning and come up and meet with me” (Ex. 34:2 paraphrased). Psalm 88, “In the morning my prayer comes before you” (v. 13).  Psalm 5, “My voice You shall hear in the morning, O LORD” (v. 3 NKJV). 

Psalm 57—this is a verse I wish was not in the Bible, but it is, “Awake, my soul! I will awaken the dawn" (v. 8 NIV). Psalm 119, “I rise before the dawning of the morning, and cry for help; I hope in Your Word” (v. 147 NKJV). Psalm 143, “Cause me to hear Your lovingkindness in the morning” (v. 8 NKJV). 

Some of you are thinking, I'm just not a morning person. I think we are wired differently. I will grant you that. But I tell you what, you would probably be more of a morning person if you got to bed earlier at night. Just remember, a morning devotional life starts the night before. "I can't go to bed at ten o'clock like your dad did." I'm not telling you when to go to bed or when to get up. I'm just saying, if the number one desire of your heart is to know God, then you will do whatever it takes to seek His heart and to cultivate spiritual hunger.

Number three, it needs to be alone, a solitary place away from the crowd. Mark 6, “When He had sent them away, He departed to the mountain to pray” (see vv. 45–46). 

I love that essay that Alise wrote. Alise, it was so powerful about being saturated in noise, and how afraid we are of silence, of stillness. This is a techogeneration. We are always plugged into something. We always have noises going. You will not get to know the God of the universe in a crowd or with noise constantly bombarding you.

You've got to have time that is quiet. You get a quiet place, a quiet heart. You turn off the radio. I hate to be saying this while we're on the radio at the moment, and I thank the Lord for Moody radio. But there are times when you need to turn off your Christian radio station, too. Times when you need to unplug the electronics, the email, the Facebook, the whatever.

Let me just suggest a few specific ingredients. I don't have time to do this justice. Let me just say to you that a number of years ago, in partnership with Moody Publishing, I wrote two books to help encourage people wanting to know how to have a daily devotional life. People kept asking me for resources. I knew they were hungry. I could find a lot of devotional books, but I couldn't find a book on how to have a daily quiet time and have a meaningful time with the Lord.

So, I wasn't a writer. I didn't aspire to be a writer. But the Lord orchestrated my path to connect with Moody. We wrote this book called A Place of Quiet Rest: Finding Intimacy with God through a Daily Devotional Life. If you need some help on getting started, let me encourage you perhaps to pick up a copy of that book. It's available at a resource center here.

Then, a companion book, if you need a track to go on for these next thirty days, as I’m going to give you that challenge in just a moment. Here's a help for some of you if you don't already have your own track. It's A 30-Day Walk with God in the Psalms. I'll tell you in advance, don't try to do it in thirty day. It really should have been called A 30-Day Jog with God in the Psalms. Take sixty day. Take ninety days. Take whatever it takes. The goal is not to get through the book and fill in the blanks. The goal is to know God, to seek His heart. Those resources are available if they'd be helpful to you.

You want to make sure that in your quiet time, in your devotional life, you have a balance of receiving from the Lord and responding to Him. Receiving from Him in His Word.

The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple. The statutes of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart: the commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever: the judgments of the LORD are true and righteous altogether (Ps. 19:7–9 KJV).

I'll just say, students, thank the Lord for the privilege of a Moody Bible Institute education. But I’m going to tell you, you do not get to know God if the only time you spend with Him is in a classroom, if the only time you open this book is to study for a test or to write a paper. You've got to get into this book and let this book get into you—just you and the Lord cultivating intimacy in relationship with Him and saying, “Lord, speak to me.”

It was my privilege this morning—I can't say this every morning, but I knew I was going to be speaking on this topic—but I had the joy of starting today in a passage that I wasn't speaking on. Just saying, “Lord, speak to me,” and He did. He did, and He does. You need to be reading this book. That's the number one reason, by the way, people don't get a lot out of the Word of God. They don't read it.

They say, “I can't understand it.” You'll get to understand it as you read it.

• Read it.
• Ponder it.
• Meditate on it.
• Dwell on it.
• Don't hurry through it.
• Memorize it.
• Meditate on it
• Practice it.
• Study it.
• Share it with others.
• Reproduce it in others' lives.
• Tremble at the Word of God.

As Augustine said, “When the Bible speaks, God speaks.”

Martin Luther said, “The Bible is alive. It runs after me. It has hands that lays hold on me.” This is God's Word. Let it speak to you. Let it transform you. Let it fill you and change you. As you read, as you study, as you memorize, get to Christ. Get to Him. Don't miss Him. Jesus said to the Pharisees, the theologians of His day, you read the Word, but you don't have it in you, and you miss Me. It's all about Me. Let it point you to Christ.

Make sure you're not just receiving from Him, but responding to Him in worship and in prayer.

When I was in my twenties, I used to live, for the most part, at fast food and restaurant drive-thrus. Give me my tacos to go. I can't tell you how many Wendy's burgers I had over those years. When I hit thirty, something strange happened. I realized I wasn't feeling well, and I knew I had to change my eating habits to nourish my body. I confess to you that many times over the years, I have found myself spiritually in fast food drive-thrus as it relates to my time with the Lord.

I know the importance of grabbing a proverb for the day or a psalm for the day, but my heart was not there, not still and quiet. I was letting the world and ministry crowd out that time with the Lord. I'm so thankful that again and again the Lord brings back my heart, gives me a new hunger and a new heart to seek Him early in the day.

It's a recurring battle for me, I'll tell you that. But I believe it's a battle worth fighting. The Devil knows that if he can stop me here, I can do all kinds of things for God, but not really be fruitful and not be any threat to the Devil's program.

You say, “I don't have time.” You have time for Facebook but not His Book? What's wrong with that picture? 

You say, “Are you against Facebook?”

No, unless it's become an idol in your life and it's stealing time for the Lord. This whole issue exposes the idols in my life. Anything that crowds out time for God is an idol—work, study, recreation, physical fitness, relationships, ministry, sleep, computer games. Ours is a culture that is always seeking to be amused, entertained, and satisfied. I'll tell you what Satan does. He sits there and laughs, down wherever he is, because he's got us amusing ourselves to death and never getting truly satisfied with the bread of life.

Jesus said to Martha, “You're anxious and troubled about many things, but only one thing is absolutely needful” (see Luke 10:41–42). Have you chosen that good part? Are you choosing it? This time will tether your heart to God, to His kingdom and His ways. It will keep you from being set adrift in this world, being driven by your emotions and by your circumstances and by other people.

Students, let me just tell you this, it will not get any easier when you get out of here. You think you're busy now? I thought I was busy in Bible college. It won't get any easier when you get out in ministry and have a family of your own. It will provide a stability for your life, for the storms to come.

Remember what Jesus said to the man who built his house on the foundation of a rock? When the storms come, and they will, your house will stand because you were the wise person that Jesus said heard His words and kept them (see Matt. 7:24–25).

I told you I’ve been meditating on Psalm 27. The psalmist says, “You have said, 'Seek my face'" (v. 8). The ESV marginal note says that command to seek My face was given not just to one person but to many. God says to all of us, “Seek My face.” But then David personalizes it. He says, “My heart says to you, your face, LORD, do I seek” (v. 8). What's he saying? "It doesn't matter whether anybody else does or not, I’m going to be one who will choose that most needful thing."

Dannah: That’s Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth. Maybe you’ve had a long-standing habit of meeting with the Lord in prayer and Bible study. I hope Nancy has encouraged you to keep going in 2022! One way to strengthen your quiet time habit is a resource we’re calling the The Place of Quiet Rest Journal. Nancy put this together as a practical way to interact with Scripture. You read a passage in your Bible, then in the journal you write down your observations, what it means, and how it applies to your life. Then each day also has a place for you to write out your response to God, your prayer, and some takeaway thoughts. It’s a helpful resource. And we’d love to get a copy into your hands.

Here in January, The Place of Quiet Rest Journal is our way of saying "thank you" to you for your donation of any amount. There’s more information at ReviveOurHearts.com, or call us at 1–800–569–5959.

Tomorrow, Gretchen Saffles joins us to help us understand how we can better bring God’s Word into our lives. I was just looking at Gretchen's books online. Do you know that she is one of the breakaway Christian authors of this past year. You are really going to want to hear this conversation with Gretchen tomorrow on Revive Our Hearts.

Challenging you to make your devotional life a priority, Revive Our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth calls you to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

All Scripture is taken from the English Standard Version unless otherwise noted.

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