John Wesley asked class members, "How is it with your soul?" We are asking, "How are your devotions?"

Are you spending time in devotion every day?

• Set aside fifteen minutes, then thirty minutes, then an hour.
• Sit quietly in your chosen place, talk to God, and allow God to speak to you.
• Choose a devotional guide: Upper Room Daily Devotional Guide, Upper Room Disciplines, Daily Word, or other.
• Personalize what you have read in order to discern what God is saying to you. Write your name in it.
• Apply the message to your activities and to the people around you throughout the day.
• Allow the Scripture to lead you into a personal prayer.
• Read other inspirational or spiritual essays or books in your time of devotions and at other times.
• Include other activities in your devotions, such as listening to or singing inspirational songs and hymns. Relate the messages to your life.
• Use the time you spend traveling on the subway or in your automobile to reflect on the reading of the day.

Are you reading the Bible daily for personal spiritual growth?

• Choose verses or a chapter for your daily study.
• Hear the Word that God is communicating to you in the Scripture lesson.
• Think about how that particular passage can influence your life for the rest of the day.
• See yourself as one of the characters, like Daniel in the lion's den, Jonah running away from God, Miriam celebrating God's goodness to the Israelites, or Moses being given the words to say by God.
• The Psalms represent all of the emotions we experience. Find a Psalm of joy or one of lament that will help you express your own joy or sadness.

Are you praying daily?

• Pray for family, friends, enemies, and others, asking God to bless them.
• Visualize them as your sisters and brothers, and as God's children.
• Forgive them.
• Pray for strangers walking down the street, riding in their cars, or in other vehicles.
• Pray for aggressive drivers, including yourself.
• Pray during the day for people in your workplace, in the gym, in the shopping mall, or standing on corners.
• Pray for people you fear.
• Pray for the persons in church sitting beside you, in front of you, behind you — whether you know them or not. See them in your mind's eye as a part of the body of Christ.
• See the whole congregation where you worship on Sunday as a part of your family and God's family.
• Pray for the leaders of this country and of other countries, even those we call enemies. In your prayers, make them your friends.
• Pray and give thanks while vacuuming, washing dishes, or cutting the grass.
• Pray "Thank you, God!" all during the day, when good things happen.

Are you journaling?

• Write your thoughts and feelings (good or bad) to God in a notebook.
• Write down thoughts received from God.
• Write five things you are grateful for each day. The more blessings you write, the more you will recognize.
• Write poems about your relationship with God, if for no one else's enjoyment than your own.

Do you spend quiet time in the midst of the natural world, or do you view God's creation from a favorite window?

• Notice the grass, trees, clouds, flowers, and animals. Spend time just meditating on it all.
• Recognize God's presence in nature, in you, and in the people around you; and give thanks for the beauty in all of it.
• Remind yourself often that God is still in charge.

Do you listen to your thoughts?

• Change depressing and disturbing thoughts by substituting hopeful and uplifting ones. "Whatever is true, honorable, just, pure, pleasing and commendable . . . think on these things" (Phil. 4:8).

Do you share your faith with others?

• Share inspirational books, magazine articles, movies, and TV programs.
• Pray aloud with family and others.
• Listen to and respect the other person's point of view.
• Share words of love, and pay attention to your own words, body language, and thoughts.
• Smile often.
• Keep reactions to daily problems in tune with God's words to you each day.
• Recognize daily happenings as opportunities to bless, forgive, pray for, or help others.
• Accept interruptions as possibilities for good.

Spending time in devotion means more than just reading a devotional guide; it includes living devotionally in all that we do. We are called to be "doers of the Word, and not merely hearers . . ." (James 1:22).

Grace Bradford, author of Guide for Class Leaders, lives in Washington, DC, where she is a member of Asbury United Methodist Church. She is a class leader, writer, teacher, musician, mother, and grandmother.