Getting Started: Three Keys to Establishing a Consistent Priority Time
I remember when Clyde Cranford first taught me how to have a priority time. He started with the basics and just asked me to spend at least twenty minutes a day with God through the Bible and prayer. It was a simple and straightforward requirement that anybody should have been able to honor. Unfortunately, it took six months to establish consistency in my priority time. Clyde never emphasized consistency for legalistic reasons; he emphasized consistency because he knew, apart from Jesus Christ, I could do nothing. He knew that if I wasn’t abiding in Christ, then I couldn’t bear fruit, more fruit and much fruit.
The first key to establishing a consistent priority time is humbly asking God to give you the desire and ability. The truths of John 15:1–11 were foundational for me. I had to humble myself and admit that I couldn’t even spend twenty unhurried minutes with God in His Word and prayer by my own determination and discipline. I remember waking up in the morning and praying this prayer, “God, give me the desire and ability to spend time with You through Your Word and prayer today.” I would constantly have to confess my resistance and ask God for forgiveness. I was so frustrated with myself that I wrote down this question, “Would you rather be rested or holy?” and taped it onto my alarm clock. I had to answer that question every morning before I chose to hit the snooze button. The hardest part of establishing a consistent priority time is changing your morning routine.
The second key to establishing a consistent priority time is to overcome your fears about reading, understanding and applying the Word of God. The purpose of a priority time isn’t discovering the unknown; it is obeying the known. Our problem with sin and holiness isn’t our lack of knowledge; it is our lack of love and obedience. If you simply seek to know and apply the obvious truths then you will be growing spiritually. Obeying the obvious truths is the first step to understanding the less obvious truths.
The third key to establishing a consistent priority time is your commitment to learn the discipline of focused thinking. You must determine in your mind that you can and will learn how to ask the journalistic questions. Focused thinking is simply a helpful way to answer the question, “What do I see?” The more you ask the journalistic questions of “Who, What, Where, When, Why and How;” the more simple and obvious the truths of the Bible will become. Once you learn how to discover the truth of the Bible, you are dangerously close to developing an addiction, and addictions are always consistent.
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