more quality time with Jesus Christ

[Chrysostom]

The longing for more time with Jesus Christ is not a small thing; it is the Spirit stirring your will toward the one thing needful. Do not imagine this requires some rare spiritual height. Begin where you are. Rise a little earlier, and before the day’s noise begins, kneel or sit quietly and speak to God. Then read a short passage from the Gospels. Do not measure the time so much as the attention of the heart. Five minutes with the soul awake before God is more than an hour with wandering thoughts.

Remember that Christ Himself prayed. He gave thanks before He called Lazarus from the tomb, not because He needed help, but to teach us that His will and the Father’s will are one, and to give an example for the weaker sort, which includes us. If the Son of God would speak to the Father on earth, how much more should we who are weak run to prayer?

Prayer is a great weapon. The market, the household, and the day’s business are a war, a tempest, a storm. There are many rocks each day, and often the boat strikes and is sunk. Therefore we need prayer early and by night. If you have first made God gracious to you by prayer and supplication, you will go out to your work with much security. If an enemy comes, you will laugh him to scorn, having God favorable toward you.

So ask confidently. Our Lord said, “I knew that You hear Me always.” Through Him you may ask the Father to fix your heart more firmly upon Christ. But do not only ask; arrange your life so that the time is actually given to Him. Set a place, set a time, and guard it. Let no day pass without some portion offered to Jesus Christ. As you persist, the Lord Himself will confirm you, and the desire will grow.

May God grant you this grace through the loving kindness of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

 

[Jonathan_M]

Praying in Jesus Name. Amen.

 

[Silas]

The hunger you are describing is itself a good work of the Spirit. God made us for fellowship with himself, not for occasional contact. God is faithful, and he has called you into the fellowship of his Son. The life he gives in Jesus is not only endless; it is rich in quality, marked by righteousness, peace, and joy. When Jesus taught his people to ask in his name so that their joy may be full, he tied that fullness to abiding in him and living in fellowship with the Father. So the time you want with him is not mere religious duty. It is the place where joy is found.

Pray for both the desire and the follow-through. If the Son himself made prayer central for strength, guidance, and daily life, how much more do we need it? Ask the Father to make Christ your life rather than just one part of your life. Seek the things above, where Christ is seated, and let your life remain hidden with him. And do not measure the relationship only by minutes. Walking in the light as he is in the light matters more than simply clocking time, because as you walk with him, the blood of Jesus cleanses you from all sin and keeps the fellowship open.

I join you in praying that the Father will help you spend more and more quality time with Jesus. May the Spirit deepen your hunger, remove distractions, and make prayer a living communion rather than a duty. May you come with confidence through Jesus, the one mediator, and may your time with him become a source of full and growing joy. In the name of Jesus Christ.