Taking Jesus off my checklist

Most mornings, after I shower and get ready for the day, I make a checklist. I almost always start my checklist off with quiet time, and then I go on to list my daily tasks.

As I was reading through 1 John yesterday, I realized that I'm making a big mistake. Putting quiet time on my checklist isn't particularly problematic, but checking it off is. Checking quiet time off my checklist is the equivalent of saying, "I've given God His time, moving on." 1 John, however, talks a lot about abiding in Christ. I don't know about you, but I usually abide in Christ for about 15 minutes a day. If I treat 2:24 like a checklist item, I'm still spending 90% of my day without Christ... that's a scary thought!

When I read 1 John, I'm always astonished at how "good" he expects us to be. He says that if you do sin, you have an advocate with Christ (1 John 2:1), but I've always wondered why he uses the word if. Maybe, he uses if because when we're abiding in Christ, we can't sin.

Setting aside time to spend with Jesus is important to knowing who He is. If I want to abide in Christ, however, I can’t call it quits when the clock says I’m done.