I once heard a speaker say that God will never leave or forsake you. That is true according to Hebrews 13:5. But in the same message, he said that if you do not start your day with the LORD by having a “quiet time” you go into your day without the LORD! How can that be? He is either with you or He isn’t? Or is His presence with you conditional on whether you have a “quiet time?” Did you have one this morning? Oh good, then He is with you. You didn’t? Then He is not with you if we go by what he said. So how do you decide?
What does the Word teach? It teaches He is always with us. “I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you…Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous! Do not tremble or be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.” – {Heb 13:5; Joshua 1:9}. How would you and I know this? We always go back to what His Word says as the final authority. And the only way we do not have the misconception that If we don’t have a “quiet time” I am facing this day all on my own, is because we have seen it in His Word. We have been in His Word…
The speaker had gone outside the bounds of Scripture and taking a “good thing” and elevated it above the Scriptures. Can you imagine the guilt, confusion, turmoil that could cause a young mom trying to get up in the morning, feed the kids, get them ready for school and deal with their fighting and then the thought comes, “God is not with you because you didn’t have “a quiet time!”How dangerous, demoralizing and deceptive that is. I am not saying the speaker deliberately tried to deceive but he was wrong. He elevated a tradition above the Word of God and in doing so could put people in bondage!This can be one misconception about having a “quiet time”- You wrongly think and believe, “If I don’t have one or miss one then I am going into the day without the LORD.” And so, fear has an entrance due to a misconception! And if anything, “bad” or difficult happens that day then you interpret it because you didn’t have a “quiet time” and God is”punishing “you and has abandoned you. He has left you on your own! It is thinking wrong about God! It is wrong thinking about… God!It is to believe a lie about God and then present that lie to others as though it is true! So, not only has the evil one deceived you but using you to spread deception to others!
So, “fear” becomes your motivation for having a “quiet time,” rather than the desire to spend time with the LORD to hear from Him in His Word and speak to Him in prayer by carving out some time to be able to do so.God’s promises never to leave or abandon you and He is always with you is not dependent upon you but on Him!Take courage and rest in His love… you can never be more accepted by God than you are now, for you are “accepted in the Beloved” and that is irrevocable-{Eph 1:6} –🙂
Having “A Quiet time” is not a duty to be performed but an aid to help a relationship to be developed!
{From “When a ‘Quiet’ time is Not ‘Quiet,’ What Do You Do?”}
