Did you ever wonder why God set up our Earthly days to be 24 hours? I mean if you lived on Venus your day would be a whopping 1,408 hours long. Think of what you could get done in one day! On the other hand, if you lived on Jupiter your day would only be 10 hours long, barely enough to eat and sleep and watch one episode of Seinfeld. I’m not sure why God settled on 24 hours, but I do know one thing, God picked the absolute best daily cycle for us and in that 24 hours is all the time we need each day to accomplish what God intended for us.
One of my favorite quotes is from John Maxwell on just this subject. “You'll never change your life until you change something you do daily. The secret of your success is found in your daily routine.” Great quotes like this just roll off the tongue and often they also just fly right over our heads. You have to really stop, take a deep breath and ponder the deep meaning to really get the gist. Men and women are capable of achieving anything they put their minds too, but until they commit their daily routine to that achievement, nothing will happen. Consider the example of the great wall of China. The wall is 13,170 miles long, half the length of the Earth’s equator. It’s about 20 feet tall and 20 feet wide and it’s estimated that it consists of over 3,873,000 billion bricks. But do you know what’s ironic? We look at the wall as a whole but it’s made up of individual little bricks. Our lives are no different. You can look at any life today and search it for joy, hope, peace, goodness, love and mercy. Maybe you know someone that enjoys this abundant life. But folks, that life didn’t just appear, it was built like the great wall, a daily routine of placing one brick at a time. An abundant life like that was built on a daily routine of worshiping Jesus Christ.
Today in Numbers 28, God has a little review session. He takes a little time to stop and talk about what has been mentioned in the past and how important it is. Just like when we were in school, if we don’t often stop and review what we’ve learned, we’re in danger of forgetting some important things. So, God carefully reminds His people about the many important rules of offerings, sacrifices and festivals. And folks, if it’s important to God, it should be important to you.
But out of the numerous sacrifices, offering and festivals, it’s the one He starts out with that we will take special note of today, the “daily” offering.
“The Lord said to Moses, “Give this command to the Israelites and say to them: ‘Make sure that you present to me at the appointed time my food offerings, as an aroma pleasing to me.’ Say to them: ‘This is the food offering you are to present to the Lord: two lambs a year old without defect, as a regular burnt offering each day.” Numbers 28:1-3
Please pay special attention to the last two words in the passage. “each day.” Did God say for them to maybe catch up with Him once a week at the temple? Nope. Did God say when you think about it or when it’s convenient for you, come and make an offering? Nope. Did God say I recommend this for you as a general idea that might be kinda good every once in a while? Nope. Here God issues a command that the people are to start with one thing and one thing only. Daily worship of Him.
So, what’s changed today? Where has daily worship of God gone? Does God say that you can maybe catch up with Him once a week or once a month at church? Does God say that when it crosses your mind you should crack open your Bible and read a random passage? Does God say that you should serve Him only when you Pastor ropes you into it? You see, in our world today, sadly, we have lost the idea and the concept of daily worship of God.
So how can you effectually train or “re-train” yourself into the pattern and habit of daily worship? Here’s a few points that will help move you back into the direction of enjoying a pattern of daily worship of Jesus.
1) You gotta want it. The world is filled with people that desperately desire a deep relationship with God but…they do absolutely nothing about it. I love the funny commercials that are on right now about just being good enough. The Dr. that just got reinstated and is as nervous as the patient about the upcoming surgery. Very funny. But think about that Dr. in school, just doing enough to get by. As he is skating by with D’s there’s another student that is studying, practicing and making A’s. What’s the difference? Passion, tenacity, vision and sacrifice. By the way, do you know what they call the medical student that graduated with a D+? Doctor. You see, you can be a D student for God, or you can be an A+ student for God. It all depends on how much you truly desire a thriving, living, intimate relationship with Jesus.
2) You gotta make habits. The other day I got too close to a burner on the stove and I enjoyed the magic of reflex. My hand jerked back with the reflexes of a ninja. Impressive trick God. I didn’t learn that, but we can learn a similar reflex. Habits we call them. If you do something over and over thousands of times, you’ll find yourself doing said thing without even thinking. Folks, you gotta make daily worship of God a habit. And habits take time, repetition and effort. The 5 Minute Challenge was created as just this. A tool to help the youth at the church I was working at to develop a much needed habit of spending time in God’s Word each and every day. The 5MC in a nutshell is to read God’s Word for 5 minutes every day, for 30 days in a row. No skips and no mulligans. We must train oursleves in the habit of daily worship and to do this you gotta really want it. (Revert back to point #1)
3) Recruit accountability and support. If you fight this fight by yourself, your odds of success are pretty poor. Another facet of the 5MC was accountability. I started a group chat with the youth and as we would all read the same passage every day, we would all chime in about what we read. Accountability. You see, God never intended for you to walk the Christian walk alone, He gave you help. Find your help and use it to develop your new daily routine with Jesus and in the process, you’ll be helping others do the same thing.
4) It will be a fight. There are a million things on this planet satan would rather see you do than start a vibrant, thriving, daily walk with Christ. The distractions, obstacles and hindrances will come flying right at your face as you begin such a pursuit. Be prepared to fight ferociously for the daily privilege of drawing near to God. Some days will be like soaring with eagles, but others will not. You won’t hop up every day motivated and enthused and that’s ok, it’s part of the fighting and part of life. These days will seem harder and colder than concrete but hear this, DON’T YOU GIVE UP ON JESUS! Fight to be in His presence every day! The day you want to skip your daily time with God might just be your breakthrough day. Don’t let your mood or problems dictate your day, let Jesus do that.
Folks, a thriving daily walk with Jesus Christ holds the abundant life that Christ promised us in John 10:10. It’s right there in front of you for the taking. Do you want it? Are you willing to fight for it? It won’t be easy, but it is oh, so worth it. Daily time in His Word will offer you the wisdom, vision and foresight of Almighty God to handle the difficult situations this world will throw at you every day. Daily time in prayer to God will allow you to share your heart with Him, thereby allowing Him to respond to you with His love, care, peace and goodness. Daily time serving Him will allow you to garner an external perspective on this life and “get out of yourself” as you invest in the lives of others. Seeking out daily blessed fellowship with other believers in Christ will give you the support structure God built for you. In this fellowship is strength, encouragement, joy and peace. In this fellowship is a safe place to regroup for the daily battles that are coming.
Today, if you are lacking this secret routine of daily success, you can have it. Get on your knees and pray to your Heavenly Father to give you the passion to pursue Him daily. He will allow you to shed the bad habits of this world and replace them with daily habits that will truly allow you success, a success that the world does not understand. You see, success has nothing to do with money, prestige, houses or cars. Success in this world is granted when you wake up each day, looking forward to walking it in the care, comfort and love of Jesus Christ.
God Bless you as you passionately pursue Him.
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