The Quiet Time

Note:  The Christmas season has afforded me the opportunity to have a couple of weeks vacation and this has afforded me a respite from the busy and cramp schedule.  I also took this opportunity to clean up mu bookshelves and fortunately I found a file of old manuscripts I have written almost twenty years ago.  I would like to share with you this piece entitled The Quiet Time. I wrote this article way back in 1990 and was published in the youth section of the bi weekly journal The Messenger of Truth in June 20, 1990.

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On of the spiritual exercises that are indespensible to Christian growth is the quiet time.  Each and everyone of us feels the need for an inner fortitude to sustain us in our daily walk of life.  Therefore the apostle Paul prays, "That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man." (Ephesians 3:16)

The object of practicing the quiet time is for us to be still and know the Lord is God.  We need to set aside an hour where , in quietness and stillness, we can think about the goodness of God, where in quietness we can open our hearts to God.  Sometimes during the busy hours of the Day our thoughts are so scattered; we hardly have room for for thoughts about God.  If we are not used to giving the first hours of our mornings to God, we might find our day trivial and our evenings unpleasant.  If this is the case let us ask God to direct our meditation upon the love of God.

A good part of the day to have our quiet time is the early morning.  While there is no set rule, the time most convenient for us will do.  The Bible is the tool we use in our meditations as we spend our quiet time.  A good devotional book may be a good supplement.  As much as possible there should be privacy.  It will be easier for us to direct our thoughts to God when we are in private.  Jesus said, "Be though, when though prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hst shut thy door, pray to thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly" (Matthew 6:6)

Spending time more with God will change our charcter.

Mental discipline is one of the factors that will contribute to the degree of blessing we can receive in our quiet time.  Sometimes our thoughts are prone to jump form one point to another.  Thus in our quiet time we must realize we are communing with God.  Our minds must be directed to Him.  If we have problems, such as, jobs or business pressures, let us leave them behind while we enjoy our quiet time and devotions.  Remember that for everything there is  a proper time.  If we are willing to commit everything to God, then He shall make everything beautiful in His time (Ecclesiastes 3:11).  The time we spend with God will always be for our own benefit.  We can receive every blessing that God has stored for us.  Let us take Moses as an example.  Forty days and nights he spent with God caused his face to be so brilliant that he had to veil it.  He was so immersed in the divine presence that God's glory was abiding in him.  He was not conscious of that until the Israelites told him they feared to approached him because his face was so brilliant with light.  In the New Testament, Paul compared Moses' experience  in this verse: "But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the Glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord". (II Corinthians 3:18).   Spending time more with God will change our charcter.  In this way we find strength to do our daily tasks and duties.  This inward strength will be a motivating factor for us to work for the Lord.  This will give the Holy Spirit a chance to implant in our hearts convictions that would surely build us into mature Christians.

We cannot minimize the role of quiet time in relation to our spiritual development, if we neglect this spiritual exercise, we will find it difficult to listen to God.  We will not be able to perceive the voice of God wile our mind is occupied with the cares of this life.  When God spoke to Elijah, He spoke in a "still small voice" (II Kings 19:12).  Can we hear this "still small voice" if our minds are occupied with the hub of activities? Of course we can hear God in the busy workplace just as we can hear Him in the loneliness of a desert.  Quietness is a state of heart and mind.  It is even possible for us to go in the quietness of the desert and yet our hearts can be filled with turmoil.  As we set a certain time of the day for our quiet him, we will discover that it is very worth the while.  There we can hear that "still small voice" speaking in the depths of our soul.  As we bow ourselves to God, our hearts will be filled with reverence for Him who has saved us and washed us from our sins.