FOUNDATIONS: 1 Making the Most of My God Times

What is the most important reason to spend time with God?
What are suggested elements of biblical meditation?
What will be some hindrances to consistently having God Times? How can you overcome these?
What was especially meaningful to you in this chapter? Why?

Spending time with God has been the most life changing and enjoyable thing Kurt has ever done. Which is why he has spent a lot of time with God. Kurt became a Christian while serving in the U. S. Army in West Germany. He remembers actually enjoying the long and frequent times under the stars in the middle of nowhere on guard duty. He would pull out his pocket New Testament (NT) and listen to all the new things God was teaching him.

In college Kurt regularly got up early in the morning before classes and walked to a nearby church to spend time with God. Sometimes he even stayed overnight in that church, sleeping on the floor of the sanctuary, just to be with God. It was during those times that God revealed Himself to Kurt through Scripture in life changing ways.

Becoming a Pastor was just another reason to spend time with God. In fact, for many years he spent more time with God than any other person. Kurt knows what the Apostle Peter meant when he wrote:

Like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation. (1 Peter 2:2 NASB ^[1])

Spending time with God is the most important thing you can do.

Why spend time with God?

A God Time is: a conversation with God by talking to Him in prayer and listening to Him in Scripture. Why should we spend time doing this? The best answer may surprise you. The most important reason to spend time with God is to bless Him! David began his God Time recorded in Psalm 103 with “Bless the Lord, O my soul” (v. 1, NASB). We seek God’s blessing in our God Times, but let us first seek to bless God!

Do you know how much your Father in Heaven enjoys spending time with you? How much He appreciates you sacrificing some time just to focus on Him? It blesses Him! When you think about all the wicked people and evil things that your Father will see and hear on Earth today, imagine how much joy, glory, and pleasure He experiences when He sees and hears you spending time with Him. Loving God is the ultimate and primary reason you should do anything. And spending time with God is one of the most important ways you can love Him today. In fact, if you do not take some time each day to talk and listen to your Father in Heaven, can you really claim you are loving Him at all? Spend time with God first and foremost to bless, honor, glorify, and love God!

God Times will certainly bless you too. Our text says: “Like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation” (1 Peter 2:2 NASB). This study assumes you have “salvation” and have a personal relationship with Christ through trusting in Christ to pay for your sins by His death on the cross. If you have any doubts that you have this personal relationship with Christ, then we would encourage you to complete Christian Essentials study #1: FORGIVENESS before proceeding in this study. ^[2]

The purpose of this study #2: FOUNDATIONS is to help you “grow in respect to salvation.” Among the greatest desires of a Christian is to grow. Grow in your faith in God, relationship with God, enjoyment of God, imitation of God, and obedience to God. In fact, if your greatest desires are not these things, it is doubtful you are a Christian. But many Christians are not willing to do what is necessary to spiritually grow.

Our text tells us one thing you need to grow: “Like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation” (1 Peter 2:2 NASB). Have you ever seen a newborn craving its mother’s milk? The Greek word here for “long” expresses desire in the strongest possible terms because of a great need. The reason why an infant so desperately hungers for their mother’s milk is because that is their greatest need. And so is God’s word for us. Growing as a Christian means growing closer to God. Nothing draws you closer to God than Him speaking to you. And this is what He does through Scripture. Which is why you desperately need “the pure milk of the word” to “grow in respect to salvation.”

But to spiritually grow you must not only “long for the pure milk of the word” but you must consume it. A baby who craves its mother’s milk but does not actually consume it will remain weak and even die. How do you get “the pure milk of the word” off the pages of Scripture and into you? Setting aside God Time and having a conversation with Him by listening to Him through Scripture and talking to Him through prayer.

You need spiritual strength and nourishment to live for God each day. Jesus told the devil: “The Scriptures say, ‘People do not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Matt 4:4). Just like food nourishes and strengthens you physically, the word of God strengthens you spiritually. Because the Psalmist knew his need to spend time with God, he exclaimed: “My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? (Psalm 42:2 NIV)

Our text says Scripture is “pure” (cf. Ps 12:6). Think a moment about all the mental “junk food” you take in every day through people, the internet, television, movies, and just life experiences. Through these your enemy the devil constantly communicates lust, fear, greed, anger, selfishness, and worthlessness in order to destroy your spiritual life. Consuming God’s word protects you from these spiritual diseases.

But spending time with God is not just about listening to God in Scripture. He also gives you the tremendous privilege of worshipping Him through praise and talking to Him through prayer! In Scripture God speaks to you. Through praise and prayer you speak to God. What is more important in your life than these? This is why spending time with God is the most important thing you can do.

Jesus spent much time with His Father because He loved Him and was strengthened by Him. “Very early in the morning . . . Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed” (Mark 1:35-36). “One of those days Jesus went out to a mountainside to pray, and spent the night praying to God” (Luke 6:12-13). “Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed” (Luke 5:16). And so should you.

In fact, every man or woman who did great things for God, spent a lot of time with God. Moses spent 40 days on a mountain with God and numerous other times in the “Tent of Meeting” (cf. Exod 34:28; 33:7). The Psalms of David are a record of some of his God Times. The Apostle Paul constantly referred to his prayer life (cf. Rom 1:10; Eph 1:16; Phil 1:4; Col 1:9; 2 Thess 1:11; 2 Tim 1:3; Phlm 4). And the Apostle Peter knew from experience that, “Like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation” (1 Peter 2:2 NASB). These men spent a lot of time with God! Spending time with God is the most important thing you can do.

How to spend time with God? The P.O.W.E.R. plan

We have no desire to be legalistic about how to spend time with God. But the Scriptures and experience tell us there are some helpful elements of a God Time. These elements can be reflected in the acronym P.O.W.E.R. It reminds you that one of the purposes for God Time is receiving spiritual nourishment and strength. And having a plan like P.O.W.E.R. can help you focus on having a conversation with God. Scripture says, “be earnest and disciplined in your prayers” (1 Pet 4:7). One of the most difficult things about spending time with God is staying focused. The P.O.W.E.R plan will help you do that. P.O.W.E.R. stands for:

Praise

Openness

Word

Entreaties

Resolutions

Praise is a good way to begin a conversation with God. “Enter His gates with thanksgiving; go into His courts with praise. Give thanks to Him and praise His name” (Ps 100:4). The “name” of God represents His character, and beginning your God Time by focusing on who He is will help you have the proper perspective on who you are spending time with! And thanking Him for His blessings will give you the proper perspective on your day and your whole life, no matter what else is happening to you. As we discuss later in this study, there is a tremendous amount of power in praise.

Spending time to worship and thank God at the beginning of your day is another way you love and bless God. God says: “Giving thanks is a sacrifice that truly honors me” (Ps 50:23). Remember the ten lepers Jesus healed but only one returned to thank Him?! Jesus asked, “Where are the other nine? Has no one else returned to praise God?” (Luke 17:17-18). He seemed hurt by their lack of gratitude. Do not be like the majority of people who take God’s blessings for granted. Be like the one who returns to Him every day to thank Him for His goodness.

Openness is being honest with God about your feelings. This is essential to having a real relationship with Him. David illustrates this throughout his Psalms. And so did Jesus. “While Jesus was here on earth, he offered prayers and pleadings, with a loud cry and tears” (Heb 5:7). Jesus was honest with His Father about His feelings, and you should be too.

Spending time with God is often referred to as a “quiet time.” But this idea can hinder the honest expression of feelings to God. The verse above tells us that Jesus’ times with God sometimes included “loud crying and tears.” Some of the best God Times are not “quiet times” at all.

In fact, we strongly encourage you to express all your praise and prayer out loud to God during your God Times. One of the greatest difficulties you will have is staying focused on God; your mind will constantly want to wander and think about other things. If you keep your conversation with God merely in your mind, you will be much more likely to think about a lot of other things. Expressing your praise and prayers out loud will greatly help you keep your mind and time focused on God.

Some Christians struggle with expressing sinful feelings like anger and worry to God. But read the Psalms. They are a record of divinely inspired God Times and there is a lot of emotion expressed in them. Both good feelings like joy and thanksgiving, but also bad feelings like anger, envy, sorrow, disappointment, guilt, and fear. The Bible says, “Give all your worries and cares to God because He cares about you” (1 Pet 5:7). You can hardly GIVE your worries to God without EXPRESSING them to Him.

Of course, God already “knows the secrets of every heart” (Ps 44:21). But it is important for you to recognize and respond to what is in your heart. “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life” (Prov 4:23). Your whole day, week, and life will be controlled by what is in your “heart.” You cannot even begin to “guard your heart” against evil beliefs, desires, and emotions until you know what is there. Your feelings reflect what you are really believing. Learn to be open with God about what is in your heart so He can help you change it.

Word refers to the truth of Scripture. ^[3] There are many ways to interact with God through His word. But the worst way is the most common way Christians practice. They just read the Bible like any other book and do not EXPERIENCE it as God talking to them. How can you more consistently experience God in Scripture?

PRAY through Scripture, do not just read it. And we mean pray out loud. Try it and you will experience the difference. It is harder to PRAY rather than merely read through Scripture. You will need a place where no one can hear you. It will take some time to make it a habit. But if you will learn to PRAY out loud through Scripture, having conversations with God about what you are reading, instead of just reading God’s word like any other book, it will be one of the most life changing things you ever do.

How do you PRAY through Scripture? As you read, pause often to talk out loud to the Author about what it says. After all, the goal is to spend time with a Person, not just a book. Stop and think about statements that seem important to you. If you read a promise, thank God for it. If you read a command, ask for God’s help to obey it. Make God Times a two-way conversation with God! PRAYING through Scripture will help you get the Word of God off the pages of Scripture and into your heart. Start today!

God told Joshua: “Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful” (Josh 1:8-9 NIV). The key to experiencing God’s word instead of just reading it is to “meditate on it.” How do you meditate on Scripture? God told Joshua how: “Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips.” Speaking Scripture, and verbalizing it, is how you meditate on it. And praying through Scripture is an important way to meditate on it. This is why we highly recommend reading and praying Scripture out loud. God said His Scripture is to be “on your lips” not just in your head. Reading and praying Scripture out loud will help you to focus and meditate on it.

But keeping Scripture “always on your lips” to “meditate on it” probably refers to two additional practices that were prevalent in Old Testament (OT) culture: discussing and memorizing Scripture (cf. Deut 11:18-20). We will discuss the first one in the next chapter.

Memorizing God’s word is a vital practice for the Christian. The Psalmist said: “I have hidden your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you” (Ps 119:11). The original Hebrew word translated “hidden” means to store up, treasure, and protected something. That certainly requires memorizing Scripture. One Scripture memorized is worth a thousand merely read. This is why throughout the Christian Essential studies you will be encouraged to memorize the main verse for each chapter. The memory verses for this study are listed in Appendix C. Write the memory verse down so you can look at it often. Speak it out loud “on your lips” 10 times and you are close to locking it in your heart. ^[4]

To “meditate on” God’s word is to think deeply about how it applies to your life. How can you do this? Again, start with your feelings. And ask yourself some vital questions: What are you feeling today? Do you have any bad feelings? Why are you feeling that way? What lie are you believing to make you feel anxious, angry, depressed, etc.? What would God say to you about that false belief? This is how you practically use “the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God” (Eph 6:16-17) to confront controlling lies in your life. If you believe, “the truth will set you free” (John 8:32).

Notice how the Psalmist does this when he writes: “Why am I discouraged? Why is my heart so sad? I will put my hope in God!” (Ps 42:5). Your Openness to God will lead to experiencing God in His word, instead of just reading. Meditating on God’s word and how it applies to what is happening in your heart, will change your day, and your life.

The practice of praying and meditating through Scripture is why we suggest reading shorter sections of Scripture each day. This means that in some God Times you might meditate on only one verse. Maybe a memory verse. Remember, if you really want to consume “the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation,” the goal is not to just “get through the Bible,” but to get the Bible in you.

We would also suggest you read the NT before, and more often than, the OT. The NT applies more to the Christian’s life. However, you will find the Psalms and Proverbs in the OT very helpful as well. Of course, while you are going through this Christian Essentials study, its chapters can be your Scripture reading for the day a few times a week.

Entreaties simply mean prayers and requests to God. The Bible says, “Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus” (Phil 4:6-7). This summarizes much of what we have said about God Time. Be open with God about your feelings (e.g. “worry”). Praise “him for all he has done.” And “you will experience God’s peace” and “guard your hearts” against worry if you ask why you are feeling that way, recognize the lie you believe, and replace it with God’s truth.

But the focus in your God Time should not always be yourself. With Entreaties you can pray for others. And as will be discussed later in this study, this kind of prayer is how you see the power of God work in your life.

Resolutions simply means commitments and decisions to act. Notice that God did not want Joshua to only pray about, talk about, memorize, and meditate on His word. He told Joshua the reason for these other disciplines was “so that you may be careful to do everything written in it.” Again, simply reading about God is not enough to change your life. Many Christians do this because it is easy, but they do not grow. The Bible says, “Don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves. . . If you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free, and if you do what it says and don’t forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it” (Jas 1:22, 25).

Before you leave your God Time, decide on something you can obey that day. How can you be kind to someone today? How can you represent Christ to someone today? What specifically would you like to do for God today? Decide it, plan it, then do it.

Again, the P.O.W.E.R. plan is not intended to be legalistic. Some people will enjoy and connect with God more through different parts of it. Some will find singing a song during the Praise time very meaningful. Others will enjoy journaling during the Word or Entreaties part. Experiment and feel free to do what helps you the most to be encouraged and in love with God.

Finally, we offer some additional suggestions about your God Times, but again, with no desire to be legalistic. It is usually best to choose a specific place and time for your God Time. Try to find a place where you can pray out loud without being heard by others.

Consider scheduling your daily God Time in the morning. David said: “Listen to my voice in the morning, Lord. Each morning I bring my requests to you and wait expectantly” (Ps 5:3). Likewise, we noted above that, “Very early in the morning . . . Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed” (Mark 1:35-36).

Is posture important for spending time with God? Maybe more than many think. There is coming a Day when God will finally get what He has always wanted and “every knee will bow” before Him (Isa. 45:23). We can kneel now, at the beginning of every day, as a sign of respect to our King. Millions of Muslims kneel before their “god” seven times a day. Most Christians do not kneel before our real God even once a day. There is no need to be legalistic about it, but the Apostle Paul practiced it himself (cf. Eph. 3:14). An entire God Time need not be spent on your knees, but perhaps your initial Praise time.

How long should a God Time be? Martin Luther said, “I want to spend enough time with Jesus every day that my heart gets glad.” ^[5] That is how you know you have really spent time with God! Your praise, prayer, openness, and meditation on God’s word has replaced your anger, anxiety, and apathy, with love, joy, and peace. Obviously you can and should fellowship with God all day. But ideally you should leave your God Time with the P.O.W.E.R. to love, serve, and glorify God throughout your day.

However, it may be good to set a time goal for your God Time. This will help you “stretch your soul.” You might be amazed at how difficult it will be to simply focus on praising God for literally two minutes or to pray for others for just three minutes.

A good goal to work towards is to spend 30 minutes each day going through the P.O.W.E.R. plan. But it is more important to spend time with God every day, even if it will not be very long. Do not underestimate the power of even a 5 minute God Time! But longer times can certainly be more life-changing. This is why you will be encouraged and instructed how to spend a 1 hour time with God in this study.

“Like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation” (1 Peter 2:2 NASB). Spending time with God is the most important thing you can do.

► Return to the beginning and answer the questions there.

► Memorize 1 Peter 2:2 in the translation above or another one.

► Look at the “P.O.W.E.R. Plan for God Times” in Appendix A. Try “stretching your soul” for 30 minutes following the plan. Share your experience in your Barnabas Group this week.

► Read the next chapter to prepare for your Barnabas Group this week.

“Pure milk of the word” translates Gr. logikon from logos meaning “word.” This translation is supported by the references to Scripture in the preceding vs. (1:23-25). ↑
The FORGIVENESS study on how to become a Christian and know you are a one can be purchased from the New Life Resource Center in the front foyer of the church or obtained free online from the New Life website at http://www.newlifecr.com. ↑
We recommend the New Living Translation (NLT). A version with helpful notes can be purchased in the New Life Resource Center in the front foyer of the church. For a thorough study of Bible translations see Pastor Kurt’s book at

http://trainingtimothys.org/books/book-15-bible-translations/.

A good electronic Bible program for your phone or computer can be found at https://www.olivetree.com/. A very effective verse search program is Google. ↑
There are some helpful and free apps available to help with verse memorization. A good one can be found at https://scripturetyper.com/. ↑
Quoted in Every Man a Warrior, Lonnie Berger, Book 1, p. 35. ↑