A Crazy Idea for Perky Morning People (and ordinary folk like us)

Six years ago, within a matter of one week, two women told me that they had daily family devotions and prayer before school.  I remember thinking that was clearly a crazy idea reserved for perky morning people.  But the comments planted themselves in my heart, making a nice and cozy home with no intention of leaving.  At the time I had an insomniac baby, a husband who regularly worked until 3 in the morning, and an extremely inconsistent prayer life of my own.

That same year my heart started to change.  One of those same friends, Joanne, convicted me of the importance of a daily morning devotion time.  Over the course of a year, it became as important to me as my morning 4 cups of coffee (yes, at least 4).  My morning devotions became such a blessing to me that I wanted to find a way to share this blessing with my family. 

The idea of morning family devotions continued to nag at me, but a new obstacle had appeared in our life, as Pete’s job took him out of town more and more often.  While I started doing regular, but not daily, devotions with the girls, I prayed that somehow our family could figure out how to make this happen together… daily.  

The answer was not really what I was looking for... but this is how it happened...

This spring our life was turned upside down with a cross country move to North Carolina.  Pete’s new position promised to keep him in town and on normal 8-6 hours.  The girls made the change from homeschool to a private school.  As we sorted out the new pieces of our family puzzle, the idea of daily morning devotions surfaced again.  Pete and I decided it was the time to try.  With some intentional morning routine plans put into place, we were able to squeeze in 10 minutes a day for devotions.  Amazingly that’s all it took, 10 minutes.  All of a sudden we were those perky morning people making a seemingly crazy idea work. While we only had a few months of this new routine, the time together was amazing.    Pete and I are both looking forward to school starting again and getting back into our morning devotions. 

With a new school year just beginning, I want to encourage you to consider structuring your mornings to allow 10 minutes together as a family to read the bible and pray together.  Just 10 minutes, that’s all you need.  Now I know many of you might be where I was a few years ago, thinking there is no way your family can do it, but I want to encourage you to at least pray about the possibility. 

Next week I am going to post 10 ways to save 10 minutes on a school morning.  I hope these practical ideas will help you streamline your morning routine to find the needed 10 minutes together as a family. 

And what are you going to do in those 10 minutes?  Six minutes of bible reading, four minutes of prayer. Next week I will also be posting a 175 day reading plan of the Gospels and Psalms.  In six minutes of reading a day your family can read through these books together this school year.  I hope you’ll pray about joining our family on this reading plan. 

If God is nudging you to take this step with your family and you would like a partner to pray with you, please send me a message or post a comment, it would be my privilege to pray for your family.