Sometimes drawing close to God is hard. You read your daily devotions, you pray quickly, then you rush off to make breakfast for the kids, or go to work. Life is a chore! And sometimes you just want to rest! I understand. My life is crazily busy too.
Stress, busyness of life, and most recently world crisis, has shifted humanity into a spirit of fear and out of a spirit of boldness and courage. These difficulties can sometimes cloud our judgement, our minds and make us spiritually weak. We panic instead of pray, and look to the world for the global response, instead of taking it to the Father for answers.
Kenneth Copeland says, "fear tolerated is faith contaminated; and contaminated faith doesn't work." We either trust God and run to Him, or we fear the world and all that is in it. We can't really sit on the fence of both, it is usually one way or the other. What I find works is I stay near God all the time, in and out of season, in and out of trouble, good times and bad times. He is not someone I just run to when I need something, He is the only one I run to, all the time.
But this was not always the case. I would usually find myself drowning in deep dark pits that He would have to drag me back out of, or at the end of my rope for a situation before running to Him, or choking on the desires of the world that overclouded my judgement and my desires. But now I find it easy to just surrender every day. Have a conversation every day. Listen to the Holy Spirit and watch what is happening in the spiritual realms everyday. Does someone in the spirit realm visit me and try to break inside my hedging of protection? Are Angels there watching my back during the day? Is the Holy Spirit moving and trying to tell me something? Does someone need me to pray for them through their crisis.
But for everyone spiritual growth may be different. Irrespective of your experience, or supernatural encounters, you can still get close to God and achieve spiritual growth – even if you don’t feel like it. Understanding how to study the bible and praying effectively will assist you on your journey toward spiritual maturity.
How did Jesus do it? We know He was God made flesh, but He still prayed like all of humanity. So how did He pray as a human and get spiritual growth.
The Steps:
1. He prayed early in the morning before everyone got up daily.
2. Prayer was His priority.
3. He asked God before He made any commitments for that day.
4. He knew His daily plan after speaking to God
5. He consulted God first always.
TIPS:
1. A great way to do all these things and stay focused is Prayer Journaling.
Having a Prayer journal keeps you focused during prayer time so you don’t drift into your daily planning without God.
2. Have questions ready for God that you may want to ask, or who you will be praying for.
3. Write down your discouragements that week and talk about it to God.
4. Holy Spirit will bring Key words to your mind, do a bible study of those words that week.
5. Read the Bible to God and ask Him what you don't understand.
6. Bring all your requests to God and write down the answers. Usually He will give you a scripture, study that during the week.
"For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God." [Romans 8:19]
"I will be a Father to you, and you will be My sons and daughters," says the Lord [2 Corinthians 6:18]
Learn more in Free eBook "Five Keys to Answered Prayer"
