#1, September 16, 2025
It’s a clever quip, “All I need today is a little bit of coffee and a whole lot of Jesus.” It reveals a growing dependence on, and love for, the Lord.
My wife rises at four each morning and immediately starts the coffee maker. Why so early? It’s September in Texas, and temperatures still climb into the 90s every day. Joy wants to beat the heat and watch the sun rise.
As she jogs or walks, she enjoys fellowship with the Lord in the growing light of day; but she doesn’t go out for her three-mile run before she’s had her coffee, studied her Bible, and gotten down on her knees in prayer.
This morning, I overslept, and didn’t get up until 4:20 AM. If you’re wondering how this marriage has lasted sixty-one years, it should be obvious that Jesus has deeply involved himself. With Joy struggling with her own health issues, and me miraculously sustained by God after surviving prostate cancer, and even now walking around with Carcinoid cancer, severe hypertension, and heart problems, you might understand why I’d be happy to sleep longer, and why I frequently take a nap in the afternoon.
But all humor aside, a little coffee and a whole lot of Jesus are a necessity to me too, and early morning has also become a vital time of day for me. So while Joy makes a nest on our bed, surrounded by Bible, notebooks, pens, and reference works, I sit out at the big kitchen table I made over 50 years ago, with my own Bible, a hymnal, and a notebook before me.
Each morning, I quickly review the scripture I studied the day before, searching for some truth to “jump out at me,” something that the Holy Spirit wants to bring to my attention. It’s my prayer that the Lord will lead me as I rapidly write down the thoughts that occur to me, barely noting what I write, exploring implications in an impromptu manner, new ideas and possibilities that I may not have noticed before.
To others, my thoughts may seem shallow, my conclusions inaccurate, and my arguments weak; but to me, this labor is edifying, and I’m alternately convicted and blessed, sometimes teary-eyed with sorrow and repentance, but more often filled with joy at my growing understanding of Jesus’ mercy, grace, and incredible love.
Sometimes I have to figuratively gird up my loins and “hang on,” sharing a finite sense of the ineffable loneliness, sorrow, and pain that the Lord suffered on Calvary, when,
… about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?” that is, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” (Matthew 27:46).
If you’ve ever felt that your earthly father rejected you, you might imagine the devestation of having your heavenly father turn his back on you?
Sometimes I don’t feel God’s presence with me in our little country kitchen, but I know that this sense of absence is an illusion, a momentary testing of my faith to reveal to me my absolute dependence on him, and to cause me to examine my faith, and to measure my determination to persevere, even in the darkest moments.
Sometimes the Lord’s presence is almost palpable, and I seem to feel the brush of angels wings as I I sense the shadows of not one, or two, but even three angelic beings, their wings folded, bowing in awe before King Jesus, and comforting me with the knowledge of their appointed protection. Of course it’s just my imagination. Isn’t it?
I look up at the little cross hanging above the archway to our living room, a gift from dear friends, and I try to imagine the love, tears, and blood that flowed down from Calvary as Jesus Christ somehow paid an infinite price to save multitudes from the penalty of our sins, not just for a day or a year—in what some mistakenly think of as purgatory—but forever and ever, because his death and resurrection meant that the price was paid, and:
“We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord” (2 Corinthians 5:8).
There’s no waiting time required; no penalty we can pay to defer hell or hasten heaven; because there is no sin burden remaining on a born-again believers account!
And after an hour or so, writing down things as they flow unbidden, there comes a time of worship and prayer and praise. I set aside my Bible and notebook, and I open a hymnal that survives from a church I was privileged to plant and pastor fifty years ago. And with my physical eyes dimmed, and my ears damaged by the exigencies of time and illness, this old voice croaks out the glorious melodies of Christ’s saving power and eternal love. And somehow the Holy Spirit raises up the truth that there is joy and liberty in Christ, and I truly begin my day with Jesus,
“Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory” (I Peter 1:8).
Oh, how I wish I might have understood the blessings of rising early at the birth of my faith, with a little bit of coffee and a whole lot of Jesus. Oh, that I might have arisen before the birds, and as a young pastor, started my day on the wings of certain faith!
But even as a young pastor, I was foolish and shallow. “God will understand,” I would delude myself. “He knows I have too many things to do, too many people to help, too many lessons to teach and sermons to preach, and too many burdens to bear for both family and church, to be able to spend more time in personal Bible study and prayer. Perhaps young Timotby faced the same temptations, for Paul exhorted him to,
“Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2:15).
We can’t really teach others until we submit ourselves to the guidance of the Holy Spirit in our pursuit of truth.
So it was that foolish, short-sighted reasoning that caused me to leave the house most mornings, having failed to,
“Put on the whole amour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil” (Ephesians 6:11).
Too many mornings I left the house failing to put on the whole armor of God. Too many days I fell short of God’s best.
You may never have the opportunity to read the last book that the Lord gave me—for it has not been published—but Average Guy Meets Extraordinary God is my account of how the Lord continuously delivered this too busy, too shallow, too self-confident young man from the consequences of his own carelessness and foolish decisions. And the Lord didn’t always save me. Why? Because I needed to learn my lessons well, and sometimes his loving discipline was necessary to indelibly impress them on my heart and mind, that I might grow thereby.
There’s a lesson here for all of us. Those moments you might spend each morning with the Lord are not only precious, but immeasurably profitable.
Earlier I remarked that I open my Bible to review the passage about which I wrote the day before, looking “for some truth to jump out at me.” This morning, that truth was:
“Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake…for that is the will of God” (I Peter 2:13-15).
Wow! That’s a hard saying, for we frequently observe evil leaders setting down ungodly requirements for us. But that is a subject for another day, inasmuch as I was carried me off into a confession of my own failure and subsequent loss of blessing. I pray my testimony profits you.
Perhaps you will better understand it if you start rising an hour or so earlier, to start your day
with…
a little bit of coffee (or OJ or milk) and a WHOLE LOT OF JESUS.
Life will become far more manageable, your labors will be more productive, and your heart will be filled with joy if you follow that practice.
Take it a brother in the faith who has wandered around for 77 years since his confession of faaith. I’ve been privileged to live long enough to learn it the hard way…but I am learning it. Don’t wait too long. Only the Lord knows what you might achieve if you take time to sit at his feet each morning.
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From Frank Becker’s Words of Encoruagement, September 16, 2025.
© 2025, Frank Becker.