Hey! I’m Ciana and I’m a third-year uni student. If you want to make me smile, tell me a cool history fact or even better, show me a photo of a cat. Seriously… I am that person who’s going to have seven cats when they’re retired. Just wait. 😉

One thing you should know about me is that I am horrible at sticking to a routine. Unless it is something that I know someone else is depending on, I cannot stick to a plan. I can’t tell you how many times I spent hours crafting the perfect weekly routine, with every hour blocked out in neat colour-coding, only to throw it out two days later because I just don’t do routines.

I think that my non-structured approach to life is also reflected in my quiet time with God. While I do really enjoy sitting down every so often and really trying to dig deep into a Bible passage, I am not a person who does this regularly. Instead, I am more of a ‘throughout-the-day’ person. I will often find myself walking to uni praying to God about my day, lying in bed an hour after I should have been asleep, pouring my heart out to Him, and grinning about the smallest praise point and thanking God for it, while speed walking from one class to another. I often find myself most invested in a Bible passage at the most inconvenient time, normally ten minutes before I have to leave for work or uni!

But to me, that’s what’s important about quiet time – not how long it is, or where it is, or when it is, but its quality. I believe that time spent with God should be genuine and sincere, and if you’re like me and can’t stick to a routine, maybe you also can start to add small chunks of prayer or Bible reading into your day, even in the smallest quantities.

Spending time with God throughout my day rather than devoting one large chunk of time to it has taught me to see God in everything and to be thankful for it. One thing I’ve started doing this year every time I pray is to end with this sentence: ‘God, please give me not what I want, but what I need.’ Sounds simple, but it is an incredibly hard sentence to pray sometimes. Yet somehow, this way of spending time with God and acknowledging the superiority of his plan over mine has made me truly appreciate his goodness, his kindness and his power.

My challenge to you this week is to try to see God in the smallest of things each day. If you get a good grade, thank him for it. If someone is rude to you, ask God to show you how that will strengthen your character. If something has gone horribly wrong in your life and you cannot see a way out, ask God to help you trust him. Thank him and ask him to give you what you need, even if you can’t see what that is yet. I promise you, your relationship with God will only grow stronger.