In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of being aware of our actions and habits. He encourages keeping a log to understand how we spend our time and make necessary changes. The speaker also emphasizes the importance of worship and suggests singing songs and playing instruments as a way to praise God. He then transitions to discussing the book of Mark, specifically chapter one, and suggests breaking up Bible reading into manageable sections. The sermon concludes with a mention of a book on one-on-one discipleship and the speaker's upcoming trip to Brazil.

I'm Peter Axop. I'm retired Air Force, retired back in March. Well, let me open us in prayer. Father, we're here to learn about how we can grow in the depth and breadth of our relationship with you and to learn to delight in you and worship you, to learn to treasure being in your presence. So Father, I ask for your spirit to give each person here one thing from your word that stirs them and draws them closer to the Lord Jesus that we might see him face to face even while we're still here. Amen. Okay, we're looking at quiet time. The official title is Quiet Time Appointment with God. I have a working definition here at the top of the page. Quiet time is a daily time alone with your Lord Jesus in the Bible and in prayer that he might encourage, correct, and train you, and give you direction for the day, and that you might delight in him, giving him the first fruit of your time. So let's look at the parts of that definition and see what sort of scriptures illuminate that for us. Daily time alone with your Lord Jesus. Let's look up Psalm 73, 25 through 26. My flesh and my heart faileth, King James. Thank you, Jerry. Gee, mine didn't have the King James in there. Okay. Whom have I in heaven but thee? And besides thee, I desire nothing on earth. Now, I can't pray that with a whole heart, but I want to be the kind of man who can pray that with a whole heart. That's the kind of man I want to become. I want to say of my Lord Jesus that he is all that I have. And so I delight in him, and I desire nothing else. And so that's the prayer we can have. That's why we have a quiet time, so that our heart grows towards him, so that we can learn to hear his heartbeat, that we can be sensitive to him so that he doesn't have to hit us with a bat to correct us, that he just needs to give us that look. And when you were a kid, you know, your parents had that look they would give you? Okay. So now that's preferable to the swat. But we have to develop a heart for him so that we can see the look before the swat comes, and that we want to have that relationship. And a good servant learns his master so that he can learn to read his master, so that the master doesn't have to say things many times. He just has to look over here or look over there, and the good servant knows what to do. And so it's like every relationship, it takes time. Quiet time will cost you. Jesus bought you with a price, the price of his own blood, so he owns you. So you're not given something that's not his already. But it's time set aside with him so that you can learn to hear his voice, to be a sheep so that you understand his voice when you hear it. So that's why you meet with him once a day, to cultivate your ear for his voice, and so that someday you can pray with a whole heart, whom have I in heaven but thee? And besides thee, I desire nothing on earth. And that fruit of that close relationship is the second half of that verse, or the second verse rather. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength in my heart and my portion forever. That as we know him, then we can have confidence in him. And then we know what his intentions are towards us. And then we believe that he is watching out for us, and that he will never abandon us, and that he will not forsake us. But we don't believe that easily of a stranger. We only believe that of somebody that we have confidence in. And it takes confidence, it takes time to build, it takes a long time. And so quiet time bears fruit early on, but it bears special fruit in the long run. Come on in, grab a handout please. It bears fruit in the long run because as you grow, remember God you can't see, God you can't taste, God you can't touch, God you can't hear with your normal ears. It takes time to grow in that relationship so that you can hear him. So your spirit is sensitive to his spirit. Okay, second part of the definition was in the Bible. Deuteronomy 8.3, let's look that up please. Thank you kitchen crew for being hard at work and cleaning up. So I understand, do not be ashamed about coming in late. I know you were doing work that served the rest of us. So thank you. We appreciate your service. Yes. It's a pleasure to see you. That's the right answer. If you know the reference for that, you get extra points. Is there one? Yes. Remember Jesus told the story, this is a freebie, it's not on your agenda. Jesus told a story about the servants who came in from the field and immediately served the master his dinner. Serve the master first before you could eat. Yeah. And the response was, we're unworthy servants, we did only what we were supposed to do. And that was the illustration Jesus gave of the servant. I don't know the reference either, but I know it's in there. We can look it up at the end. I got electronic concordance here. Okay. Deuteronomy 8.3. Would somebody read that for us, please? This is a fascinating passage. You're familiar with the one in the New Testament where Jesus says that you live on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. But this is where he was quoting from the Old Testament. And God said that he made them hungry in the desert so that they might understand that they live on the word of God. And that's a truth. It doesn't matter whether people read it or not, they don't understand that they're sustained by the word of his power. And that if it were not for the living God speaking into the world, we'd all perish. And so to teach them that truth though, he made them hungry. And then he gave them food. He gave them the manna, which sustained them for the next 40 years, that they might know that they live by everything that God says. So the reason you want to spend part of your quiet time in the Bible is so that God can tell you, so you can read what he has already said. And so that you can learn that you live by everything that he says, and you can grow and flourish in that. By the way, this is also an interesting reference. If you decide to do a time of fasting and prayer, to make sure you do some of that time in the word. And the fasting is good because it helps you, while you're hungry and reading the Bible and praying it, that hunger helps teach you that. He said that there's a connection between our physical hunger and our spiritual ability to discern and understand that we live by everything that he says. Now, I don't understand why that connection is there. I just know it's there because that's what he said. He said there's a connection. Conversation with my brother late last night. And one of his comments was, and he got the brains out of the two boys in the family. I see. You got the brawn, Jerry? Got the good blood. But his comment was that he did not eat before he was taking a test. Because otherwise the blood is in your stomach, digesting your food. And as I say, he graduated from high school. And he said it's all right for an hour and a half exam. But when you start taking the all day, four hours and eight hours, he said that's a long time to go without food. Okay, good. Thank you, Jerry. I love brother Jerry. He always has interesting things to come up with that are relevant and illuminate things from a different angle. So thank you, brother. Okay, third part of the definition. In prayer. There's a handout there by the door. First Thessalonians 5, 16 through 18. The quiet time is time that you set aside for prayer. But that doesn't mean that prayer isn't a part of our lives that as things come up during the day, that we aren't praying on those things. But this is a time where set aside. So this is especially good time for things that you want to pray for. And so you have a list like of friends who have difficulties or missionaries or members of your family or people you're trying to reach. And so that's a good time. The quiet time is a good time for that. So because you have your structured checklist there and you can say, yeah, today's Wednesday, I'm praying for Fred, whose wife just died and he's got three little kids. And there was a separate workshop this morning on prayer. And so I won't go into any more about things you can do to help you. I pray like that. But that's a good point, Harold. Thank you. Okay. By the way, anytime you have any questions or comments, feel free to speak up. We've had trendsetters here setting the pace. So don't want the rest of you to feel intimidated or anything. Those weren't plants. Okay. Fourth part of the definition that he might encourage you. Romans 15, four. Now I read this verse one time when I was reading through, I don't know, Leviticus or numbers or something like that. And I was just really challenged that, you know, the phrasing here was written in earlier times. It seems to me more a reference of the ancient past, the old Testament, as opposed to the recent past, the gospels. So this idea that God gave those things that I might have hope. And as hard as it is for me sometimes to slog through certain sections of the scripture that God says, he gave it that I might have hope. I may not understand how he's going to give me hope out of that. And he gives it to me in different ways. And yet he says that all those things that were written, the things that we normally assume that are good and encouraging, like some of the Psalms and some of the miracles we see in the old Testament, but some of the kind of mundane everyday things that are in the old Testament are given to encourage us that we might have hope. So part of what happens in our time with God is that he can encourage us. And that if we get discouraged, that's where a lot of problems go from being just problems to being, you know, disasters, that we don't know how to deal with something, whether it's a problem or a success, whether it's a sorrow or a joy, because we can be consumed by anything. We can make an idol out of anything. And so we need to learn how to walk in success and in defeat and victory and joy and sorrow and pain, and that the scriptures were given to encourage us. So you want to use the Bible in your quiet time. It's not the only thing that you'll use, but you want to make sure you use it. One of the things I gave you as a handout was a reading plan. Now this particular plan is designed for reading the whole Bible in a year. That's not the intent to read the Bible in a year during your quiet time. If you take one of the columns, that's a good breakdown for your daily reading in your quiet time. So if you've had a hard time trying to figure out what to read or how much to read, that's one of the things you can do. So for example, if you start in January, the first column starts in Matthew and it breaks it up. So sometimes the chapter gets done in one day and sometimes it takes three or four or five days. So it's a nice breakout. Another way to break up what you read in the Bible is if your Bible is marked into paragraphs, you can read it. Or in the case that some things are marked in stories like parables and it runs several paragraphs. Usually for most sections of the Bible, reading a chapter a day is probably too much for a quiet time because there's too much material in there and you just kind of miss it all because it's going by too fast. However, in some places, you know, the story, the key part of the story is one or one and a half chapters long. You may have to read it to kind of get the front to the end of the story. So this is something just to help you. And then feel free to skip around. I wouldn't read Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John straight through, but you might want to. So you might read Matthew and then use, go read Jeremiah, you know, and use the section from Jeremiah there where it's broken up. Now I have to warn you, the Old Testament since to get through it in a year, you usually have to read two or three chapters a day. So it works better for the shorter books like the Gospels and stuff. Also up on the cart here that you can look at afterwards are two other Bible reading plans. So you can get an idea of some others. One's just for a New Testament, go through the New Testament in a year. So that would be a really good one for a quiet time. And the other one, just a different breakout of doing the whole Bible in a year. Okay. Now, where do you get that, Harold? Is it something you sell or is it something, is it an actual Bible that's been reordered? It's called the Victory Reading Guide. And it takes you through the Bible. One of the disturbing things in the Old Testament. Yes, sure. Right. Yeah. Great. Oh, good. By the way, you know, over the course, Jesus saved me about 22, 23 years ago, and I haven't done the same thing every time through that time. So feel free to change, change the translation you read, can change the sequence that you read it in, change the amounts that you read. So there's nothing magical about that. Point is that you're listening to what God has said. These are the things that God has chosen to tell us about himself. See, if God didn't reveal himself to us, another freebie here, if God didn't reveal himself to us, we wouldn't know very much about him because we'd have the testimony of creation, which tells us a few things, but not very much. So, and if God wanted to hide himself from us, he could, right? But he's chosen to reveal himself to us. So this is the things that he's chosen to say. This is not all he says to us, but these are the things that that he sent so that we might know him. Let me interrupt one more time out of Romans 15. Yes. A verse that I've been exposed to recently in 1514. As far as I knew, I never knew it was in a book. Okay. What's that, Jerry? And it says, and for my money, it is a parallel passage to 2 Timothy 2. All right. Most of us have been exposed to it more than once. And I myself also am persuaded of you, my brethren, that you also are full of goodness. He died as a character, Tom Yankley Bookman on the nuts and bolts of one-on-one discipleship. Okay. He talks about to follow up what it is, what it's not. Has 16, 14, 14 suggestions for what to do on a one-on-one session. Another 14 for tips and a final 10, 20 pages. Got more information on one-on-one discipleship than I've ever seen in 20 pages in my life. Now, what was the name of that book again, Jerry? The Nuts and Bolts. The Nuts and Bolts. Of one-on-one discipleship. Of one-on-one discipleship. Okay. You have one with you, Jerry? No, I've got one in the car. All right. But one of the guys, in four words, exposed me to it, and he's going to take it to Brazil. Got it translated into Portuguese, 13th of this month. That's great. Excuse me, one more time. You'll never be interrupted by a nicer guy. Okay. Next section, correct and train you. 2 Timothy 3, 16 through 17. Does anybody know that by heart? Now, make sure you got to know the second verse. Good. Thanks, Gary. I memorized those two. The official memory verse is just the first verse. I memorized the two together because it seemed to me the whole point of the first verse was the second verse. That God says that this book will equip me for every good work. So, I can't do any good works apart from being instructed by the Spirit of God and that He uses His word as a key part of that. And that a lot of what comes out of my quiet time is Him instructing and correcting and training me. So, I listen for those things. So, that's another reason why you want to use the Bible during your quiet time, but that it's God that's equipping you for every good work. If you think you can serve somebody, you can't serve them apart from the Spirit of God and His word. You can't do well at school. You can't do well at work. You can't do well in the home. You can't do well at anything apart from Him. So, our time with Him in the morning is to equip us to live successfully that day. We really can't do it on our own strength. 1 Corinthians 3.5-6 1 Corinthians 3.5-6 Our main speaker has been talking about chaos and that we're overwhelmed. He talked about internal generated problems and external things. And many people complain about not having enough time or how to manage their time or whatever. And that's one of the reasons why I think the quiet time needs to be in the morning to be especially fruitful. But it's not a command of God, by the way. It's not a command of God. It's a matter of practical utility that if it's first thing in the morning, then God can speak to you about what do you do today. And sometimes it helps you make the distinction between two hard decisions. Do I visit my sick mother over here or my sick brother over there on their opposite sides of the county? And sometimes it's easier things to decide. But if we're spending time with him in the morning, he can tell us what's on his heart today. And that what he told us to do yesterday isn't what he necessarily will tell us to do today. We're going to look in our exercise later this afternoon, we're going to look at how Jesus had to make a decision. And it's completely counter to the way we think that the decision should have been made. And so Jesus spent time with his father so that he might know what does my father want me to do today. And it's not what he had me do yesterday. And it isn't necessarily going to be what he's going to have me do tomorrow. We like rules. Another freebie here. We like law. We can't keep the law. The law condemns us, but we love it. We want to know the five things I have to do, and then I'm okay. But we have to walk by faith. And that means that what he tells me to do today may be different tomorrow. And the only way I can know that is if I turn back to him. And spend time with him. I try to go by my checklist that he gave me a year ago. I'm probably wrong. I'm probably wrong. Okay. Next section, delight in him. Psalm 16, 8 through 9. Psalm 16, 8 through 9. I often have to remind myself the reason I have my quiet time is not because I have a scorecard to fill out. I'm here to see Jesus. I'm here to listen to him, and delight in him, and to worship him. And so often I have to correct my thinking on that. Because I just start in with, okay, what five verses am I reading today? And what can I make up for an application? Or what can I make up for an interesting insight? And I have to calm my heart and say, no, I'm here to meet my Savior. I have to focus on that. It's too easy to lose sight of him because I can't see him. He's not sitting in front of me. And I can't hear his voice out loud. And so it's too easy for it to turn into a mindless ritual. It's too easy for it to turn into that. So I remind myself. And that's one of the reasons why, you'll see later, I suggest, you know, you may want to sing a song as part of your quiet time. You might, you know, get a songbook, you know, whatever you like to sing or listen to. And you can sing a song. Right. But I encourage, if you're having trouble, especially, do it out loud. Do it out loud. You know, it's interesting. We, in fact, even praying out loud in your quiet time, read the passage out loud during quiet time. Because, you know, many of the things in the Scripture, it uses verbs that imply that we're talking or saying or whatever. And we usually apply it by just thinking it. But there's something different about it when you say it out loud than when you just think in your head. And, of course, that's something you may have to adjust by your circumstances, depending on where you can do your quiet time and who you would wake up. But it's something, if you're struggling with your quiet time, then that's something to consider. That, well, you know, maybe I really need to do what they say in the Bible, because they say, sing joy, sing praise to the Lord. Well, you can't sing in your head. That's not singing, that's thinking. Singing is out loud. So if you're having trouble, I would say, try it out loud. If you're successful doing it in your head, praise God, keep on going. You know, but if you're having trouble or if you hit a dry spell and you may do it for a while and then stop or whatever, I don't sing all the time, but sometimes I do. And so it's something to help you because we're to delight in Him. That's why you're meeting with Him. It's fascinating. We have a natural tendency to spend time with people that we like. So whether it's your best friend next door or the girlfriend down the street or the gal you're engaged to be married to, your wife or your favorite kid or whatever, I mean, there's a natural tendency to spend time with those whose hearts are knit with ours. And so that's what we want to cultivate in our relationship with Him, that our hearts are knit to His and that we just delight in being with Him. We like to go do things with Him, just like you like to take a friend with you or whatever. Okay, the last section of the definition, giving Him the first fruit of your time, Proverbs 3, 9 through 10. Proverbs 3, 9 through 10. Thanks, David. This verse is talking about materially giving to the Lord. I think that it's useful to think about giving of our time in the same way. That, okay, I woke up this morning, so I'm going to give God the first fruit of the next 24 hours He's going to give me. I'm going to give it to Him up front. Now, many people ask about, you know, why does it have to be in the morning? Well, it doesn't have to be in the morning. There's no command that says it has to be in the morning. There's plenty of examples of it being in the morning. There's no command. And there's plenty of people whose lives you would desire to imitate who did it in the morning. So, and part of it, I think, is this idea of giving the first fruits of your time. Part of it's to set your heart straight for that day, because you wake up, you know, it's been eight hours since, or whatever. So, it gets your head on straight for the day. And to praise, yeah, Cody, do you have a question? What's special about first fruit? Well, in the Old Testament, the first of anything was the Lord's. So, the first fruit off of a tree was the Lord's. The first child was dedicated to the Lord. The first animal, calf or lamb or whatever, was sacrificed to the Lord. So, I believe that, so there was a consistent example of that in the Scripture. And I believe it's because it's this idea of God first, God first, that we believe Him and we honor Him first. He's more necessary to us than our food. So, we give Him the first lamb and we believe Him for the ones that we're going to need to live later on. So, I think that's the basic idea. So, that's why I think applying it to doing it in the morning is important. Now, if you're doing it in the evening and you're successful at it, praise God, keep on going. But if you're struggling, then I would say try in the morning. Do it first and give Him the first fruit. I believe it brings fruit in many ways because it, like I said, it orders your day. You give Him the first fruit and then He multiplies your time later on, so to speak. Yeah, we tend to have better control. There are times and seasons in your life. So, this is not the law. I remember reading an article where Billy Graham's wife was talking about the fact that there was a time when she had several young children in the house, infants at the same time. And so, she had the Bible set up on a stand next to her kitchen sink, which she was always at all day long. And that's when she got her time in the Word. It was every time she went there. But that's not the habit of her life. She wasn't advocating it. So, the thing is, if you want to get time with somebody, you figure out how to do it. So, you're looking for ways to make happen what you want to make happen. So, yes, if it works best for you, there's no reason to change. If you're having trouble with it, I would say that's something to consider. Yep, sure. So, like I said, I mean, we already looked at the verse that says, pray without ceasing. And we also looked at verse Psalm 16, 8 through 9, where he said, I have set the Lord continually before me. So, there's no magic time of day where we get credit. And if you do it some other time of day, you don't get credit. That's not the way it works. But if you're struggling with having it at all, I would advocate, shoot for the morning. Another freebie on that, according to some articles I've read over the last couple of years, approximately 90% of American adults are sleep deprived. And in fact, a year ago, ever since I left high school, I thought I needed seven hours of sleep a night. So, that was my standard for going to bed and getting up. And about a year ago, I was starting to have some real physical problems. And I decided to run an experiment. So, I went to bed an hour earlier every night than I normally did. And for two weeks to see if seven hours was enough. And by the end of the two weeks, I was showing pretty consistently that I actually needed seven hours and 30 minutes to seven hours and 45 minutes to sleep a night. And that when I get that, I do much better. I didn't have to drink as much caffeine in the afternoon to stay awake when I got seven hours, 30 to 45 minutes. When I was only getting seven hours a night, I was really dragging by the afternoon. I was knocking down three cokes to stay awake. And so, one of the big secrets, if you're going to have a morning quiet time, is go to bed early. Go to bed early. And if you find that you just can't get up, you may be a person like me who thought you only need seven hours of sleep and you really need eight. Or you may need nine. Or you may need six. I mean, everybody's different. But for over 20 years, I was depriving myself. And so, I'd sleep in on Saturdays for several hours to catch up. I don't have to sleep in on Saturdays anymore because I get it during the week. But anyway. By the way, if you're also having trouble figuring out why I can't get to bed an hour earlier, I've got a separate project for you, which is keep track of how you spend your time in 15-minute blocks for a week. And then you can sit down with that list and ask God, which things should I do maybe a little less of? And which things do I need to give up something so I can go to bed 15 minutes earlier so I'm awake when I get up to see you? Because until we write it down, we usually don't know what's really happening. We think we only read the newspaper for 15 minutes a day, but it's really half an hour. Just like we think we're running five miles, but it's really only four. And we think we run five days a week, but it's really only three. And we think we only had a four-ounce serving of something, but it was really eight. So if that's something you're struggling with, keep a log. And it'll help you understand what's going on, and then you can decide what to do. You can take it before God and say, well, should I give this up or should I do less of that? Or whatever the right answer is. But you need information to make a decision. Okay. So a practical quiet time. Start off, offer a short prayer to calm your heart and ask God to meet you. Jeremiah 33, two through three. This is the Lord who made the earth, the Lord who formed it to establish it. The Lord is his name. Call to me and I will answer you. And I will tell you great and mighty things that you do not know. By the way, the official verse is only the second half of that, but I memorized the first half because it tells me, well, who is this God that I'm calling on? It's the God who made the earth, the God who formed it to establish it. God is his name. So I'm not just calling on somebody, I'm calling on a special somebody. And he says that, so ask him to meet with you and to show you the things you need to know. Like I said, that can be everything from encouragement or comfort in the time of distress. It can be correction or rebuke in a time of sin. It can be just a, well, today you need to go visit your sick aunt Gertrude. And you're thinking, well, I just visited her last week, but you don't know if she's going to die tomorrow. And so you should go see her today. And stuff like God does things like that. God does things like that. Or she may just be having a real low, a real low spot for some reason. And you're the way God's going to cheer her up. Okay. Next, read something from your Word. I gave, talked about the Bible reading plan already. You can pick your own schedule. The idea is have some way of deciding what to do, because otherwise you'll waste your 15, you may have 15 minutes set aside for your quiet time, and you'll waste 10 minutes of it trying to figure out what you're going to read. You don't want to do that. You want to know, okay, here's my checklist. Here's the next paragraph. Or if it's on your heart to reread what you read yesterday, because it really made an impression. I mean, feel free to do that, but have something that's guiding you so that you don't flounder and squander the time. Job 23.12, I've not departed from the command of his lips. I've treasured the words of his mouth more than my necessary food. Now, I can't say that with a whole heart either, but I want to be able to. I want to be able to say that I treasure his words more than my necessary food. By the way, you can skip a meal or two or three, you can go 40 days without eating and you won't die unless you're already really sick. You can't go with water more than a few days. You can't go with air more than about a couple minutes. So if you miss a quiet time, you'll live. If you miss 40 days of quiet times, well, things are going to get rough. My average for the last 22 years is somewhere between five and six days a week. So I aspire for seven days a week. That's what I aim for, but I managed to pull off five or six days a week. So don't quit just because you don't get them all in, but if you're only doing it once a week, you're going to get pretty thin. By the way, nobody gets fat pigging out at Christmas and Thanksgiving. You get fat by having Christmas and Thanksgiving every day. So if you want to be fat on the word of God, you got to have it often. And if you don't spend time with him very much, you're going to get pretty thin. So just on Sunday, you know, you aren't going to do well or just on Wednesday night, you aren't going to do well every day, every day. I know somebody who was going through a tough time and he had two quiet times a day for a few weeks because he was dealing with a problem and he felt, hey, you know, when I have other problems, I spend extra time at work or throw extra men on the job or whatever. I got a problem here. I should call on God twice a day. So he had a quiet time twice a day as he went through something. Okay. You want to review the passage that you just read, looking for something to focus on. Now, some people have a hard time figuring out, well, okay, I read the story. Now what? So I'm going to give you a, show you the spec technique where you look for five things in the passage. You go through and look for the five things and see if you can find it. That just helps you to draw something out of the passage. If you finish reading the passage and God's already impressed on you something, then you're already done. But if you're having trouble picking something out, excuse me, then go through this. Sin. Sin to avoid. Numbers 11.1. Now the people became like those who complain of adversity in the hearing of the Lord. And when the Lord heard it, his anger was kindled, and the fire of the Lord burned among them and consumed some of the outskirts of the camp. So that's an example of a verse where there's a sin to avoid, grumbling in the hearing of the Lord because he burned up, I don't know, 50,000 people or something like that. So that's a passage where you'd say, well, that's interesting. Grumbling against the Lord. Okay. So that's a sin to avoid. It might be a promise to depend on. Exodus 14.14. The Lord will fight for you while you keep silent. You may be in a situation where you're feeling oppressed and that everybody's against you and nobody's looking out for you and nobody's standing up for you. And he says, the Lord will fight for you while you keep silent. So it's a promise that you can depend on. There may be an example to follow or not to follow. 1 Samuel 14.7. And Jonathan's armor bearer said to him, do all this in your heart, turn yourself and heroin with you according to your desire. So Jonathan's armor bearer had a heart to, he was going to go with his master. He said, whichever way you want to turn, I'll be there with you. You may be in a situation at work or in a home or something where you need to follow whoever the leader is and just really give your heart to that leader. So that'd be an example to follow. You can find all kinds of examples in the Bible, by the way, of things you don't want to follow. So there may be a command to obey, like in Leviticus 19.11. You should not steal, nor do falsely, nor lie to one another. So that gives you three things not to do. So a passage may have that in there. Or last one, knowledge about God or man. For example, Genesis 1.27. And God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created him male and female. He created them. So it tells me something both about God and man, that God made man and that he made man in his image. And that in order to do that, he had men and women because that was in order to present his image. So the passage may teach you about that. By the way, there's other things you can find, but these are five questions you can ask if you're having trouble pulling something out of the passage that may help you find something. So you have something to write down. And if you go through the passage and you find these things, and then pick one and write it down as kind of your key observation for the day. Write it in your journal. Here's my journal. It's a composition book. You get it like Office Depot. Now, some people save them and collect them, and nobody trades them like baseball cards. But me, I shred mine when I start a new one. But other people like to keep theirs and go back periodically and look at them and things like that. Me, I shred them because I, for me, feel like I need to go and get a word from God today. And that there's too much of a tendency to rest on my laurels of what happened 20 years ago. But that's my personal circumstance. Everybody's different. So this is bound. So if you want to save it, it's neat, whatever. Also, I feel more free to write things in here, knowing that it's not going to wander around in the wrong hands. If I have a collection of them, I have to keep track of them all, and I just don't want to do that. So that's why I shred mine. But that's what I need to do in order to feel free in my time with him. Okay, then think about this thing that God's pulled to your attention and ask him, is there some way that you need to be applying this in your life? Some application, maybe something you do, it may just something you rest on like a promise. Ezra 7.10, for Ezra had set his heart to study the law of the Lord and to practice it and to teach his statutes and ordinances in Israel. So Ezra read it and thought about it and resolved to do it. Writing it down is good. Just like I, we talked about earlier, I talked about singing out loud or praying out loud, writing it down or saying it all, it just helps clarify things. Things run around in our heads and then when it has to come out, it crystallizes a little better and takes a little firmer shape. And also, by the way, another freebie, if you feel tempted to say, to sin, say out loud what you're going to do. It has a way of, it sounds worse when you say it out loud than when you just think it in your head. And so it may dissuade you from doing it. So that's a freebie. Yeah. Well, actually some of those, the shame of saying you're going to do it might be enough to dissuade you from doing it. If everybody heard you say, I'm going to go do this, then you might have second thoughts about it. But anyway. Okay. Well, let's see. I'm going to have to adjust my schedule here, I guess. Well, you'll have a choice. I'll give you a choice. Would you rather do the exercise and practices, or would you rather I lecture you more? I don't know. If we did the exercise, I wanted to give you time to do it. I'll talk you, we'll talk it through and kind of help you see it that way. Okay. It isn't. What do you know? No, that's right. No, that was an error. That was an error. You know, it's one of these automatic indentation and paragraph numbering paragraphs. Well, yeah. Well, for the exercise that would just make it longer in here. Yeah. It's really tough when you get 20 people in a room and they're all singing different songs. So, I thought I'd spare myself that one. So, okay. Now, there was a workshop on prayer, but in case you didn't go to that, I'll give you a little thing to help you with praying, if that's the hard part for you in your quiet time. So, we got another acronym called ACTS. And in fact, Kerry, would you pass these out? Everybody can have two. One for you and one to give away to somebody when you have an opportunity. The first one is adoration. Second Samuel 22, two through three. He said, the Lord is my rock and my fortress, my God and my deliverer, my rock in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold and my refuge, my savior, you save me from violence. So, when you pray, you know, praise God for who he is and what he's done and the great things he's done in the past. By the way, it's just really good every once in a while to sit down and think of some things from your distant past that you want to thank God for. I'm periodically reminded that because God gave me the parents he gave me, that I have prospered greatly in my life because I've seen people who didn't have the benefit of that and they struggle against their inheritance. They struggle. 22, two through three. Is that on the handout? Okay. I was wondering if my word processing program deluded me once again. Okay. Confession. Second Chronicles 7, 13 through 14. Do we have enough of those handouts to go around? Anybody not get anyone? They'll be up here afterwards if you didn't get yours. Second Chronicles 7, 13 through 14. If I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or if I command the locusts to devour the land, or if I send pestilence among my people, and my people who are called by my name, humble themselves and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will forgive their sin, will heal their land. So, we want to confess. That's really good to say out loud. I find, I've only been a Christian 22 years, and I find already that there's a tendency to get glib about the same old things I'm confessing over and over again. So, one of the things I'm doing to help me with that is to confess my sins out loud in my quiet time, just to break the rut of just kind of running high speed through my head. I can only talk so fast, mostly. So, and they sound worse when I say them out loud. So, confession. It's amazing the things that God will forgive when somebody confesses. David committed adultery and had a man killed, and God forgave him when he said out loud, I've sinned against the Lord. So, he is, I don't know this verse, but in Psalms someplace it says that a broken and contrite heart he will not despise. Anybody know the reference on that? You think it's Psalm 51? Okay. So, that's, you know, I'm marked as a Christian not so much by what I do or don't do, but how I respond when I do wrong. So, do I make amends? Do I seek forgiveness? Do I repent? You got the reference? 5117? Great. Thanks, Brian. So, confession seems to be the hallmark of God's people. Thanksgiving. 1 Chronicles 29, 11-13. Anybody know that one? 1 Chronicles 29, 11-13. I know the plan that I have for you. Nope, that's Jeremiah. And thou dost exalt thyself as head over all. Both riches and honor come from thee, and thou dost rule over all. And in thy hand is power and might, and it lies in thy hand to make great and to strengthen everyone. Now, therefore, God, we thank thee and praise thy glorious name. So, that was David's prayer as they were the people who gave for the temple, the temple that Solomon would build. So, Thanksgiving should mark our lives. And think big things, little things, frequent things, special things, routine things. We like it when people acknowledge what we do for them. It shouldn't be too much of a stretch for us to figure out that it pleases God when we thank Him. The last one, supplication. Before we get there, everybody stand up and stretch. A few people are nodding off in the heat. Is it just me or is it hot in here? Maybe we can prop the door open. That's right. Yeah, that's right. Okay, up on your toes. Get up on your toes. That's it. Stretch those calves. Pump that blood out of your feet. Your brain needs it. Okay, take your seats. Supplication. Supplication is a fancy word for asking for things. It's a polite way to say, gimme. But it also conveys this idea of pleading on behalf of others and interceding on behalf of others. Ezra 8, 21 through 23. Then I, Ezra, proclaimed a fast there at the river Ahava, that we might humble ourselves before our God to seek from Him a safe journey for us, our little ones, and all our possessions. For I was ashamed to request from the king, troops and horsemen, to protect us from the enemy on the way. Because we had said to the king, the hand of our God is favorably disposed to all those who seek Him, but His power and His anger are against all those who forsake Him. So we fasted and sought our God concerning this matter, and He listened to our entreaty. So Ezra had no problems praying for himself, his children, and his stuff because they were getting ready to leave captivity and hike back to Israel to rebuild the temple on the wall. But there's lions and tigers and bears on the trail, so he asked for God. So they had a nationwide fast for three days before they set out. They asked for their own lives, the lives of their children, and their stuff. So it pleases God even when you pray for your stuff because you're praying to Him. You're turning to Him. You're looking to Him. You're depending on Him, and you're giving it up to Him. And then close with a song, Psalm 33, 1 through 3. Sing for joy in the Lord, O you righteous ones. Praises be coming to the upright. Give thanks to the Lord with a little lyre. Sing praises to Him with a harp of ten strings. Sing to Him a new song. Play skillfully with a shout of joy. So sing a song. Back before we had a lot of projection systems, the churches I would go to would hand out the songs for the day, the worship, on a sheet like this. And the ones I really liked, I'd save them, and then I'd have them to use during my quiet time. And I also bought a songbook that had music in it because I can read music, and I can't remember tunes. So I can sound it out until I can remember, oh, I know what the tune is now. So whatever to do. If you have a, you know, you can buy a company music from your favorite music group or whatever. Some of them sell just the music, so you can listen to music. Okay. So for the exercise, we'll quickly walk through Mark chapter 1. Any questions so far? Or I should say any more questions. Okay. Mark chapter 1, 32 through 39. Somebody read that for us. So we'll wait a minute for everybody to get there. Mark chapter 1, 32 through 39. Okay. Pages are still turning. All right. We're there. Somebody want to read? Okay. So they're talking about Jesus. He's been healing a lot of people in this town. In fact, how much of a hit was he? Verse 33. Old town's showing up. So here he is healing people, and they're just showing up by the droves. Okay. So there's a need. They're looking to him to fill it. He can fill it. Most of us, when we're in a situation where there's a need and we can meet it, that's a hard decision point for us, because if there's a need and you can't meet it, then there's nothing you can do anyway. And if you disagree with the need, then you don't feel obliged to meet it. But when there's a real need and you can fill it, that's a really hard decision. And so it was a real need. How do we know? Verse 34. They were ill with various diseases and demons. And demon possession is pretty serious. So I haven't seen it myself, but everything I've seen in the Bible makes me convinced I wouldn't want anything to do with it. And we know it's the opposite of what he wants us to have, which is his spirit. So I would say that's probably the most serious need anybody comes with to him would be demon possession. So what did the people want him to do the next day? What did they want him to do? More. Yeah. And we know that because in verse 37, the disciples came out and said, Jesus, everybody's looking for you. So they were evil. By the way, this is not the group like in his hometown where they wouldn't believe. And so he did almost no miracles. This group believed. This was prime territory. This was what he came for, right? To teach and to heal, to proclaim the coming kingdom of God. So what does he say in verse 38? Was that a hard decision? Is that the decision you would have made? Is that the decision you would have made? That's right. So how could he go off and leave everything that looked like you ought to be doing? Yeah. Yes. Yes. Thank you. See, his father told him today, I want you to go to the next town. So Jesus could leave that town with demon possessed and sick and eager people. He could walk away from that town with a clear conscience because his father told him where to go. And he entrusted those people to his father. So are there any sins in this passage? Sins to avoid? Yeah. And I don't know anything about it. That doesn't seem to be the, yeah. So I would say, so not every passage in the Bible has something in it on every topic. So, okay. No sins. Okay. Okay. There, there you go. Thanks Gary. So there's a possible thing there. How about any promises? Is there a promise to depend on in this passage? Yeah. I don't see one either. Is there an example to follow or not to follow? Okay. Okay. Good. Excellent. Sure. All right. Okay. Excellent. Four examples in one passage. Well, you can just read that for the next three days and keep using them up. Okay. Is there a command to obey? I beg your pardon. Okay. Good. Is there 38? Okay. Yes. Right. Yeah. And that's right. So, and some of these things overlap, you know, commands tend to overlap with sins that you shouldn't do and things like that. So don't get too worried about it, but good. Okay. And maybe any knowledge about God or man? Okay. Okay. Another one might be Jesus needed direction from his father. Okay. So if Jesus needed direction from his father, I'm pretty confident I need direction from my father. I'm pretty confident. Okay. All right. Okay. Good. Okay. Great. Okay. Now on your sheet, I have a, for the diligent student, if quiet time is something that you're struggling with, or you feel like maybe I've gotten into a rut on, or you're just interested in it because maybe you need to have an opportunity to teach somebody else. I've given you eight passages there that you may want to use as your quiet time passage for the next eight times that you have a quiet time. And they have, and they, and it will explore various things about the fruitfulness and necessity of quiet time. You know, a lot of the things that have to do with quiet time are really applications of verses that have to deal with the heart and where's our heart and we're giving our heart to the Lord. So, but that's just eight suggestions. If, and then if, if you're doing all right and you don't have any other plan, then I would start the gospel of John and you can use the reading plan here, find the gospel of John section, and just let that break up for you. How much to read each day, or you can use any other methods you come up with. I've listed some resources for you at the bottom. The Bible reading plans, and I have two more up here. If you want to take a look at them, the Bible reading plans, I got off the NAV Press website and the, and the address is there. Hand it out, the seven minutes with God. And if you didn't get your two copies, please come up and get yours. I've got three other resources up here, which were listed on your thing. If you want to just take a look at them, but please don't take those. But that way you can say, oh, this looks interesting. And you can go buy one for yourself. Okay. I'd like you to take out your conference book, turn to page six. It's the evaluation form for the conference. In the middle there, roughly, there's a section for evaluating the afternoon workshop. The title is quiet time. So if you'd write in there quiet time, well, usually I don't finish in time to do it. So I'm, you're seeing me at my best. Usually I tell them to, you know, skip the first 10 minutes of the next meal to fill it out, but that doesn't go over very well. So if you'd fill that out, any specific comments, there's some room on the right margin there.