Society encourages you to be constantly busy, so the quiet seasons of life can feel more challenging than the busy seasons. But in God’s kingdom, the quiet seasons are often the most productive. A quiet season is a time when you can step away from all the noise around you so you can hear God’s voice more clearly. Enjoying a quiet season allows you to experience God’s love for you simply because you’re one of his beloved children, not because of what you achieve for him. Let’s look at 7 ways you can grow spiritually in quiet seasons.
1. Embrace being overdoing: In John 15:4-5, Jesus encourages you to focus on being connected to him in a relationship, rather than on what you’re doing at any given time. He says: “Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.” A branch doesn’t try to grow a grape. It doesn’t strain or stress in any way. It simply remains attached to the vine. The life of the vine flows into the branch, and the fruit happens naturally. In quiet seasons, God is teaching you how to “remain” in a relationship with him. He’s showing you that your value isn’t based on how much you can do, but on your connection to him. So, when you feel the urge to do more to prove your worth to God or others, stop and remind yourself that you’re a branch and God is the vine. Remind yourself that your only job today is to stay connected to God through trust and love. If you do nothing else but stay close to him, you have had a successful day. This growth is the most significant because it changes your identity. You stop trying to earn God’s love and start just enjoying the love from your Heavenly Father, who loves you completely and unconditionally.
2. Relearn the art of rest: During a quiet season, you’ll have more space in your schedule than you usually have. You might be tempted to fill that space with new tasks. But Jesus invites you to rest. He says in Matthew 11:28-30: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke and put it on you, and learn from me, because I am gentle and humble in spirit; and you will find rest. For the yoke I will give you is easy, and the load I will put on you is light.” Jesus modeled the importance of regular rest during his earthly life. In these verses, he mentions a “yoke”, which is a tool for work, but he promises that his yoke is easy. Jesus is telling you that even when you work, you can do it from a place of rest, not a place of panic. You can use this quiet time to really rest. Put your phone away, go for a walk, or sit in a chair and enjoy communicating with God. Ask God to show you where you’ve been trying to carry burdens that he never intended for you to carry. As you learn to rest in God’s presence, you’ll find that you start to recharge spiritually in ways you never could during busy seasons. You’ll strengthen your faith and trust in God by learning that God will meet all of your needs even when you’re not working.
3. Strengthen your prayer and meditation habits: Jesus made communicating with his Father in heaven a top priority during his earthly life, and his example shows that prayer and meditation should be a central part of every day. Luke 5:16 points out: “But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.” This verse shows that prayer was an important part of Jesus' lifestyle. Prayer is talking to God, while meditation is listening to God. Psalm 19:14 points out the importance of both prayer and meditation: “May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer.” During quiet seasons, you have valuable opportunities to start prayer and meditation habits you’ll enjoy. As you do, you’ll start to see that communicating with God is an opportunity, not an obligation. You’ll enjoy God’s company and then be able to communicate with God in more relational ways (to build a closer relationship with him) rather than just in transactional ways (to ask God for something). Experiment with different ways of praying and meditating until you find the ways that work best for you. By strengthening your communication with God now, you’re building a strong relationship with God that will sustain you when your life gets busy again.
4. Enjoy reading God’s messages to you in the Bible: When you’re busy, you may just briefly read the Bible, picking a quick verse for a bit of encouragement and then moving on. But in a quiet season, you have the opportunity to spend more time reading God’s messages to you in the Bible. Psalm 1:1-3 points out: “Blessed is the one … whose delight is in the law of the LORD, and who meditates on his law day and night. That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither – whatever they do prospers.” When you’re at the start of your next quiet season, pick one short book of the Bible, and commit to staying there for the entire time when you’ll be enjoying less busyness in your schedule. Instead of rushing to finish chapters, read just a few verses of the book and ask yourself questions that encourage you to reflect, such as: “What does this tell me about God’s character?” and “How does this change how I see myself?” Pay close attention to God’s messages to you through what you read. Consider writing down your thoughts in a journal. By slowing down your reading, you’re allowing God’s messages to soak into your soul. God’s words for you will then be in your mind to tap into whenever you need them later on.
5. Seek God through silence and solitude: Quiet seasons can be uncomfortable because they often involve waiting quietly for what you want to happen. Lamentations 3:25-26 reminds you that there’s a kind of goodness you can experience when you wait quietly: “The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.” When you stop talking and stop listening to the noise around you in this fallen world, you create a space where you can actually hear what God is saying to you. So, prioritize seeking God through silence and solitude. Try to spend 5 to 10 minutes each day in total silence – with no music, no talking, and no notifications coming in from any of your devices. Just sit somewhere comfortable and focus on listening to whatever messages God brings to mind. At first, your mind will probably wander to something you need to do, like a chore or an errand. That’s fine. Gently bring your focus back to God. This practice will train you to recognize the “gentle whisper” of God’s voice (1 Kings 19:11-13). Over time, you’ll find that you can carry that inner quiet with you even when life gets loud again. The more you practice listening for God’s voice during silence and solitude, the easier it will become for you to recognize God speaking to you in all situations.
6. Find the wonder of God’s extraordinary work in your ordinary life: Quiet seasons often feel so ordinary that you might lose your sense of inspiration unless you make an effort to seek the wonder of God’s work in your life every day. Just because you’re not having especially dramatic experiences doesn’t mean that God isn’t working around you. Psalm 65:8 points out that God’s wonderful work is everywhere when it says to God: “The whole earth is filled with awe at your wonders; where morning dawns, where evening fades, you call forth songs of joy.” In a quiet season, you can grow by learning that there is no such thing as a secular experience, because God is always doing something sacred in your life. So, choose some boring tasks you have to do every day and pray while you do them. As you wash the dishes, you can thank God for the food he provided. As you drive to work, you can pray for the people in the cars around you. When you do ordinary tasks prayerfully, you can start to notice more how God is with you in the mundane details of your life, not just in the dramatic blessings he gives you. You can grow spiritually by discovering God’s extraordinary work even during ordinary quiet days.
7. Ask the Holy Spirit to change your heart: The Bible often compares human hearts to gardens. Song of Solomon 4:16 is a prayer to ask the Holy Spirit to blow into someone’s heart to bring positive change: “Awake, north wind, and come, south wind! Blow on my garden, that its fragrance may spread everywhere.” Gardens require constant, quiet maintenance, including watering, weeding, and pruning. If you think of your heart like a garden, you can see the importance of using quiet seasons to take care of tasks like weeding (removing sinful and unhealthy attitudes and behaviors with the Holy Spirit’s help) and watering (spending more time on practices that renew you spiritually). Ask the Holy Spirit to guide you to the specific types of spiritual gardening work that should be done in your heart, and to help you do that during your quiet season. Are there any old grudges you’re holding onto? Are there any habits that are pulling you away from God? Work with the Holy Spirit to weed those out. Would you like to schedule more time to read the Bible, to pray and meditate, to spread kindness, or do something else that will renew you spiritually? Water your heart spiritually by making time for it.
In conclusion, as you walk through this quiet season, remember that it gives you valuable opportunities to grow spiritually. So, make the most of the time and space you have now to focus more on growing closer to God. God loves you and will help you grow in ways that will last forever!
Photo credit: ©GettyImage/Daniela Jovanovska-Hristovska
