The Importance of Spending Personal Time with Jesus in the Morning

Each morning when we wake up, we can choose how we’ll begin our day. For example, let’s consider two scenarios.

Scenario 1: The alarm goes off. You reach for your phone and start scrolling through text messages, emails, and social media. More time goes by while you catch up on the news. Then you get up, your mind occupied by your to-do list. The day has just begun, but you already feel weighed down as you rush to get going. 

Scenario 2: You hear the alarm go off and say, “Lord Jesus, I love You.” You get out of bed and spend time fellowshipping with the Lord in prayer and reading His Word. Refreshed and spiritually nourished, you feel strengthened for the day ahead. 

We’d probably all prefer the second scenario. In this post, we’ll discuss how beginning each day with the Lord Jesus brings invaluable benefits to our spiritual life and mention some pointers for developing this habit.

The importance of spending time with the Lord

If we want to have a relationship with someone, it’s essential to spend time with them. There’s no substitute for face-to-face quality time. This is even more true of our relationship with the Lord Jesus. He’s a wonderful person who lives in us and who wants us to know Him in a personal way. Spending time in His presence is irreplaceable. It’s during such times that we can fellowship with Him and begin to know Him on a deeper level. 

The Bible assures us that when we turn our hearts to the Lord, we will behold Him with an unveiled face—that is, with nothing between us.

Second Corinthians 3:16-18 says:

“But whenever their heart turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. And the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. But we all with unveiled face, beholding and reflecting like a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord Spirit.”

The Lord today is so near; as the Spirit, He’s dwelling in our spirit. When our hearts turn to Him, all veils are removed and we can behold Him face to face in our spirit. As we speak to the Lord in prayer and let Him speak to us, He imparts more of Himself into us.

The best time of day to spend with Jesus

We certainly can, and should, contact the Lord in our spirit throughout the day. Any time we spend with Him is valuable.

But the best time of day for us to spend uninterrupted time with the Lord is in the morning, before our hearts and minds are occupied by so many other things. We’ve probably noticed how opportunities to be alone with Jesus seem to dwindle as the day goes on. Before we know it, the day’s over, and we’re exhausted. 

Rather than rushing to get going, we can enjoy intimate fellowship with the Lord Jesus in the freshness of a new day. While everything is still quiet, we can open our hearts to Him to behold His beauty, fellowship with Him, speak to Him, and enjoy Him in His Word. By spending this undisturbed time with our dear Lord Jesus, we enter more and more into an affectionate, personal relationship with Him.

Having this time in the morning also helps set the direction and tone for the rest of our day. We can’t underestimate the value of beholding the Lord first thing in the morning.

Meeting the Lord in the morning

Many verses throughout the Bible speak of meeting with God in the morning. Here are just a few from the Old Testament:

Psalm 5:3: “O Jehovah, in the morning You will hear my voice; in the morning I will set forth my words in order to You, and I will watch.”

Isaiah 26:9: “My soul desires You in the night; indeed my spirit within me seeks You at the dawn; for when Your judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness.”

Isaiah 50:4: “The Lord Jehovah has given me the tongue of the instructed, that I should know how to sustain the weary with a word. He awakens me morning by morning; He awakens my ear to hear as an instructed one.”

And in the New Testament, the Lord Jesus Himself is our example:

Mark 1:35: “And rising very early in the morning, while it was still night, He [Jesus] went out and went away to a deserted place, and there He prayed.”

Establishing a habit

Spending time with the Lord first thing in the morning takes more than fleeting inspiration. We have to make an effort and even establish it as a habit, which takes practice and perseverance. We may not succeed every day, but eventually, it will become a regular part of our lives that we can’t live without.

Let’s look at some practical pointers for establishing this healthy spiritual habit.

1. Ask the Lord for help. Since the Lord wants to have a relationship with us, surely He’ll answer our prayers about this matter. We can pray, “Lord Jesus, I really want to start my day with You. Supply me with the grace each morning to put everything else aside so I can be with You first.” 

2. Don’t stay up too late. Going to sleep late makes it hard to be with the Lord before we have to get on with our day. Making a small change of going to sleep even 20 or 30 minutes earlier will help us get up earlier so we can be with the Lord in the morning.

3. Don’t be discouraged by failure. We should remember that building up a lifelong habit takes practice. If we fail, being hard on ourselves doesn’t help. Instead, we can simply start again the next morning. The Bible tells us in Lamentations 3:23 that the Lord’s compassions are new every morning. We just need to take it one day at a time.

4. Start small and be consistent. When developing a new habit, it’s easy to bite off more than we can chew. We can be inspired and promise ourselves that we’ll dedicate an hour to the Lord every morning. But we probably won’t be able to keep that up for very long, especially if we’ve never done it before. It’s better to begin with something small, maybe just 10 minutes, and build up from there. You can find what works for you, but the main thing is to be consistent. 

5. Try using a printed copy of the Bible. The best way to avoid all the distractions on our phones is to put them away during our time with the Lord. You can try using a printed copy of the Bible instead of reading it on your phone. This makes it easier to focus on the Lord and His Word and avoid the temptation to check messages, emails, or other notifications. 

May the Lord help us all to view each morning as a precious opportunity to enjoy Him and delight ourselves in Him.

If you live in the US, you can order a free copy of the New Testament Recovery Version here to use in your time with the Lord.