The year had come to an end, and Steve was glad. It felt unmemorable—like a wasted year in which he had done little more than exist. Life felt flat, and his relationship with God felt distant. He was beginning to question whether his life had any real purpose at all.
It wasn’t marked by one defining tragedy, but by a slow accumulation of disappointments, frustrations, and quiet failures. By the time the calendar turned, Steve found himself doing something he hadn’t done in a long time—looking honestly at his life with God. And the truth unsettled him.
Steve believed. He attended church. He was fluent in Christian lingo and knew how to sound spiritual—but it had quietly become a cover for how shallow his daily walk with God had become. That realization hurt more than the difficult year itself.
So as the New Year began, Steve made a sincere decision: this would change. He didn’t want to sound devoted anymore—he wanted to be devoted.
He started small, but intentional.
As he went to bed, he prayed, “Lord, I love You and want to spend meaningful time with You in the morning. Please help me.”
He set his alarm earlier. He woke up, brewed his coffee, sat in his favorite reading chair, and opened his Bible in the quiet of the morning. He greeted the Lord with a sincere and prayerful welcome. Though he meant it, his words felt thin. And too quickly, resistance came. Distractions—emails and work texts were buzzing his watch. And then, old habits—the urgency to get things done—pushed back hard. Instead of reassurance, doubt whispered louder than ever. Yet something important was happening that Steve didn’t recognize at first. Discipline was being formed. Not perfection.Not intensity. But discipline—the simple choice to show up.
Then one Sunday morning, everything shifted.
As the pastor spoke, he shared words from Scripture that landed deeply in Steve’s heart:
Psalm 5:3 (TPT) “At each and every sunrise You will hear my voice as I prepare my sacrifice of prayer to You. Every morning I lay out the pieces of my life on the altar and wait for Your fire to fall upon my heart.”
The pastor went on to explain that God’s Word was given so He could speak to us—and that prayer is our humble response. In prayer, we magnify who He is, we bear our souls, seek His wisdom, acknowledge that we cannot do life without Him, give Him our worship, and lay our hearts and requests before Him.
“This,” the pastor said, “is the rhythm of fellowship—when we first let Him speak to our heart through His Word, then cling to that Word and share our heart with Him. It is here that the wind of the Holy Spirit blows on the embers of our hearts and fans the flames of our relationship with Him. Communing with God is where our strength from the Lord comes from. This is where the power of the Holy Spirit empowers us.”
The words felt so personal, it was as though God Himself was speaking directly to Steve.
One day, Steve asked a trusted friend if he could share his manna—the verse God had spoken to him through that morning. As they talked, the fire within him grew stronger.
Day after day, Steve continued to show up and meet with the Lord.
His circumstances didn’t instantly change—but Steve did. He found that he loved his new routine more than the interferences that once discouraged him from it.
In the months ahead, his hunger and thirst for intimacy with God went from embers to flames. He was growing. He felt alive again. Not because he tried harder—but because he learned that the first step toward a deeper life with God was simply to show up, let God's word speak to Him, ask for God's help in his day, and His help to be a blessing to others. And He did.
The fire of God grew in his heart. God’s Word came alive and began to speak to him daily.
His journal was filled with thoughts from God. He couldn’t wait to talk about the scriptures that were burning in Him with his friends.
What began as the simple discipline of just showing up to be with God, became holy fire and real intimacy with God.
He had never felt more alive in Him, or more in love with Him. And that is the foundation that God has established for us all!
James 4:8 (NLT) “Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you.”
