Skip to main content

Time with God for new moms



Everyone I know has at some point or another said they have difficulties making time to spend with the Lord.

I thought I had issues...until I had a baby. I could hardly take a shower or eat more than a granola bar. How was I supposed to sit down for a half hour to study scripture? I beat myself up over it for a while, until I had been back at work for months and I listened to an episode of the Journeywomen Podcast. It’s about spiritual disciplines and a man is the guest, but he gets it.

“If you’re a young mother and you’re getting up at five o’clock in the morning or maybe three o’clock in the morning with a fussy child, or a child that needs to eat, maybe the most spiritual thing that you could do in that moment is not beat yourself up because you’re not getting to read your Bible like you want to, but to recognize that right then, you’re serving! You’re serving! That’s a spiritual discipline. You’re serving your child and your family. Maybe the most spiritual thing you can do in that moment is to not be reading your Bible or practicing some more romantic spiritual discipline. Maybe the best thing you can do in that moment is to serve that child and then to go take a nap.”

Then, the very same podcast addressed this issue again two episodes later.

“Remember to give yourself some grace in this season. God has put you in the season you’re in. He isn’t caught off guard if you are exhausted from being up five times at night with a baby. Just do what you can. This may mean that you’re just reading Scripture and then maybe coming back at another time to dig a little deeper. Or maybe this is just the time for you to read through the entire Bible and then jump back into a more in-depth study when you’re able to. Utilize nap times. Don’t think that your quiet time has to be quiet! A lot of times, it’s just not. On the flip side, we also have to be willing to take a long, hard look at ourselves and give grace when we’re in those difficult seasons where it’s just a really trying season, and also be able to recognize when we really need to shift our priorities and prioritize God’s Word.”

How freeing is that? Time with the Lord doesn’t have to mean an Instagram-worthy moment with coffee and perfect calligraphy in your journaling Bible.

This doesn’t mean you’re giving God your leftovers. It’s letting him meet you where you’re at. It, of course, doesn’t mean making excuses to get out of spending time with him. But, it does mean that he gives you grace because of the season you’re in. So you should give yourself some grace too.

The Well-Watered Women blog hits the nail right on the head by addressing lies we believe about quiet time.

Quiet time doesn’t have to be quiet. It doesn’t have to feel good. It doesn’t have to be perfect.

Don't put the pressure on yourself to make it perfect. Give yourself grace here. After all, it's a perfect God meeting with an imperfect human. He knows you're imperfect. Give him the best you can each day. If that best is two verses of a Psalm while you're finally using the bathroom in peace, then that's great! That is your best for that day.

(Stay tuned for Part 2 of this post, I’ll share some ways I’m able to fit in my own imperfect resemblance of a quiet time in the midst of having a young child and working a full-time job.)
Labels:

Comments

  1. salimeasleyFebruary 25, 2022 at 4:10 PM

    Why do casinos charge a fee for players? | GoyangFC
    Casino gambling is not bet365 가상 축구 an easy thing, especially in 슬롯머신 Europe. It 온라인 슬롯 is also an 러시안룰렛 extremely dangerous thing to do. It also makes golden star it

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Yes, read to your baby!

Babies are just lumps of cuteness that sleep, eat, cry and poop for months. They don't understand your words, but you still talk to them, right? While they don't understand the stories in books, it's still important to read to babies. Research finds that early exposure to language has a “profound influence on children's learning through life,” according to this NPR story from 2014 . There's nothing to lose by reading to a young baby, only something to gain. To read to a baby or child, you are close to them, which is a bonding experience too! The article states: "Just one-third of children in families below the poverty threshold are read to daily. That statistic improves as family income rises. But less than two-thirds of children in families making $95,400 for a family of four are read to daily, according to the 2011-2012 National Survey of Children's Health. As a result, children in poorer families lag behind in language processing as earl
20 comments
Read more

Chocolate Peanut Butter Banana steel cut oats in 15 minutes

The Instant Pot is a kitchen gadget that seems too good to be true. It claims to be able to replace several other appliances and cook time consuming things like sweet potatoes in only a few minutes. It's not too good to be true. And for a working mom, it's a necessity. When I do the bulk of my cooking on the weekends, It's not unusual for me to use my Instant Pot four times each weekend day! If you're not an Instant Pot owner already, at the very basic level, it's an electric pressure cooker that also has a saute mode and a slow cooking mode. You can cook rice, hard-boiled eggs, pasta dishes, soup, a whole chicken in it and more. If that's not enough to convince you, maybe this recipe for chocolate peanut butter banana steel cut oats will. This recipe is my version I've perfected over a few months, using bits and pieces of other recipes. And of course, all of the ingredients can be found at Aldi. I add a little bit of sugar to it when the bananas are
2 comments
Read more

How I do ONE Aldi trip every other week

Right around the time a more expensive chain bought out our favorite affordable grocery store nearby, an Aldi opened 20 minutes away. I gradually transitioned to shopping only at Aldi, and doing it every other week. With the driving distance, it doesn't make sense to me to take a chunk out of every weekend. This means some sacrifices. Aldi doesn't have everything. They don't have the name-brand of pasta sauce we love. I can't pin any recipe and buy the ingredients for it. I have to bag our own groceries. I go shopping at Aldi every other weekend with the goal of spending under $200 for everything except pet supplies and a small handful of personal care items and and cleaning supplies we get through Grove Collaborative (that order is about $15 every month or every other month). In between Aldi trips we often have to stop to stock up on bread, milk, eggs and the occasional item Aldi doesn't have. We buy diapers, wipes, trash bags, dishwasher detergent, toilet
Post a Comment
Read more