I think most followers of Jesus will agree that, in order to be spiritually healthy, prayer and Bible study are essential. Every good pastor talks about the importance of a daily “quiet time”, but do we really talk about what goes on during a quiet time? Am I just supposed to read the Bible and pray a little bit? Do I just sit in a quiet room and think? Quiet times are by no means scientific, but they can and should be strategic. In this series of articles, I’ll be discussing what goes on during a quiet time, and how we can make our time with Jesus more fruitful.

Let me tell you what I mean. There’s a dangerous thought going through the church today that in order to be “spirit led”, we have to refuse any sort of plan or direction. Worship leaders arrive on Sunday morning with no clue what songs they are going to sing, pastors get to the pulpit without any real direction, and Christians walk into a quiet time with no idea what to do. We have forgotten what it means to be strategic and intentional in our relationship with God. Instead, we often enter a quiet time without a plan, hoping the Spirit will show up and do something, but many times we walk away still feeling distant from God. Our quest to be led by the Spirit has actually harmed us by causing us to adopt a lazy spiritual life without any real active pursuit of God. Maybe Jesus is waiting for us to make the first move.

Strategic and intentional people walk into a quiet time knowing, for the most part, what they are going to do, but they also expect God to do something as well. When we open the Bible, we should expect God to speak to us. When we pray, we should expect God to answer us. If we don’t expect anything from God, then God doesn’t have much of a reason to give us anything. God can and will be present in our ordinary actions if we expect Him to be. The Woman at the Well went for some ordinary water, but she came back with extraordinary Living Water. Paul thought his trip to Damascus was going to be ordinary. Mary and Martha thought it was a normal Sunday morning. Jesus is not normal. He is not ordinary, and our expectations of Him shouldn’t be either.

Experiencing Jesus during our quiet time, or any other time, doesn’t mean leaving behind all normalcy and familiarity, or neglecting any plan or strategy. It means expecting God to be present. It means believing that God can and will bless our time spent pursuing Him. It means abundant life through an intimacy with Jesus.

For more thoughts on how to have a productive and fruitful quiet time, stay tuned for my upcoming article titled “More Than a Quiet Time”.