When I Have a Free Hour

I am a mom of three kids, ages 10, 6, and 4. If you came for a visit at my house, you’d most likely also see a few of the neighborhood kids. My house is never quiet, and it’s not what I would qualify as peaceful.

It’s an understatement to say it’s loud, here. It’s often filled with music, laughter, and sometimes yelling (both out of excitement and anger). There is always something to do and/or be done. So when I have a free hour to myself, which doesn’t happen often…I’d love to tell you what I do.

• Admin household tasks: I treat running our household like a business. I create organizational systems, plan “company meetings” with presentations, order and stock supplies so that we are never OUT of anything, and do everything necessary to keep this household running smoothly

• Writing/editing: Writing books, study materials, and even writing in my journal has been one of my favorite things to do. I wish I had the time to do it everyday.

• Personal assistant work: When my kiddos are in school, I tackle the tasks I have for my personal assistant clients. If you’re looking for someone to help with your business, I’m currently available here.

• Listen to the Bible Recap

• Sleep: In reality, I’m not the best at resting. But, when I have had a long day/week I have zero problem closing my eyes for a few minutes. It’s my brain that won’t shut up. When that happens, I just lay there with my eyes close and let my mind wander in prayer until my 30 minute timer goes off to get up.

In making this list, I’m learning that I need to be better about setting time aside where I’m not doing…and instead I just allow myself to be.

I’m still trying to figure out how to keep myself from thinking that I must be productive to be useful. For anyone else, that needs that reminder today (myself included, clearly), rest is productive. You are more than what you can accomplish.

My Quiet Time…That Isn’t Very Quiet

I think the last time I actually sat down and had quiet time was six months ago.

Don’t get me wrong, I am in scripture every single day (sometimes multiple times a day). More often than not, I’m not sitting down reading scripture, I’m listening to it.

Did you know that if you use the youversion Bible app, you can have the Bible read to you?

I am a huge fan of listening to audiobooks. I love putting on my bluetooth headphones and pressing play while I sew a quilt, put laundry through the machines, or even when I’m making dinner for my family. My kids know that if they see me with my headphones on and I gasp or laugh, it’s not about them. Mom is just in her own little world.

When I figured out that I could do the same with the Bible, my world was changed forever.

So, when I was painting and redoing my three childrens’ rooms this past summer, you can better believe that I was listening to the Bible at the same time. I started the challenge of reading the Bible in chronological order using the Bible Recap in January 2026, and as of today, I just finished Lamentations…my 29th book this year. I would’ve struggled to focus if I tried to sit down and read all of that, but listening to it has been wonderful for me.

I tell you all of this, not to brag, but instead to give you freedom to read scripture in the way that works for you. I used to feel guilty that my quiet time wasn’t actually quiet. So I tried harder, thinking I must’ve not been “doing it right.” I lost focus often and gave up, thinking I was doomed for failure.

In reality, I personally just learn better when I have something to do with my hands while listening instead of reading all the time. Nothing was wrong with me, I just needed to let go of “the right way” because there is no right way to study scripture.

As long as you’re studying scripture for yourself, it doesn’t really matter how you’re doing it.

How I Study the Bible

Studying the Bible doesn’t have to be difficult. It also doesn’t have to be instagram worthy, with the perfect lighting and multiple highlighters next to a steaming hot cup of coffee.

Don’t get me wrong, if you like studying that way…go for it. I’m not going to yuck on your yum.

But, if you’ve ever felt guilty that your quiet time doesn’t look like that I want to give you the freedom to know that it’s ok. My personal study time doesn’t happen at 5am, it happens more often than not at 10pm after my entire house has gone to sleep.

I’m a night owl, so when the rest of my family is asleep is when I do my best thinking. It’s when I wrote my book, Miracles in the Quiet, it’s when I formatted the entire Bible in a wide margin, double spaced format, and it’s also when I do most of my personal Bible study.

Regardless of when your quiet time happens, I want to share with you the steps I take in my own personal study time. Bear in mind, while I say steps I don’t necessarily do all these in order…you don’t want your study time to be a checklist. But, if you are just starting out in studying the Bible I highly recommend reading the book, Women of the Word by Jen Wilkin because it changed how I study scripture for the better.

Five P’s of Sound Study

Based off of Jen Wilkin’s Women of the Word: How to Study the Bible with both our hearts and our minds

Supplies you should have before you start:

• A printed copy of the text, double-space with wide margins. Include footnotes and cross-references if possible (you can find them in resources section)

• A pen and a highlighter

• Optional: colored pencils/pens 

Study with Purpose

Where does your text fit into the metanarrative of creation-fall-redemption-restoration?

Study with Perspective

What is the historical and cultural context?

Study with Patience

Don’t hurry yourself, be realistic with your pace of study

Study with Process

Study for comprehension, interpretation, and application

Study with Prayer

Ask the Father to help you before, during, and after your study time

• Pray- Praise, Admit, Request, Thank

• Read your text once (at least)

• Answer- Where does this fit in the metanarrative? Is it telling about creation, fall, redemption, or restoration?

• Answer the archaeological questions to find historical/cultural context (look for this information in a study Bible or trusted commentary)

  • Who wrote it?

  • When was it written?

  • To whom was it written?

  • In what style was it written?

    • Historical narrative (factual retelling of events)

    • parables/storytelling (crafted characters/settings to teach a lesson)

    • Law (uses language referring to situations or relationships)

    • Poetry (uses language symbolically and metaphorically to paint word pictures)

    • Wisdom literature (communicate principles that are generally true, thought not universally true)

    • Prophecy (uses language in symbolic ways)

  • Why was it written?

• Read your text again- Give yourself patience (it’s ok if it takes you a month to understand one sentence, and it’s also ok if you only have 5 minutes of study today)

• Pray- Praise, Admit, Request, Thank

• Comprehension

  • Make an outline of your text

  • Annotate anything you think is important

    • Repeated words/phrases/ideas

    • Attributes of God

    • Are there several points in a row? Number them

    • Mark words you don’t understand or one you do know but want clarification, look them up in a dictionary & write it down on your copy

    • Key transition words (if/then, therefore, likewise, but, because, in the same way); draw an arrow to the beginning/concluding thought

    • Write down questions to address later

• Interpretation

  • Look up cross-references (let scripture interpret scripture)

  • Paraphrase your text (write in your own words what you read)

  • Consult trusted commentary

• Application

  • What does this passage teach me about God?

  • How does this aspect of God’s character change my view of self?

  • What should I do in response?

• Pray- Praise, Admit, Request, Thank

When God Feels Silent

I once had a friend say, “How do you hear God?”

My heart broke as I looked into her longing eyes. She then went on to talk about her strong desire to hear the voice of God, but she didn’t know how or if He even spoke to her.

It might seem like an overly simplified answer, but here’s my answer nonetheless…

“When was the last time YOU were quiet?”

Sometimes when we pray, our prayers are filled with “God will you grant this request, take care of my family member, and thank you for all that you’ve given me.” As soon as we have said all we wanted to say, we tend to say amen and move on with our lives…forgetting to even stop to listen for God’s response.

I think if we’re truly honest, we’d realize that it’s not that God is silent. It’s that we aren’t listening.

God talks to me every single day:

In the way my youngest son crawls into my bed in the morning during the summer months to give me a squeeze and say, “I just love you”

In the soft breeze in the afternoon or a hard afternoon rain when the morning was scorching hot.

In the song lyrics that I hear on the radio every time I’m in the car for a full week.

In a whisper that can only be heard from someone sitting shoulder to shoulder with me.

If I’m honest, I’m not always fully paying attention. I’m getting better, with practice.

So next time God is feeling silent to you, take a look around. Close your thoughts (and maybe your lips), and open your ears. I promise, He’s not silent…you’re just not listening yet.

Why I Chose the Title “Miracles in the Quiet”

Have you ever heard God speak to you?

I used to think that if I didn’t have burning bush like Moses, or a traveling cloud like the Israelites, that I was just hearing my own thoughts all the time. With my ADHD brain, that could be true…and I do talk to myself while I’m doing chores around the house. But, you know what? I’ve heard the voice of God in those mundane moments.

For me, God whispers.

When I was freshly out of a season of medical crisis, I was having a lot of thoughts about how I needed to process everything I went through. I had just dealt with my husband being in a 74-day long stay in the hospital while simultaneously taking care of our three young children, and I needed to deal with trauma and more than three years of a broken relationship with God.

So I started outlining my book Miracles in the Quiet, but I didn’t have a name or even a concept yet. I just had the idea of writing about my experience.

I woke up one morning in summer of 2025, after having a few late nights of working on the outline to a very distinct voice. It wasn’t loud, booming, as anything on fire.

It was calm, reassuring, and sounded as if it was a friend sitting right beside me on my bed.

All the voice said was, “You’re calling it Miracles in the Quiet. It’s time to write OUR story.”

That night, after my entire family fell asleep…I wrote the first draft of my first chapter. I originally thought my book was going to be about how my husband survived, but it really was about how I needed to thrive because of God.

So next time you’re looking for God to speak to you, my advice…find somewhere quiet, and just listen.