Day 7 - Principle 2: Establish a definite time

Do you think that prayer is an essential part of your daily life? Do you have problems keeping a regular prayer time? Does life keep interfering with your prayer life? Is your schedule just too full, too busy?

Here's the deal: You don't fit your prayer time into your schedule. Your schedule adapts to your prayer time.

Isn't that logical? After all, if prayer is as important as so many of us confess it to be, surely it should be very high on our list of priorities and it should enjoy more prominence and time than everything that is below it on the priority list.

Is that the case in your life?

If not, and if you're serious about improving your prayer life, this is your first step:

• Establish a definite prayer time.

 Make a decision to pray at a specific time every day.  Write it down.  Do it.

This may seem like something very simple, but you will be surprised how effective it is.  There's a huge difference between "I am going to pray every day" and "I am going to pray at 6 am every morning".

Of course "6 am" can also be "before breakfast".

My personal routine is to get up, shower, make a cup of tea and pray.  That's it.  That's how I start my day and it works for me.  Some days I sleep a bit later.  No problem.  My routine still holds.  When I have something to do (relatively) early in the morning, I get up earlier so that my routine still fits in.

It works.

Naturally this approach does not mean that there are no other times of prayer.  You can pray anytime, anywhere but having a set prayer time is for our benefit.  It helps us to be disciplined and to grow in our relationship with the Lord.

Selwyn Hughes (15 Ways to a More Effective Prayer Life) has this to say about establishing a definite prayer time:

Some Christians complain that their busy lives leave them no time to pray, but as it has been said "If you are too busy to pray, then you are busier than God intended you to be." So build a fence around a certain part of the day and reserve it for contact with God through prayer. The best time to pray is in the moring when your mind is fresh and the day is still before you. The psalmist sȧid, "In the morning will I direct my prayer unto Thee, and will look up."(Psalm 5:3) Don't try to find a time for prayer - make time. If you go through the day trying to fit a prayer time into your schedule you will fail. Make it the first priority after you awake from sleep to keep a prayer appointment with the Lord.