Advice For The Christian Girl

Regaining Our Passion For Christ

How Do We Regain Our Thirst And Passion For Christ.

We can stop slowly losing our hunger and thirst for Him when we are already filled with the world. If we are constantly always concerned with this world, desiring only material things or distracted we won't focus on feeding our spirit.

This is one of the beauties of fasting. Whether from food, shows, movies, a person, whatever it is that's pulling you further from God or being a distraction.

But if for example, it's the distraction, it wouldn't be wise to spend less time studying and working because these are things you need to do but rather while you're studying you can take beaks of every 30 minutes and spend 10 minutes in either prayer or worship. This is something my father guided me to do. He said how at times you'll be busy, one day if you have kids if you have a job or are in exams. You'll find yourself to be busy but that's not an excuse not to spend time with God.

What I try to do, is while I do chores. This can be doing laundry, washing the dishes or cleaning around. I'll be listening to worship music or to an edifying podcast. The purpose behind this is so that I'm not just doing work and wasting time but I'm using my time to both do my responsibilities and also to serve God and spend time with Him. It's not about being unwise and spending 10 hours straight just praying but neglecting your home, studies and health but it's about incorporating God within your life. When you're cleaning or doing mundane things use that time to honour God and spend time with Him. If you're studying, after 1 hour or every 39 minutes, spend 10-25 minutes with God in-between. Pray for those few minutes, worship, praise or go back to that podcast.

Do whatever you see you're neglecting. If you're neglecting your prayer time or find you don't give much time just to sit and pray, I would use that 10-25 minutes to pray. If you are neglecting worship and praise, use those minutes or if you're neglecting reading the word and learning more about God, use those few minutes to do a little Bible study you can complete throughout the day.

This requires a lot of discipline and your flesh will fight you at first. Trust me, I know but now I'm so used to worshipping whenever I'm doing chores that it feels weird not to. I'm so used to praying in between times I have rest that not praying feels strange and I get uncomfortable easily.

What feels like hard work will soon be your lifestyle if you continue the course. A lot of people stop whenever it gets tough. Something I learned online about learning the guitar (or any other musical instruments) is that during that first stage, most people quit the guitar because it's overly challenging. The balancing, the doing all those things at once while keeping up with notes gets tiring. A lot of people give up because they see why bother. That's a question we all ask ourselves.

I can read my Bible and be on fire for God, but your expectation is perfection. Once you make a mistake, stumble or sin you look down on yourself and wish you were more together.

So we just give up on ourselves and compare others. We believe others can do it but we can't. We wonder what's wrong with us.

But my sis, you need to realise that those people you admire paid the price. They did the hard work, the perseverance, they also did those mess-ups and not always getting it right but now you're just seeing the result of many mess-ups, many tears and wanting to quit results.

No one just jumps to being able to be daily in the word. It's a challenge. I wanted to give up but my desire to become a Godly woman of the word exceeded that of my excuses and Insecurity and I pray in Jesus name that you future your desire for God do the same.

I know you forgot to read the word but saying why bother is you giving up way too easily. When you give up so easily, you're giving the enemy an easy win. He shouldn't win at anything but lose at everything!

As women of God, I know it can feel like we are so far from being perfect and that's true. I'm not here to tell you that you'll arrive at this destination of perfection and will do it all and know it all. You won't, at least not with your flesh fighting back. The Bible describes our flesh at war with our spirit (Galatians 5:17-25). It's a constant battle. There are days when we don't feel like reading the word first but we want to do other things but at those moments it feels so off for me not to read the word first that I force and push myself to do it anyway and I end up doing it. It's not about ticking off a box but seeing that we are on a journey to be more like Jesus each day. I'm not here to make you perfect, I'm here to be a servant of the Lord who helps His daughters remember that you won't reach any perfection here on your own, in Christ we are righteous but you will grow to be more disciplined.

Suddenly those 10 minutes of prayer that felt like years feels like seconds to you. Suddenly Bible studying that feel like a chore is soon something you do as a lifestyle. That's my prayer for you girls not to give up but to remember you're growing, you'll might mess up and that's okay but get back up again when you do. Too many of us fall and stay on the ground when God calls us higher.

So young women of God. Those 5 minutes you sent in prayer, yes it's not like your fellow sis who spent 1 hour but it's your growth. That sacrifice you're doing in between a hectic schedule of exams yet you spend time on prayer with your father. This is what God honours in private and also honours in public. It's not about length, or fancy words we use that pleases God but God looks at our heart and motives (Matthew 6:5-6).

Those we admire as Great and mighty men and women of God are a result of their quiet times. What they do in secret is revealed in public.  I pray for God to use me is for His glory and His kingdom, we as servants of God go last! We are simply nothing without our God. Our Abba Father is He who establishes the ground on which we stand.

Keep that fire for Jesus. That fire to spread His gospel, that fire to pray, that fire to be in His presence and that fire to be with His people. You feed that desire when you're doing that desire. When you read the word and grow in the knowledge of the mysteries revealed. The more you hunger for more revelations of who God is and His word. The more you pray and you see the results of your prayers. The more you are in His presence the more you want to stay. The more you hunger for God's presence once more. The more you spend time with fellow believers in deep Godly conversations and in worship, the more you want to be in that Christain concert, the more you love church, the more you desire your Bible study group.

-What can help you is to fast and learn to fast regularly

A tip I received is how you can challenge yourself to fast every month, at the beginning of the month or even at the end. Some people do this to conscrete the month and also to seek God on the following month, to intercede, seek God and ask for His direction on the month to come.

And for those who want to go even deeper, some people even challenge themselves to fast at least once every week. They do this to seek God on every week and to consecrate that week in God's hands, His direction, guidance, revelation etc.

For those new to fasting I would suggest you can start with once a month and for those who desire to go even deeper in their walk, in walking with God and growing spiritually, I suggest you can challenge yourself to once every week or even every second week.

Fasting is a disipline that is apart of our walk that is important for its a time where we set aside our worldly desires and needs temporary to rather focus on spiritual things. We replace the time we would use for anything else with the word and prayer. We put aside distractions and our earthly appetites temporary so we can feed our spirits with spiritual food (reading the word, prayer and simply having resources that bring you closer to God).

Fasting isn't just food but can also be for many things. Maybe if books can be a distraction sometimes you can fast from that. Whatever you see is truly a sacrifice before God where you say "God this is less important than you so I'll give this up temporary to focus on You"

Whatever you sense is taking you further from God, you can take a fast away from that thing/person temporary and rather focus on reading the word, listening to sermons and prayer. This will change your desires and focus to be on God, it will be difficult at first but the less time you focus on the world and the more you do on God and your relationship with Him, the more you'll have a taste of His water and desire the fountain. Meaning, the more you'll increase your desire for more of Him.