Devotions: How to Use a Devotional Book

How do you use a devotional book in daily devotions?

(This is part four of a series of posts about Devotionals. Click on the numbers to read parts 1, 2, and 3.)

For the first 25 years of my walk with God, I didn’t read a devotional book.

I didn’t see a need to when I had the Bible and my own prayers.

My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers

But in 1999 someone in my husband’s Sunday school class gave him a copy of a famous devotional I’d heard of many times but never looked at: My Utmost for His Highest.

We had reached an odd period in our lives when that devotional book first arrived in our household.

My husband had been out of work for several months and wasn’t having much success finding new employment.

Our oldest son was leaving for college; our second son was beginning to focus on where he would go once he graduated from high school.

Things were changing, again, and we had other stressors in our “larger” family.

I’d been teaching Bible study for years but I needed something to “change up” my daily worship of God.

I needed a little more input into how to pray and how to look at God.

So, when this devotional book arrived in my life, I thought, “why not?”

Loved it at once

My Utmost for His Highest captured me on the first morning. A 350-word per day devotional, it prepared and asked me questions I didn’t expect.

I’ve read it every day since, because I find so much in it that speaks to where I am on any given day, and challenges me to think about God differently.

For many people, it’s “advanced Christianity,” because it demands a depth of commitment to God many people haven’t considered.

It’s a different way of looking at your spiritual life.

OC asks us to be mature in our Christian life. He asks questions I don’t always want to think about. Sometimes the readings make me uncomfortable in my spiritual life on that very day.

Other times, the readings reassure me, point me in the right direction, or simply confound me. They’re different 366 days of the year—just like I am.

The Power of a Praying Woman by Stormie Omartian

Like most women, I wanted to strengthen my marriage as well, so I picked up The Power of a Praying Wife by Stormie Omartian, and used it in my devotions with God during the same time.

The Power of a Praying Woman is divided into 30 chapters; each one a specific way of praying for your husband.

The end of each short chapter has a short prayer dealing with the issues discussed in the chapter.

After the first several times I read through the book and felt like I had a good handle on the how and why of each chapter’s prayer, I’d open to that day’s date and pray that prayer.

I  used The Power of a Praying Woman as a devotional book for 4 years.

An amazing thing happened during that time.

My husband changed.

And so did I

His spiritual walk deepened, I began to see him in a different way. God was at work and my prayers probably played a part.

You don’t have to use this book on just your husband. Lately, I’ve been thinking I should pray these same prayers for other men in my life . . .

I didn’t spend a lot of time on either books.

(Well, maybe a little longer on My Utmost for His Highest, if I was completely confounded or some concept caught my attention and needed me to pray about it.)

Don’t forget the Bible

A devotional book can augment a quiet time but should not replace the two main ingredients: Bible reading and prayer.

The three components, My Utmost for His Highest, my Bible, and my personal prayers have served and abetted my understanding and relationship to God for a long time.

I’m so thankful the Creator of the Universe wants to communicate with me and reveal who He really is.

Thanks be to God.

Tweetables

How to use a devotional book. Click to Tweet

A devotional book in addition to the Bible and prayer? Click to Tweet

The role of a devotional book in a quiet time. Click to Tweet

The other posts in the series are:

1. Devotions or Quiet Times?

2.Devotions: Bible Reading

3.Devotions: Prayer