How Jesus Calling Changed My Quiet Time

For years, my quiet time was a thing I did because I was supposed to. I would sit in my recliner by the living room window with my coffee, open the Bible, and read a chapter. And most mornings, by the time I reached the bottom of the page, I could not have told you a single verse I had just read. My mind was already on the dishwasher, the phone call I needed to return, the church office work I had not finished. I loved the idea of a steady devotional life. The practice of it kept slipping through my fingers.

I tried the things you try. A reading plan that started strong and fizzled by mid-February. An app that buzzed at me and somehow made a daily devotional feel like a notification. A thick study Bible that I loved and rarely opened because I never knew where to start. None of it was bad. None of it stuck. Then a friend in my Tuesday morning Bible study handed me a copy of Jesus Calling by Sarah Young and said, 'Just read tomorrow's page. That's all. One page.'

That is the whole premise of the book, and it is why I think it worked for me when other things did not. Each day gets one short reading, written as if God is speaking directly to the reader, followed by a few scripture references to look up. Not a chapter. Not a study guide. One page. You can do one page at six in the morning with a half cup of coffee left.

This matters to me more than it used to. In my late fifties, I went through a stretch of burnout, the kind where you are running the church office, helping with the grandchildren, and serving on one committee too many, and something has to give. I started walking most mornings and paying attention to sleep and stress. And I realized my quiet time had become one more task on the list, which is the opposite of what it should be. I needed something that felt like rest, not another assignment.

I started on a Tuesday. By the following Tuesday I had read seven pages, which does not sound like much until you remember that I had not managed seven consecutive days of any devotional in years. By the end of the first month, it had become the part of my morning I looked forward to, and that surprised me. Some mornings I read the page and sat with it for a few minutes before I even reached for my Bible. Sarah Young writes the way a patient friend talks, direct and warm, and the scripture references sent me back into the Bible itself, which is the part I had been missing. I have not missed a morning since that first Tuesday. I cannot say that about any other devotional I own.

I have not missed a morning since that first Tuesday. I cannot say that about any other devotional I own.

The honest part: this is not a deep theological study, and it was never meant to be. If you are looking for an exegetical commentary on the lectionary, this is not that book. What Sarah Young does, and what she does unusually well, is lower the barrier. On my worst mornings, the ones where I had slept badly and my head was full of worry, I could still manage one page. And more often than not, that one page was exactly what I needed to hear. I do not know how she manages that across all 365 entries, but she does.

I took it to my Tuesday morning group about a month in. We did not plan to use it as a study. I just mentioned it, and three women asked to see it. The next week, four of them had their own copies, and we started opening the day's page together before we opened our study. It became a small anchor for the group, a shared starting point, and it is still that three years later. Nobody in that room would call themselves a person who reads a devotional every day. And yet. We are ten women, give or take, and we have been meeting on Tuesday mornings for about twelve years. This is the only book that has made it into every single meeting since.

A few practical notes. The padded hardcover holds up well to being carried in a bag, and the pages lie flat, which matters when you are holding it in one hand and a coffee mug in the other. The print is a comfortable size for my 61-year-old eyes, and the scripture references are printed right there on the page, so I do not have to flip to an index. I have bought several copies as gifts since, for friends who said they wanted to start a quiet time habit and did not know where to begin. For a book that sits next to your chair for a whole year, it takes the wear well.

What I'd Tell You If We Were Sitting at My Kitchen Table

I would tell you not to overthink it. You do not need to read this book the right way. You do not need to catch up if you miss a week, and you do not need to feel guilty about the reading plan you abandoned in February. Just put the book by your chair, read tomorrow's page when you sit down with your coffee, and look up the verses if you have two more minutes. Some days that is all you will have. It is enough. It has been enough for me for three years now, and I suspect it will be enough for you too. If you miss a week, just start again on Monday. The book does not keep score, and neither should you.