The practice of having a devotional comes from the example in the book of Acts where the disciples gathered in the upper room to seek God for the power to do the job that they had been given to do. The goal of the devotional is to make sure that a person at least spends a little time with the person that they are supposed to love and be devoted to.
However I got to thinking. Has the practice of doing a daily devotional became a religious exercise rather than accomplishing what it was intended to accomplish. Do you have devotion, or are you just doing your religious duty?
In the book of Acts, the disciples were not trying to establish a religious practice. They were seeking a very real God. The bible says that they were in one accord. This means that they all had the same purpose. The purpose was to have the power of God, via the Holy Spirit coming and being a very real person and presence in their lives. So I had to ask the question. Am I seeking to have more of the person and presence of the Holy Spirit be part of my life? Do I really want that power to touch and change people's reality? For me, that answer was yes. I am totally aware that I am unable to change anyone or anything and that I am in desperate need to have someone bigger than me do the work. This is the same attitude the disciples had. They knew that they could not do the job that was in front of them. Very similar to you and I. We are not able to do the job either.
Secondly, they prayed. Now again prayer for many people is a religious exercise. That they get their list of prayer requests together and they go and pray for God to do what they ask. Although there is a place for doing this and asking God to move on our behalf, it is not all there is to prayer. Prayer is communication with our heavenly Father. It is meant to be 2 way communication. It is supposed to be the most intimate thing we do in our spiritual life. It is the key to becoming the friend of God. I must admit, I fall into the trap many times of lookiing at prayer as just something I do, not as a time to talk with God. I especially do not always take the time to listen to what He might say back.
So, should we have devotions or devotion? If we are engaging in doing devotions, but are no longer devoted and truly in love with our Savior, then devotions are a waste of time. We are just being religious. So we must get back to being devoted to God. To have that love, and that means we must once again rely on His power, and to spend time in actual communication with Him.
What do you think? Will you join me in working on having devotion?
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