“Spiritual disciplines” are things we do to stay in love with God and grow in faith. They can be things we do alone or together; they can be ways to spend time with God or to serve others. As the people of Sylva First UMC share one of their spiritual disciplines with you each week, we hope it will inspire you to new ways of loving God and growing in faith.
My name is Jeff Goss and my family has been attending Sylva FUMC since moving to Sylva in September 2010.
I lead a pretty busy life and have tried (and failed) many times to maintain a regular routine of reading my Bible. I used to go through spurts where I’d be in the scriptures daily for an extended period, then I’d take one day off. That one off day would quickly become a month-long hiatus. After acknowledging that opening a physical Bible each day just wasn’t working, I then tried making it a habit to go online and read The Upper Room daily devotional. I read headlines and stories of interest on multiple news websites every day and thought, surely I could make checking The Upper Room a habit as well. Not so much.
It finally hit me that I could connect with Jesus through my cell phone and email every morning, just as I connect with the rest of the world. For a few years now, I’ve been using The Bible app to deliver a “Verse of the Day” to me. My phone pings each morning with the alert just as my body begins to crave that first cup of coffee. Some days, I only read the simple one sentence verse and try to commit it to memory. Other days, when that verse is speaking to me (or I have a few extra minutes) I’ll read the entire chapter. If I miss the alert or skip reading the verse for any reason, the app sends me a reminder to keep my “daily streak” alive. I also subscribe to the Moments of Hope blog, a short daily devotional blog. David Chadwick is the author of the blog and was the Pastor of Forest Hills Church, where Rosa and I attended when we lived in Charlotte. The Moments of Hope blog email is sitting in my inbox waiting on me when I arrive at my office. I typically read it while I enjoy another cup of coffee and get settled in at my desk. I do not skip my morning coffee routine and now rarely skip my morning connections with God.
