How would you answer if someone asked, How has your time with the Lord been this week?
Some weeks, I have an answer I’m proud of. Other weeks, I find myself stammering through excuses: I meant to, but time just got away from me.
The most common response I’ve heard—and used—is some variation of: I want to, but I just don’t have the time.
It’s a familiar refrain.
Last fall, I had dinner with a friend, and our conversation drifted toward a quiet reality in Christian life: our time with God often gets shuffled into the “fit it in when you can” category. That catchall space where good intentions pile up but rarely take root.
Instead of opening our Bibles, many of us scroll through a Christian Instagram post or two. It’s easier, faster and requires less of us. We tell ourselves we’ll get around to the real thing when life slows down—though it rarely does.
The numbers are startling. The average American spends about 705 hours a year on social media, and nearly 3,000 hours in front of a television. Somehow, we manage to find the time for these things.
And yet when it comes to God, we struggle to justify more than five rushed minutes.
To be clear, the problem isn’t Instagram or Netflix. Even those who don’t use either could point to a dozen other distractions that eat away the day. The point is that all of us, if we were to honestly log our hours, would see what truly consumes us.
Which brings me to the uncomfortable suggestion: this is less about time than it is about posture.
We all have the same 24 hours. What we do with them reveals our priorities.
Think about your closest friend. If every conversation you shared was capped at five minutes, the friendship would never deepen. It would be enough to sustain familiarity, but never intimacy. Eventually, the time invested wouldn’t reflect the importance you claimed the relationship held.
So why would we settle for five minutes with God? A friend of mine put it this way: “Why would we want just five minutes?”
Of course, any time with God matters. Scripture reminds us that “better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere.” But the issue isn’t simply whether we spend time with God—it’s how and why we do. Are we offering him the leftovers of our day? Or are we approaching him with the intention of real relationship?
The late Catholic philosopher Michael Novak wrote that there are three levels of belief: public (what we say we believe), private (what we think we believe), and core (what our lives prove we actually believe). The last one, Novak argued, we never violate.
That’s a sobering measure. We sing that Jesus is enough for us. But if our schedules tell a different story, which belief is truer—our public declaration, or our core conviction?
Excuses are easy to find. I’ve told myself that breaks from work or school would finally free me to “reconnect” with God, only to discover that my free time filled itself with other pursuits. Every season is busy. The next one will be too. Which makes the real question Joshua posed feel uncomfortably present: Today, whom will you serve?
This isn’t about hitting the perfect quota of devotional minutes. It’s about whether our hearts are oriented toward God in the midst of ordinary life. Psalm 16 says, “I have set the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken.” To set him before us requires both discipline and desire—practices that don’t always come naturally, but reshape us over time.
Obedience, after all, is often more reliable than feelings. We can’t wait for desire to precede discipline. More often, discipline cultivates desire.
That’s why practical habits matter:
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Keep a time log for a few days. What patterns emerge? What claims most of your attention?
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Ask God to show you what competes with him for your affection—work, relationships, recognition, comfort.
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Make small but intentional shifts. Fast from social media. Use your commute for prayer. Wake earlier, or practice Sabbath.
These small, countercultural acts of discipline begin to tilt our lives toward God. They remind us that a life with Jesus isn’t meant to be squeezed in, but woven through.
The psalmist once wrote: “One thing I have asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life.”
What would it look like for our schedules, not just our words, to reflect that prayer?
I don’t pretend to have the full answer. But I know this: five minutes a day can never replace the fullness of life found in the presence of God. And deep down, we don’t really want it to.
