For all of my teen and adult life, I have heard many Christians around me speak of the need to be fed. And truthfully, I’ve never understood it. I am always spiritually full, unless I decide for some reason to not feed myself that day.

I do not wait for anyone else to lead me or feed me.

If I waited for any other human being to feed me, I would spiritually shrivel up to nothing.

What would I be waiting for?

It truly exhausts me hearing people blame their husband, their pastor or anyone else for them “not being fed.”

In this post, I’m going to share my spiritual diet in hopes that somebody reading this is going to finally get it and understand that it’s time to start feeding themself rather than waiting.

Every day when I wake up, the first thing I do as I’m taking a bath is listen to the podcast Pray Everyday with Mary DeMuth. She leads you through the Bible verse by verse, and then prays based on the reading for that day. It’s a 5 minute podcast.

Following this, I listen to the Daily Liturgy Podcast by Coram Deo Church in Omaha Nebraska. I was first exposed to the Liturgy when I was doing my masters degree at Southeastern. It’s totally different from anything I learned growing up, or any custom in our church or the denomination I’m a part of. But I like this for a change. It’s unique and never fails to convict me and challenge me. Believe me, it’s not dead and dried up as you might expect. Most days, the truth hits me square in the face and shows me what needs to change in my life to be more like Jesus.

Following this, I am usually in my car headed to work and I listen to a sermon from one of my favorite preachers. Some of them are:

Jentezen Franklin, Free Chapel, T.D. Jakes at the Potters House, Real Talk Kim at Limitless Church and messages from Motivation Church in Richmond, Virginia. There are a lot more but those are four favorites. I mostly listen to Pentecostal preachers.

Following this I not only listen but I worship to worship music and my absolute favorite is anything by Charity Gayle. I also do a lot of soaking worship, most of the time with Julie True’s recordings.

I read the bible daily and typically do not stay in one area or book alone, but something from the Old Testament, something from the New Testament and then a passage from Psalms or Proverbs.

It is my custom to pray as I listen to worship music but sometimes I sit in silence. Solitude is one of my key spiritual disciplines. I also journal a lot.

When I show up to church, I never show up starving. I’m already full and anything I might receive is a dessert, not a meal. I’m there to be a blessing to somebody, I’m not there because I’m starving.

Yes, I’m a leader but this isn’t about being a leader. Anybody can and should feed themselves spiritually on a daily basis. And I don’t understand those who sit around and whine about not being fed. It reminds me of cows in a pasture standing there going Moooooooo mooooooooooooooooooo. For crying out loud, pull up to the table, open the bible and feed yourself some spiritual food.

While I don’t typically use this resource for me exclusively, Larry and I do devotional plans and Bible reading on the You Version Bible app together, to stay connected in this way and it’s really good for us. We look up marriage plans and have done most of them on that app. Our favorite part is the notes feature at the end where you can write notes back and forth based on the devotional of the day. We have grown closer through this and best of all we can also do this even when I am traveling for ministry and it keeps us feeling closer.

So..stop complaining, stop mooing, and get yourself some spiritual food.