See God Work in Your Daily Life (Not Just on the “Mountaintop”)
Have you ever spent time chasing after the next Christian “experience” to shake you out of the monotony of “normal” life? You constantly hope that the next conference or intensive program will flip the switch in you – you’ll finally be that wild and free follower of Christ that you’ve long admired (or envied) from afar. But no matter how many events you attend, you never seem to see God work in your daily life.
I have definitely been that person. That comparison is still a trap I can fall into if I’m being honest. But I have some exciting news: I am free from the experience-chasing cycle, and it’s a great place to be.
Don’t get me wrong. I have 2 ½ years of discipleship schooling under my belt (YWAM anyone?), and those experiences truly shaped and formed me in ways I will always value. I have also attended my fair share of conferences and short-term intensive programs that have been greatly impactful for me.
The purpose of this post is not to disparage experiences. Instead, I want to bridge the gap that I know myself and so many others have faced in coming back down from the “mountaintop experience.” We see the revelation and excitement diminish among the many louder demands competing for our attention in the “real world.”
Over the past couple years, I have had some powerful perspective and mindset shifts. They have truly helped me to blur the line between my “practical” and “spiritual” life (because let’s be real, there’s not supposed to be a separation).
It has been a fun journey and one I want to share tips about in this post.
Ready to hear more? Let’s dive in!
The power of expectation to see God work in your daily life
If you want to see God work in your daily life, it’s key to recognize that you can shape your reality with your expectations.
We know the Word says that “life and death are in the power of the tongue.” Our words have immense weight. But I would point out that our beliefs are extremely important as well.
The enemy’s biggest weapon against us is deception – getting us to believe something false. If our beliefs weren’t critically important, I don’t think he would invest in that so heavily.
Furthermore, it’s by believing in and confessing Christ that we are saved in the first place.
So I just want to say: I think a big part of why we see God move in these big “experiential” events is because we expect Him to do so.
I have definitely had events/conferences I’ve attended where I didn’t get the breakthrough or experience I was hoping for (and possibly “expecting”). I’m not arguing that that’s because I didn’t “expect” it enough. God moves in mysterious ways and He’s not obligated to move in the way we expect.
My point here is that if you expect Him to show up in your day-to-day life, you will see it happen more. It might be because He’s responding to your faith. Possibly it’s that you’re just training yourself to notice. Maybe it’s a bit of both. But that mindset of expecting Him is one I definitely have seen impact my life.
If you want to know how I trained myself in this, it honestly was not a force of will. It was from:
- Hearing enough sermons and stories of God moving in the little things and caring about my life in every facet
- Being around people who were already walking in this
That’s what helped shift my expectation. I hope my blog can help do that for you.
The power of heavenly perspective to see God work in your daily life
I believe a big component to see God work in your daily life is calling yourself and things around you “higher.”
As Jesus taught us:
“Pray then like this: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
– Matthew 6:9-10
I want to see less inconsistency in my life between my reality and heaven’s reality.
That means:
- When I feel sickness coming on, I don’t just accept it without putting up a spiritual fight (and I’ve had a lot of victory – I’ve gone over a year without getting sick before)
- If something breaks, I might pray over it first, before just automatically seeking repairs or replacements (I brought my old laptop “back to life” through prayer once)
- I pray over plants in my garden if they’re being attacked by pests or other problems and have seen miracles there too.
In other words, I like to look for heavenly solutions before earthly ones. If the prayers aren’t working, I’ll take medicine, replace the laptop, buy pesticide… you get the idea.
It’s not to say I refuse earthly solutions. But the more opportunity you give Holy Spirit to show up, I promise, the more He will. It’s pretty fun.
I go into this topic in much more depth in my post Heavenly Reality if you want to know more (including a little more about the bullet pointed stories above).
The power of sacrifice to see God work in your daily life
Participation in a spiritual event/conference/program involves sacrifice of time and money. To see God work in your daily life, you can similarly give of yourself in numerous ways
Setting aside dedicated time for God each day is one form of sacrifice. Especially in our highly distracted modern society, it is no small thing to actually dedicate that “quiet time.” When we do this, once again, we are giving Him opportunity to show up.
Giving and serving are other examples of sacrifice. If those are your go-to’s, I would encourage you not to camp there. However, if you struggle with feeling like you have anything to offer or you think God can’t/won’t use you, then definitely look for ways you can give and serve.
Fasting
The last big one I want to discuss is fasting.
A lot of Christians have adapted fasting to include giving up any number of “vices” they may have (coffee, chocolate, Instagram, shopping, etc.). That is perfectly valid.
I’ve found especially media fasts to be really effective/powerful mental “detoxes.” (“Media” meaning TV, movies, social media – ideally fasting all of them). Sometimes it takes a fast like that to re-calibrate you so that you actually recognize certain negative thought patterns or addictive tendencies.
It has proven to help me be more aware of my surroundings and more present. (This kind of fast would pair well with practicing mindfulness – see my post on that).
I have to say though that I have grown to really love and appreciate “traditional” fasting. Since early 2020 I have made it a practice to fast at least once a week on just water and communion (2020 really shook me, guys – fasting is totally called for, let’s be real).
I will have to do a full post on fasting (and communion) because I can’t fully dive into it here, but I will just say this:
- Romans 8 tells us that the Spirit gives life to your mortal body. That means this body you have right now.
- Jesus tells the disciples, “I have food that you know not of.” That was in his pre-glorified body.
Learning to be sustained from the body and blood of Jesus and the Spirit is an amazing, supernatural experience. I was someone who would say that I couldn’t fast unless He was directly giving me grace to fast. I’ve felt the difference. I’ve fainted before from low blood sugar (to be clear: I’ve fainted when I’m not fasting at all).
Even knowing He would give me grace to fast, I didn’t think I could ever fast more than one day. Yet now I have. And somehow felt fine.
I’m so tempted to go off on this topic some more, but again, I’ll have to save it for another post.
What I’m getting at is that it’s an open invite for Him to show up and for you to really feel your need for Him. Ask Him to fill you so you don’t feel the hunger, even. I’ve had that happen and I get through my one day fasts pretty comfortably the vast majority of the time now.
Please don’t go all hardcore on this unless you really feel Holy Spirit inviting you into it. And don’t be legalistic. If you feel like you’ll pass out and your prayers don’t seem to be “working” – seriously let yourself eat something.
This isn’t about performance. The sacrifice isn’t about performance. Ok? It’s about giving Him room to show up. So be excited about it. Be expectant! Be relational. Obedience is better than sacrifice.
To conclude…
I feel like it’s the tip of the iceberg, what I’ve shared here, but I hope it helps. My goal is to give you tools to implement in your everyday life that are similar in some ways to creating your own “conference environment.”
I know there are many obstacles to setting aside time and focus the way you would at an event or a designated program. However, I truly feel that the practices above have grounded my faith much more. It has helped me see God move in my life regularly and I’m no longer feeling the need to find my next “fix.”
Expect Him to show up (especially as you incline your heart toward Him in whatever time you have).
