Good morning everyone and welcome back to another morning with the masters where we devote ourselves to the Lord daily with you. Good morning you guys. Good morning indeed. We're

rounding out with day seven of our a time to sow devotion on the Bible app. There's a link to that description of the podcast if you guys want to follow along with us and if you missed the previous days they were

fire so go back and check those out. As always I'm going to read the scripture that Tori is going to pick it with the divo. Let's do it. The scripture is second Timothy chapter three verses 16 and 17 and it says this. All scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us

realize what is wrong in our lives. It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right. God uses it to prepare and equip his people to do every good work. The devotional is titled cultivating a spiritual garden and it says there's no such thing as instant spiritual maturity to grow in our faith and walk with Christ we have to

continuously plant spiritual seeds into our lives. These seeds come through spending time with God by reading the Bible praying and prioritizing quiet time to hear from him. We can often get so caught up in the quickness of the world around us that we forget that time with God can't be rushed. We may have become so used to the noise and busyness that it may take some time for us to become familiar with

while we're quieting everything around us in order to hear God's voice. That'll preach, mm-hmm. After performing miracles, Jesus would retreat to what scripture describes as lonely places or to the mountain to pray by himself.

Mark 135-37 says, very early in the morning while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place where he prayed. Simon and his companions went to look for him and when they found him they exclaimed everyone is looking for you. Although people were searching for Jesus, he prioritized time alone with his father.

How often do you set aside time in your busy schedule to make room to be alone with God? More than likely, we neglect time with God so that we can accomplish everything else scheduled for the day. Spending time with God often becomes an afterthought.

Yet when we view our lives as spiritual gardens, it can encourage us to recognize the value of the types of seeds we are planting in order to reap the right harvest.

Conviction alert, conviction alert. I feel like we need some type of buzz or button for the podcast is basically just for me to alert you all that I am currently being convicted by the Holy Spirit and I cannot be more happy about it because although it may hurt in the moment to realize and recognize that I've been doing things wrong, I know that this is a part of God's sanctification process for me.

And he is open my heart and my eyes and my ears to see the truth because there is just part in the devotional was so simple that said this, we can often get so caught up in the quickness of the world around us that we forget that the time with God can't be rushed.

And I love the intentionality of that. It's like, it shouldn't be. No, it can't be rushed. We need to get better at quieting the world in prioritizing God because that's what Jesus did.

Literally, the disciples came and found him and said, everyone is looking for you. But Jesus prioritized that time with his father that even though he was needed by the world and we all are, we all have different responsibilities and they are important.

But nothing is more important than prioritizing alone time with our father. And so if we don't have a good rhythm of that or a good routine for that, I feel like we're risking our spiritual garden and we're really putting it in a tough place for it to thrive.

You know, like we can't survive without food or water oxygen. Well, it's the same thing for spirituality. We have to remember that man is not fed on bread alone. And so I also just want to end this part for me just with a little piece of encouragement that sometimes I will neglect God to take care of my earthly responsibilities.

But the truth is is that if I prioritize God, I will do better at honoring all of my earthly responsibilities and they will be in a better place to thrive and have fruition.

And I just needed this great reminder.

Yeah, it's so good. I kind of feel like there's been this theme, you know, when we went through the resolution of hurry and now we're going through this devotional about cultivating our spiritual gardens and it all comes down to

quieting the world and allowing space for our relationship with God to thrive. And I think that it's there's a reason why we keep being reminded.

And it's because we're so quick to forget. Yes. And praise God that his mercies are new every single morning because we fail so often to prioritize this time with him.

But I think we all know the benefit when we actually do. Yes.

There was a morning this past weekend where I was like, hmm, maybe I should fall like maybe I could go back to sleep for a little bit longer.

...