You may be told you need to have a “quiet time.” If you notice it can be anything but “quiet!” All kinds of thoughts, feelings can fly through your mind and if you’re not careful you can listen to others and how they had a “wonderful quiet time” and you can become introspective, doubts arise, “what is wrong with me? Why do I not “feel” the presence of God? Why am I not having the same experiences as others?” So then, you end up pursuing a “feeling” rather than the LORD and resting in His Word to you, which is unchanging truth-fact! You look to “walk” with “feelings” as your “assurance,” that God loves you or doesn’t depending on how you “feel.” Sound familiar? Paul said, “We walk by faith not by sight.”{2 Cor 5:7}. He was beaten countless times, rejected, stoned, imprisoned, betrayed and yet he would write, “the life I live, I live by FAITH in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself up for me.”-{Gal 2:20}. Note, he did not say he lived by “feelings,” but “faith in the Son of God.” What motivated him to live so? The love of Christ demonstrated on the cross for him! The term “walk” speaks of lifestyle. His was a life of faith in the Lord Jesus!
Whether you “feel,” anything is not the issue but faith in the Lord Jesus is the only issue! For “without faith it is IMPOSSIBLE to please Him.”-{Heb 11:6}. His Word, your foundation, not ever changing “feelings.” You can have a bad pizza late at night and then when you try and get up early and have time in the Word, you may not “feel” anything but tired and your stomach doesn’t “feel” good, and if you are not living by faith in the LORD Jesus and His Word, but “faith in your feelings,” you can interpret how you “feel” and falsely believe those “feelings” of not feeling good are indications God doesn’t love you! This is not far-fetched if your life is based on how you “feel” to assure you of God’s care and love and faithfulness to you. You will be like someone on a roller coaster ride, unstable spiritually and emotionally worn down and ready to quit. Emotionally and spiritually exhausted! Why? Because you live by “faith” in your “feelings.” “Faith,” in your self, rather than faith in the Savior! So you have to trust Him to stabilize you spiritually to choose to live by faith in the Son of God and what He says as your authority, and not in ever changing feelings! Ask Him to help you, He will, He loves you!
Having “a quiet time,” for some can be an act of legalism. They “feel” if they don’t start off the morning with one, something “bad,” could happen them that day. What they are “feeling” is not true. They “feel” that in having one that they have “appeased” God. In thinking this way they insult the work of Christ. And have fallen back into a “works salvation” mentality.
It is beneficial to your soul to have time in His Word, but don’t put it down as “something to do,” but Someone to seek to know! Feed your soul on His Word. It is spiritually nutritious for your soul.
“We walk by faith, not by sight.”- {2 Cor 5:7}