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Too Busy for God's Word?

I’ve been asked by several busy moms, “How do you even have devotions with little ones?”
That’s the time when you can’t even imagine getting sleep.
My answer, “Grab a verse and go with it.”
This is not the time when you can sit and leisurely study out what the words mean in Greek and what other commentaries say about the verse, it’s just grab a verse and go.
But as you go, you do not leave your thoughts about the verse behind. 
You mull over that verse. You take each phrase and think about it. 
You meditate on it and how it fits in the story the chapter, the book and with God.
You think about it all day, though you can’t study about it.

Take a song and sing it throughout the day—concentrating on the words and what praise it brings to God.
When I nursed, I felt like I was trapped. I couldn’t move or I’d wake them up, but they’d nurse for hours. 
What I didn’t wish that I’d planned ahead and put my Bible on the bed so I could look at it.
But if I did, the pages were hard to turn and hold so I could read it.
But now? With the bible app, BIbleis. anyone can listen to the Bible being read with a touch of a finger!

When the boys grew, I read to them. We went through the Little House on the Prairie Series two times. 
Quiet time was my read out loud time to them. “Just another chapter.” Was often asked. 
When it was too hot to play outside, we’d read longer. 
By selecting those books carefully, you can grow and be encouraged too.

Walking babies at night was a chance for me to sing. Consider the words carefully. 

We memorized together as a family.
It’s amazing how much a toddler can absorb when he’s just rolling around on the floor!
When we had our 5 and 7 year old stand and “present”, our 3 year old wanted his turn.
He knew the chapter well.

Work together on each verse. 
Say a phrase 5 times out loud, then add it to the part already known, saying them together 5 times. 
If we were unsure with a verse, we’d go back over it.
We memorized chapters as a family. 
And the Word was hid in their hearts.

AWANA helped keep me motivated when Joey was deployed.
The boys would memorize several sections a week.
As I helped with one, all the others heard those verses too. 
Now three of the boys meet with a friend of the family every week via viber to quote chapters of Philipians, Colosians, Ephesians, Proverbs…

Verses I learn now are a struggle to even find and say.
Don’t waste these years with your children. 
This is when the truth sticks!

Include your children in your Bible reading.
We read different books to them, but we also just read the Bible.
Even at a young age, they can understand the stories.
It also brings questions like, "Why did God destroy Sodom?"
It becomes a springboard to tell of Who God is and what we must do.
That's another reason why we only did one sport per year with the boys—we would have no time to for family devotions, or family meal time.
(We've talked about the importance of family meal time before and the lack of eating family dinner "together" is linked to troubled youth. See What's for Dinner?)

And these ways help you think about God’s Word all day long.
God promises that His Word won’t return void.
Those seeds planted now, will remain to guide them when you aren’t around.
And help you keep your focus today!


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Mothers today do have an advantage with apps to listen to Bible reading, etc. while nursing their babies, but as you said, it's also through songs, verses, praises to God, all through the day. Keeping God right there in our home with us to turn to at any moment and commune. I'll admit that I'm loving the slower life right now and more time with the Lord.

I write about what matters...to you---
women, wives and moms---
about your family, faith and future.
I write about what's hard, what helps and what heals.
I show you how it's done. And not done.
I hold your hand as you find what matters to the Savior.
And let go of those things that mattered to you, but not to Him.
I write about what matters...to Him.
               Sonya Contreras

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Author of Biblical fiction, married to my best friend, and challenged by eight sons’ growing pains as I write about what matters.

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