The subtitle of A Place of Quiet Rest by Nancy Leigh DeMoss (now Wolgemuth) is “Finding Intimacy With God Through a Daily Devotional Life,” and that sums up perfectly the aim and emphasis of the book.

“Devotions,” for those who might not be familiar with the term, is what we call spending time alone with God in the Bible and prayer. Some people use the terms “God and I time” or “quiet time” or other phrases as well.

In Nancy’s introduction she tells a bit of her own and her family’s history, especially her father’s example of making time to spend with God, her struggles, and finally her conclusion that:

I have come to believe with all my heart that this is something worth fighting for. I have come to understand that one of the reasons it is such a battle is that the Enemy of my soul knows if he can defeat me here, he will ultimately be able to defeat me in every other area of my spiritual life.

Satan hates God, and he works tirelessly to convince Christians that they can operate on their own, independently of God. If we concede the battle to him, he knows that we will end up defeated, frustrated, barren, and useless to God. Worse, we will end up doubting God, despairing of His goodness, in bondage to our flesh, resisting His will.

…I have come to see that “devotions” is not so much an obligation of the Christian life, as it is an incredible opportunity to know the God of the universe. He has issued to you and to me an invitation to draw near to Him, to walk right into the “Holy of Holies” to enter into an intimate love relationship with Him (p. 16).

She discusses the challenges of setting apart that time in a busy schedule, the examples from the Bible of those who drew near to God, the wrong motivations for having devotions, the inward and outward purposes of devotions, elements of a quiet time, preparing for it, the high value of the Word of God, different approaches to it, questions to ask of the text, journaling, resources, our responses to what we read, prayer, and the influence our time with the Lord will have on the rest of our lives. She quotes many Christians of past years and closes each chapter with tips for making the information personal as well as the testimony of another woman, some famous (Elisabeth Elliot, Joni Eareckson Tada), some not.

I have multitudes of places marked, but here are just a few quotes that especially stood out to me:

A carefully structured quiet time with the Lord is good, but a growing life of devotion to the Savior is more – much more – that “Do A, B, or C and you will know Him better” (p 9, forward by Joni Eareckson Tada).

Developing intimacy with the Lord Jesus requires a conscious, deliberate choice. It is a choice to spend time sitting at His feet and listening to His Word, even when there are other good things that are demanding our attention. It is a choice to put Him first, above all our other responsibilities and tasks (pp. 42-43).

“Your company means more to Me than your cooking. You are more important to me than anything you can do for me” (p. 43, from a paraphrase of what Jesus was trying to get across to Martha).

Setting aside time for devotional activity, in and of itself, does not necessarily make us any more spiritual. (The Pharisees were renowned for their “devotional habits,” but they were far from spiritual.) Neither is a quiet time some sort of good luck charm that gets God on our side, guarantees our day will go better, and keeps us from having problems. Daily devotions are not a way of bartering or negotiating with God (p. 52).

Keep in mind that it is not enough that we should just read the Word. The object is that the words that are printed on the page would become indelibly written on our hearts. God never intended that we should merely get onto His Word – His intent is that the Word should get into us.

I cannot set aside time for God sporadically, whenever I can squeeze Him into my schedule, and hope to enjoy a vital, growing friendship with Him. That isn’t possible in human relationships, and it is no more possible in our relationship with God (p. 92).

Don’t let yourself get hung up in the mechanics. The particular Bible reading and study methods that are most helpful to someone else may not be as useful to you. The important thing is to make sure that you are getting into the Word and that the Word is getting into you. Find out which methods work best for you, and use them (p. 185).

There was one teeny little area where I wasn’t sure I agreed with the author: when she discussed Jesus’ example of making time to spend alone with His Father, she used phrases like, “This is where He discovered the will of God for His life” (I would say He knew that before He came); “This is where He gained the resources to do battle against Satan”; “This is where He received grace to love the unloveable and power to do the impossible” (p. 29); “Jesus had compassion on the multitudes and gave of Himself sacrificially to minister to their needs. But He knew that He could not meet their needs if He did not draw upon His relationship with His Father” (p. 101). I believe that when Jesus was in a human body on earth, He was still fully God as well as fully man (which I know Nancy believes as well), and some of these things were inherent in His nature as God, so I am not sure that His spending time with His Father was as much of a filling up after being depleted like we would need. But I hadn’t quite considered it this way before, so I need to think about and study it more.

I especially appreciated the emphasis on seeking intimacy, a close relationship with God. Making our way through the Bible, learning truth, learning doctrine, memorizing verses, are all important, but need to be exercised under the overarching purpose of getting to know Him better and drawing closer to Him in our hearts, not as an end in themselves.

The book is highly readable and I think it would be good for both beginners who haven’t really established regular devotional habits yet as well as those who have been having time set apart with God for years.

Even though many of these truths and tips were familiar to me, and even though making time for Bible reading has, by God’s grace, been a settled thing for me for some time now, I still find books like this valuable. I do learn some new things, but they reinforce what I have come to believe over the years and inspire me to keep on.

(Sharing with Semicolon‘s Saturday Review of Books, Faith on Fire, Carole’s Books You Loved), and Literary Musing Monday)

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