My word of the year for 2023 is relationships. Each month, I broke it down to focus on different relationships and I first started with my relationship with God. My other relationships cannot be their healthiest if I don’t first have a healthy relationship with the Lord. My hope was to build habits that would improve my faith for the rest of the year. Here are five things I did that you too could do in order to build a deeper connection with the God.

Dive deep into scripture

Pick a chapter in the Bible that you feel as though God is calling you to. Initially I thought I would dive into Acts, which I did at first, but I didn’t feel God speaking to me, so I switched it up. I prayed and asked God to lead me to where He wanted me, and I ended up diving into 1 & 2 Thessalonians and few other smaller chapters in the Bible. Throughout these chapters God spoke to me and showed me how to improve my relationship with Him and others. I was able to learn more about the Lord which in turn helped me grow closer with Him. When we learn more about others that is when we truly grow closer to them. Reading the Bible and studying scripture is so important because it allows us to know God and His character. HERE is my Bible Time checklist.

Daily Prayer

Another thing is praying daily because it allows you to have communication open with God. It’s important to talk to Him when wanting to build up that relationship. My preferred way is through prayer journaling. It allows me to have a way to document my prayers and look back on them to know that God truly does answer prayers. At the end of the year, I love going back to my different prayer journals and reading and seeing how my faith had grown throughout the year and how many of the prayers I asked for were answered, even if they were answered with a no.

Attending Church

I made it a goal of mine to attend church every Sunday of January, online or in person. I do not believe you always need church to grow in your faith but if you have a church community you trust and a pastor that speaks God’s truth it is so important to attend to grow in your faith. Hearing the pastor’s accounts of the scripture can allow God to talk to you in ways you would never expect. There are so many ways that I heard God through a pastor. I have felt convicted, heard, and loved by God through so many messages. They have allowed me to learn God character through others and it reminds me that God is a good. If you are needing a way to stay focused in church or to keep your thoughts check out my Church Notes FREEBIE.

Go on a God date.

Make time outside of the home for the Lord. Spend time with Him like you would with a significant other or best friend. Take your Bible and prayer journal to a coffee house. Read God’s word and talk to Him about it over a coffee. Go on a hike and listen to your praise music while you talk with God. Find a place to have a picnic and bring your Bible. Study Gods word in His beautiful creation. By making time out of the house with the Lord, it can allow Him room in your life to speak to you.

Build a morning or nighttime routine that includes God.

It’s important to spend time with God daily. By creating a morning routine that included my prayer and Bible study time it helped my faith to grow stronger. I created a space that was comfy and cozy to spend my morning in. This made it easier for me to awake in the morning for my quiet time routine with God.

I put my Bible and prayer journal next to our reclining chair and each morning played light music in the background. By spending daily time with God, it grew that relationship even more because when we cut out time every day for someone that’s when we truly get to know them.

If you are struggling in your faith or just want to know God more, I encourage you to try one or all of these things. Primarily, the way we build relationships is by spending time with those people. Just by creating time and space for God in your day it will build that relationship.