Pray Longer With the Four-Part Quiet Time

"Dear God, thank you for this day, help me to love others well... I wonder what the weather is today... you are so worthy... I hope the traffic isn't bad on the way to work... help my kids to listen to me... oh my goodness, I forgot to call Ben yesterday... forgive me for being so distracted. Amen."Have you ever prayed a similar prayer? Have you ever gone into prayer and the time passes but you have no idea what happened? Or have you ever found it challenging to sustain longer times of prayer because you don't have anything left to pray after a short period of time?I am often a victim of distracted thinking. Just ask my wife. But I have found that a simple structure for my time of prayer has helped to bring those distracted thoughts under control.It's possible that you don't like structure and you will not listen to anything I am about to say. But I would propose that a simple structure can bring a richness to your times with God and will accomplish three things:

1. Time passes more quickly
2. You will focus on what's important
3. You will be less distracted because you will know where you are going

Here is your four-part quiet time:

1. Presence (Focus on God) - Put on some music and worship.  It can be something on YouTube or streaming worship or an album. Sing along. Pray. Just enjoy being with God. If you play an instrument, pull it out and worship.
2. Word (Focus on the Bible) - Read the Word. There are so many ways to do this, whether it's doing a Bible study from a well-known author, or a discovery Bible study, or reading multiple chapters. The key is that you don't leave this time without making a decision about how you are going to obey what you read.
3. Journal (Focus on Self) - This is a time to put your needs and wants and desires before God. It's also a time to hear what God is saying to you through His Spirit. It's a great time to ask God questions, as I talk about about here.
4. Prayer for others (Focus on Others) - Pray for others who are important to you or who you feel God leading you to pray for. I like to pray from a list. I always start with my family, then I pray for my team (co-workers), and then I pray for the specific vision that God has called me to carry out.

It's often easiest to just divide your time in four. If you have 20 minutes, do five minutes of each. If you have 40 minutes, do 10 minutes of each. If you have two hours, do half-hour of each.My experience is that when I pray this way, I usually get done and still feel like I could pray for another hour.What about you? Do you do all four of these areas during your time of prayer?