5 Powerful Daily Spiritual Exercises for Men

Every Christian man knows he needs powerful daily spiritual exercises. If he spends too long without things like prayer or scripture...he finds himself dry and panting.

But it's easy for things to get in the way. Our lives become messy with the daily drudgery, leaving us wanting those powerful daily spiritual exercises we know would change our entire trajectory.

If only we could get ourselves to practice them.

Here are 5 daily spiritual exercises that every man should include. Now, before you say, "Well, these are obvious," just remember that if you're not implementing them, they are not a behavior and therefore useless. So we're going to not only cover the daily spiritual exercises that are important for men, but we'll even help you figure out how to prioritize these pillars.

1) Daily Spiritual Exercise: Prayer

While any of these could be listed as number one, making sure prayer is one of your daily spiritual exercises can mean the difference between being transformed by others and staying the same while going through the motions.

Prayer doesn't just transform your relationship with the Lord. It transforms you. This daily spiritual exercise is vital to cultivating a relationship with the Lord that is vibrant, expansive, and deep.

Mind you, a fruitful prayer life is not saying a few words over and over or giving a few seconds to the Lord before you leave for the day.

Making prayer a daily spiritual exercise means devoting some of your most precious time to the Lord. It means taking time first thing in the morning and approaching the Lord with all of you.

The question is: can you lay yourself down in humility and approach Him with honesty and clarity?

Tip: Make prayer a daily spiritual exercise by setting aside time first thing in the morning. Get up a little earlier, and devote that time to prayer. Lay out your needs, requests, concerns, questions, and heart. Have a true conversation with the Lord.

2) Daily Spiritual Exercise: Read Scripture

Here's another daily spiritual exercise that ought to be on everyone's list. Unfortunately, many people bury their noses deep in scripture and remain bitter, angry, condemning, and self-righteous.

What gives?

They may have made it their daily spiritual exercise, but they failed in the area that matters most. They don't let it transform them...they let it inform them.

There's a difference. When we read scripture, we should measure ourselves by it. We should find something convicting every time we read. Or at least something that makes us pause and say, "Lord, help me become more like that."

When making scripture part of your daily spiritual exercise, pair it with prayer. After asking the Holy Spirit to illuminate the scriptures, stay in prayer mode as you read. Ask the Lord about the things you read. Weigh things out with Him. Let the words soak deep.

Maybe even memorize a scripture or two.

If you approach scripture as something meant to produce fruit in your heart, you'll humbly desires to speak to the Lord about it all.

Tip: Read first thing in the morning as you pray with the Lord. Meditate on scriptures and ACTUALLY use them to define your heart and actions. Lean on scripture to navigate the situations popping up in your daily life. If you do this as a daily spiritual exercise, you'll become a little more like Christ each day.

3) Daily Spiritual Exercise: Worship

No, worship does not have to be a daily spiritual exercise of singing popular Christian songs at the top of your lungs. Singing can be a proper form of worship but it's not the only form. Worship is having a heart position of humility and adoration towards the Lord. It's lifting Him up. It's putting Him first. It's honoring and blessing His traits and character. It's speaking out His testimonies.

We tend to make music the central form of worship while we abandon other forms. So if ecstatic outbursts of dancing aren't your thing...that's okay. Instead, get your heart into a powerful worship mode. Put all your heart and mind's focus on the power, strength, righteousness, and justice of the Lord.

Let yourself become fully enthralled with Him. And if you start to sing a little, then all the better.

This daily spiritual exercise can certainly accompany scripture. However, perhaps you want to do it in the car on your way to work. Maybe you do it before you eat lunch. Perhaps you find time before bed to get alone and worship Him without interruption.

Find that quiet place and dedicate time to worshipping as a daily spiritual exercise.

Tip: Set up your morning with some prayer, worship, scripture reading, and more prayer. This powerful process can set your heart in the right position, give you time with the Lord, and prepare you for your day.

4) Daily Spiritual Exercise: Fasting

Most of us fear the word. We imagine days of crawling on the ground, our tongues hanging dry out of our mouths, and our frail limbs clawing at the dirt.

And that's just after the first few hours.

Fasting is something we all should do. It provides an amazing opportunity to set aside the flesh's desires and put ourselves wholly in front of the Lord.

Mind you, fasting for several days isn't always necessary. Some people fast for a single day and get exponential spiritual value.

Others might only fast for a few hours and dedicate that time to prayer, scripture, and worship.

It's between you and the Lord. But if you haven't made fasting a daily spiritual exercise at some point, you need to.

Time spent away from food gives us focus and an opportunity to not be distracted.

Your body will fight and yell and scream. But making it a daily spiritual exercise means going beyond what your body wants and doing what your spirit needs.

Tip: Every so often, take some time to make fasting a daily spiritual exercise. This doesn't mean you need to fast every day (that might end poorly after a while), but having it in your arsenal will make your spiritual walk much more fruitful and nourishing.

Related: Failure of Going on a Fast

5) Daily Spiritual Exercise: Journaling

Maybe you're not a big fan of writing. That's okay. However, I've had people who hate writing come back and say how much value they gleaned from spending some time journaling every day.

The power of journaling is found in being forced to slow down and organize your thoughts.

Unfortunately, we have many random thoughts. Some studies suggest we think more than 6,000 thoughts per day. That means plenty of thoughts flit through our heads each minute.

But when we're journaling, writing down the words forces us to slow down and organize the points we're trying to make.

This allows us to observe real thoughts that challenge our typical assumptions. When we slow down, we see our pre-programmed answers for what they are: auto-pilot responses.

Journaling gives us clarity to be honest with ourselves. We just have to have the guts to actually write it down.

Tip: To make it a daily spiritual exercise, journal after you pray and read scripture. You can write about:

• Things the Lord showed you

• Questions you have for the Lord

• Revelations that came up

• Personal reactions to your time with the Lord

• Issues you recognize in yourself

• Prayer requests

Powerful Daily Spiritual Exercises for Men

Obviously, more daily spiritual exercises can and do exist. But if you implement these 5 pillars, you'll find your spiritual life taking off.

Remember, those pillars are:

1. Prayer

2. Scripture

3. Worship

4. Fasting

5. Journaling

Now, putting these into practice may mean waking up a few minutes earlier. But if that means getting some real time with the Lord instead of throwing Him your scraps, shouldn't you at least try?

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