Sit with Jesus before You Serve Him - iBelieve Truth: A Devotional for Women - September 20

Sit With Jesus, Then Serve Him
By: Chelsey DeMatteis

But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Matthew 6:33

I had just put my son down for nap time and per the usual, I thought of the few things I’d like to get done in my hour and a half window. On this day’s agenda, it was to work on a project the Lord had put on my heart.

Completely harmless and thoughtfully obedient, right?! As I grabbed my computer from the cabinet, I felt the Lord put on my heart, “Sit with me, then serve me.”

For someone with my personality type, it can be so hard to make the choice to sit with God before serving Him. It’s ingrained in me to do and a challenge for me to just be. Do you ever find yourself wrestling like this? We want to serve the kingdom of God, do all the things He’s placed on our hearts and experience the amazing things He does in these spaces at the unnoticeable expense of our time with Him. I’m still not sure how it goes unnoticed for so long, but there are seasons of my life that are perfect examples.

As I made my way to the cozy chair with my notebook, bible, and computer in hand, I had to decide at that moment that sitting with the Lord and learning from His was much more important than working on content that serves His kingdom.

It’s weird to me how much of a choice it was. I remember as I sat the computer down, it almost pained me. So, I asked myself this and now I want to ask you, “why is this time so important?”

My 'why' was this: “we can’t serve God from a desolate soul.” Matthew 6:33 talks about when we “first seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be added to you.” These things being, food, water, and clothing. But also, these things are the food for our souls, the covering of protection, the wisdom and knowledge He wants to share that we can only encounter through time with Him. Isn’t that amazing?

He just wants our time and in return, He gives us the truth that gives us life.

So how do we start choosing time with Him when our to-do lists are longer than we’d like to admit? We look to Jesus. Luke 5:16 tells us that He would draw to desolate places to pray. He, not they. Jesus spent time alone with His Heavenly Father. If Jesus, the savior of the world, the sinless son of God, made it a priority to still sit with His Father before serving man, how much more important should this be to us?

These are the parts in Scripture where we can truly see how much we’ve overcomplicated areas of our relationship with the Lord. Our Americanized culture has made time with Jesus seem impossible if we cannot have a cozy blanket, hot cup of coffee or tea, and matching notebook in hand.

Honestly, I’ve fallen into this trap too, and it’s caused me to fall into seasons of serving from a place of emptiness when all I needed to do was follow the example of the one who died for me. Retreat, pray, listen, then serve.

We will see over and over in Scripture the reasons we need to be alone with the Lord but now we need to put that truth into action. The action is to sit silently with Him and His word. It feels countercultural to do the action we’re called to. He calls us to sit with Him. Who has time to be quiet these days? People who make it a priority. Your "quiet" might look a little different but it's still an obedient decision. It might be a carpool line, a podcast during rush hour traffic, prayer time while jogging, or actually sitting in a cozy chair.

My prayer for you and me is that we’ll find ourselves more able to lean into the spirit as it prompts us to spend time with the Lord and not always jump to serve Him. We must stand firm in the truth that when we have hearts filled with the truth, knowledge, and love of Christ, then we are best able to serve the Kingdom from a heart prepared to be the hands and feet of Jesus.

You can find more from Chelsey on her website, https://www.chelseydematteis.com/.

Related Resource: Instead of Doing More This Summer, Maybe You Need to Do Less

If you've been feeling tired, overwhelmed, depleted, or just quietly wondering where God is in the middle of a very full life — this episode is for you. And honestly? It might be for me too, because I'm recording this in one of those seasons myself.

Today we're doing something a little different. Instead of going deep in a passage, we're talking about what to do when deep feels like too much — when you need less, not more. Specifically, I'm walking you through one of my favorite practices for weary seasons: handwriting scripture.

Not typing it. Not scrolling past it. Actually writing it out, slowly, in your own hand — because something happens in your brain when you do that. The words land differently. They go deeper. And over time, they become part of that personal library of God's voice that the Holy Spirit can pull from when you need it most. That's what Psalm 119:11 means when it says I have hidden your word in my heart — it's scripture moving into your long-term memory, where it lives and stays even when you haven't opened your Bible in weeks.

I'm sharing the five verses I wrote out for myself today — and why each one hit me fresh even though I've known some of them for years. This episode is part of our How to Study the Bible Podcast, a show that brings life back to reading the Bible and helps you understand even the hardest parts of Scripture. If this episode helps you know and love God more, be sure to follow the How to Study the Bible Podcast on Apple or Spotify so you never miss an episode!