"My voice shalt thou hear in the morning, O LORD; in the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee, and will look up" (Psalm 5:3 KJV).
Any Christian down through the centuries who did anything for God and made a difference in the world held regular devotions with God (Daniel 6:10).
Devotions are a time of our private worship of God that includes, at the least, Bible reading and prayer. Devotions are a time spent letting God talk to us through His word with the Holy Spirit giving us understanding and then us speaking to God about Himself, ourselves and others and what we say being shaped by what God has just said to us. This two-way conversation is called devotion and continues as long as life lasts. And this is how we come to know our Bible and God our Father.
Most devotions, if they can be called that, are just a few snippets of time where Christians read a "verse for the day" and offer a quick prayer, and then they're out the door to work or school.
Devotions are not finding time for God but making time for God. Finding time for God means we squeeze in time to be with Him if all our worldly activities allow us to. Making time for God means we will set aside a period of time to meet with God regularly and will not let anything intrude into that time. If all we do is find time for God, we will not find God during that time. But if we faithfully make time for God, we find Him and discover that He is remaking us during that time.
Some prefer the evening hours for their devotions, and others prefer the early morning hours. The morning hours are the better choice because we have just risen out of sleep, and our minds are fresh and not tangled up by the activities of the day as they would be with evening devotions. And we go to bed early to be able to rise early to have our time with God.
In our devotions, it is best to read and meditate on Scripture and have God speak to us first. Our following prayer, in which we speak to God, will then be according to God's will. With morning devotions, God is the first one to speak to us, and God is the first person we speak to.
Our devotions are not something we do so that we can check them off our to-do list as a good Christian. We have devotions because we have the desire to make conscious contact with God, linger in His presence, hear from Him and have Him hear us. If, during our time of devotion, we are not hearing from God and we know God is not hearing us, then we know that because of sin, we have lost affinity or fellowship with God. Our fellowship is so important to God that He ceases to speak or listen to us until we acknowledge our sin, repent of it and have our fellowship restored (Isaiah 59:1-2).
If we take our devotions lightly and give ourselves little time with God in Bible reading, prayer and self-examination and to check our affinity with God, the devil will surely get the upper hand in our lives. Our devotions are our daily appointment with God our Father, and if we will guard our time and faithfully meet with Him, we will soon find that meeting with God is our daily delight.
