My Devotional Routine: A Morning filled with Faith, Hope, and Love...
Happy Friday, friends! I hope all of you had an amazing Halloween, and are staying well and sane in the midst of all this craziness.
I know these past few days have been anything but quiet. With the election ending, and wondering what the fate of our country will look like along with the coronavirus still lurking our world, it can be hard to stay positive and not let our fears and anxieties take us down.
This year has definitely been the hardest year I have ever experienced in all my years of living on this Earth, but what 2020 has blessed me with that will forever l be a part of my daily routine for as long as I live is devotional routine, which is what I’m going to share with you all in today’s blog post.
Back in April when the country was still on lockdown, waking up in the morning was extremely difficult. It was very hard to wake up every morning with nothing to look forward to, and not being able to control or fix what was going on around me. I tried everything to distract myself from my worries and uncertainty, but I was still in a deep, dark hole.
However, YouTube (one of my distractions), has led me to the answer to all of my troubles. Ever since Fall 2019, I have been following lifestyle influencer, Allison Bickerstaff, on social media and not only does she make YouTube videos, but she shares her faith on all her platforms. She is a non-denominational Christian, and has been doing devotions, and reading scripture since last year thanks to her husband. After learning about her devotional routine, and seeing how devoting time to the Bible has helped her through her trials, I decided to pick up a Bible myself, and follow my own devotional routine, which is as followed:
I read a devotion from my devotional book
After I make my bed and tidy up my room, I’ll pick up my devotional book, read a page from it and journal. These are daily devotionals so whatever day it is when you read, you read from that page. I’ve been reading devotionals from Paul David Tripp’s, New Morning Mercies, and I love it! Paul not only uses verses, events, and biblical figures from the Bible to make a correlation to the theme of the devotional, but he makes it an obligation to teach to the reader how to not only be a better, and happier person in the eyes of God, but to the rest of the world. Once I’m done reading the devotional, I’ll pen down what I’ve learned from my reading to help me understand it better, and to help me not forget what I’ve grasped. There are a lot of devotional you can choose from but I highly recommend New Morning Mercies if you’re just starting out just like me.
I read scripture
After I’m done reading a devotional, I’ll grab my study Bible (which is The Starting Place study Bible which is in New International Version), and read passages “the Bible in a Year” plan from the Holy Bible app. You can get study plans from numerous sources, including the Holy Bible app, where you can read daily scripture on any topic of your choice. I decided to go with the “Bible in a Year” plan because the last time I studied scripture was when I was in catechism, and that my friends was a very long time ago so I definitely needed to refresh my memory on a few things.
As I’m reading scripture, I will go in and annotate anything that sparks my eye, and any verse or passage that relates to me and how I’m thinking, feeling, and behaving. I ‘ll also highlight special verses with Bible friendly highlighters. This not only helps me understand the Bible more, but it helps renew myself every day with a brand new mindset on life, happiness, trials, and more importantly, faith.
End my devotional routine with a prayer
After I’m done reading and annotating from New Morning Mercies and my Bible, I end my quiet time with a prayer. When I pray, I don’t just pray for myself, but I pray for the protection, wellness, and happiness for my loved ones and for the rest of the world. When I pray, it is my time to talk to God for His help. After I’m done praying, I’ll head down to the kitchen to make my breakfast and start my day.
Before I end today’s blog post, I just want to make one thing clear and say that I am not trying to push religion. The point of today’s content, and the whole blog in general, is to share with you all my passions and everything that makes my life a little sweeter. My devotional routine is something that I hold near and dear to my heart, and since we’re all friends here, I wanted to share with you all everything I love.
Another thing I wanted to point out was for anyone who is reading this and is Christian, and wants to expand their knowledge and participation in Biblical faith, I hope today’s content gives you the inspiration, and the proper tools to help you start your journey with the Bible. I want to thank all of you for reading this blog post today, and I hope you will visit again next week. Until then, be courageous, strong, brave, and safe.
-Love, Lexa