Whether you’re a seasoned mom or a new mom, your brain is likely filled to the brim with a list of “to-dos.” Somewhere on your list may be pulling meat out of the freezer to thaw in time for dinner, making sure your children have the stains washed out of their clothes for church tomorrow, or keeping in step with your family calendar on a random Tuesday. The reality is, as a mom, you carry a lot of mental load. And as a Christian, you can easily burden yourself with adding to that mental load a list of spiritual “to-dos.”
On some days, it’s easier to make daily Bible reading a part of our routine, and on other days, we make excuses, we get caught up in the day and don’t make the time for it, or we might even find ourselves lacking zeal altogether. There’s a reason reading the Word is referred to as a spiritual discipline, as discipline is difficult and never without cost. Often, that cost is losing a little sleep to stay up later or wake up earlier to spend time with the Lord. That cost is often leaving your phone on top of the refrigerator and skipping your morning scroll to read the Psalms instead. Often, it may mean starting dinner a little later than planned so you can squeeze in some Bible time. It may mean listening to an audio Bible in the car on the way to the park rather than your go-to playlist.
In the same way, failing to make this discipline a priority will come with a cost, too. You might find yourself less patient and more distracted. You may discover a pattern of being less present with your children and more quick-tempered. You may realize you become less self-controlled, and more self-reliant when you aren’t prioritizing God’s Word.
I remember a time when I thought that, in order to spend adequate time in the Word, I must do a deep, hours-long study of a singular passage to get something out of it. I thought, in order for my Bible reading to “count,” I must sit, pen in hand, with my Bible, a commentary, and a notebook spread across my kitchen table. I’ve done a variety of Bible reading plans, beginning each New Year with a resolution to read every day, until I missed a day. Then, I missed another day. And another, and another, until I missed so many days of scheduled Bible reading that I was unsure of how to begin again. And, of course, as I had more children who kept me more busy as their needs grew, I would find another excuse to justify my lack of time in the Word. Along with this came guilt, conviction, and, sometimes, more sin as I suppressed the sin of apathy I was committing in neglecting to study the scriptures.
Ultimately, all of these were fleshly excuses, self-inflicted burdens, and unnecessary, extra-biblical standards I was holding myself to. There was nothing godly about my approach to reading God’s Word. I was relying on myself. I was putting stipulations and conditions on the thing God required of me: “I can only read my Bible today if….” or “I can’t read my Bible today because…”
But what I didn’t understand then is that the only thing that is actually required of me is the simple daily practice of reading God’s Word.
Maybe you can relate to one or all of these sentiments. The truth is, the obstacles I was placing before myself and the obstacles keeping you from spending time in God’s Word are products of our flesh. They’re all a lack of discipline and attempts to rationalize our sinful disobedience.
God doesn’t need our worldly stipulations added to His commands. He doesn’t need us to put qualifiers on what “counts” as obedience. He simply tells us to read His Word and meditate on it day and night.
We have such a tendency to complicate a task that is actually very simple. We so often forget that His yoke is easy, and we should want to delight in the Lord through the reading of His word.
While in-depth, hours-long studies are good and beneficial to our spiritual growth, there is no need for our daily Bible reading to look like that. (And, in fact, most of us who have young children are not in a season where that is an option). We would burn ourselves out if the acceptable requirement for reading the Word was an expository study of an entire book of the Bible!
I’d like to challenge you to begin viewing being in the Word as an act of relishing in and enjoying God rather than another thing to add to your mental list. It’s more a habit than anything else. Like brushing your teeth or changing the laundry. It is not a burden to bear or a box to check off any more than feeding yourself is. Trust that it is the Lord who provides wisdom, and He will use the text to sanctify you in ways you will not see right away. Through your faithful reading and obedience to Him, He will transform the temperament of your home. Even if it’s one chapter today and three chapters tomorrow, the daily discipline is the standard.
So read it over cold coffee. Read it out loud to your children. Read it at night before bed. Stop mid-sentence to tend to your children, because that is the work the Lord has for you today. Read the same sentence several times before you can comprehend it because the Lord is sovereign over that, too. Use the passages you read to teach your children. Talk to them about what you read over dinner. Ask them what they think about it. Allow your children to watch you delight in the Lord through the reading of His Word so that they, too, will learn to do the same. The point, my friend, is never perfection, but simply that you are being obedient to God’s command, seeking wisdom from His Word, and delighting in Him who sustains you and empowers you to do all things. You need that as much as your children do.
