Soft Reboot

Scripture:
Psalm 1:2-3
But whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
and who meditates on his law day and night.

That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither—
whatever they do prospers.

Observation:

Two years ago in June was when I really got planted.  I started having a regular quiet time, I started delighting in His law, and I started meditating on what he had to say.  But for the past couple of weeks, something has happened that has taken me by surprise.  I thought this time was set, almost as if it was within me.  I thought my delight was such that my time with the Lord was an appointment within my soul and not a discipline established by my alarm clock.  But then the summer slide happened.

When it started, I was going through a rough time emotionally, and I just thought I needed to spend more time in prayer.  I didn't feel emotionally equipped to dig into the word or especially to share what I was learning.  So I spent several days of my quiet time just praying.  But slowly those prayers got shorter and then I wasn't reserving any time at all for the Lord.  I was just tossing up a couple pleas for help throughout the day.  And although I know the Lord delights in our cries for help in times of brokenness, my soul needs to be plugged in to the source of its strength during that brokenness.  In just a couple of weeks, I went from planted to withering.

Application:

Today, I had to set my alarm because I have to work.  And so as I always do during the school year, I set it for two hours before I have to be somewhere (one hour with Jesus and one hour to get ready and get there.)  When I opened by Bible Reading Plan, I saw that today is the day that Psalms starts over.  Today is a perfect day for a restart of my quiet time.

In the technology world, there are two ways to restart a machine… a hard reboot or a soft reboot.  A hard reboot means you have to completely unplug from the power source so that the machine initiates all over again.  A soft reboot doesn't require you to unplug from the power source.  Today, I need a soft reboot of my quiet time.  I need to start all over on my end, but no matter what happens, I am NEVER disconnected from my power source.  No matter how far I go, that power source won't let go of me.  If you know Jesus, there are no more hard restarts!  

Does anyone else need to reboot today?  Maybe you have gotten out of your routine because of summer.  Maybe you got distracted by hard times.  Maybe things were going so great that you became apathetic.  Maybe your quiet time has been going great this summer but you just want to recommit to that focus this morning.  If so, please join me in this reboot prayer.

Prayer:

Dear Lord, you are so awesome!  Thank you that you are always there even when I am distracted or rebellious or apathetic.  God, I am sorry that I let this time with you go.  I am so thirsty.  I so badly want to be replanted by your streams.  I want my power to be in you.  So today I start over.  Today, I need a reboot from you.  In Jesus' name!  Amen!