Proverbs 31 Challenge: Rising Early
During my last semester of college, my small group studied the Proverbs 31 woman. Each week we considered a verse or two. Some verses were more applicable than others, and for me one of the most challenging was verse 15: “She rises while it is yet night and provides food for her household and portions for her maidens.”
I have a complicated relationship with my alarm clock, you see. The snooze button has become my best friend. And hitting snooze quickly becomes a lazy habit that prevents me from having time to accomplish anything in the morning beyond the bare minimum. Sometimes it makes me late for work or church (today, it caused me to miss church completely!).
The Proverbs 31 woman had a foundation for all of her habits in life. Verse 30 says, “Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.” The faithfulness of this woman in tasks large and small reflected her heart towards God. Why did she rise early? Because she had a reverent love for the Lord that overflowed into serving her household.
This puts a different spin on the reason for rising early. It’s more than wanting to get the day off to a good start. It’s being faithful in something small. It’s giving myself enough time to prepare well for the day so I can serve others better.
The Girl Talk ladies started the 5:00 club, and while I’m not planning on rising at 5:00 in the morning anytime soon, I do want to be committed to getting up immediately when my alarm clock goes off. That’s my Proverbs 31 challenge for the week.
And since accountability is always helpful in these matters, I’m going to invite any interested readers to join me. Feel free to tweak the challenge for yourself if need be, as long as it relates to rising early. If you want to join, all you need to do is leave a comment below. If you’re a blogger, you might write an entry about your commitment and link back here so others can join. Next week, I’ll give an update on how it went for me.
Hey there Anna! I really don’t have a problem waking to my alarm clock (I do occasionally) But I want to commit to getting up early on break and being productive. One thing which I do which helps me wake up is put my alarm in a place where I can’t reach it. At school I put my alarm clock on a chair, and I sleep in the top bunk, so I have to get up to turn it off.
I have found that putting the alarm clock out of reach really helps 
Anna, I love what you’ve done with your site! You are a blessing my dear sister in the Lord and I look forward to reading more!
I’ve actually been thinking about that a lot more recently. So I have been working on getting up earlier. Thanks for the reminder! I am horrible at this, but it’s been getting easier.
That link to the GirlTalk blog was great! I read their entries on being a “highly effective woman” – so inspiring! I’ve enjoyed their writing for a while, but this topic really hit home for me. I’m the first official member of my new “7:00 club”…I figure that’s the best time for me that will allow for being productive in the morning without wasting precious time that I could use for sleeping (and taking care of that “temple” that needs its healthy rest). I’m really excited to start – being more disciplined in our lives in ways that serve God and others before ourselves is such an important priority. Best of luck with your goal – I know you like sleeping as much as I do!
Thanks for commenting on my blog. I have commented here before, but it has been a while.
I’ll join you. My goal is to wake up by 6:30. So far this week, I can’t say I have done so well. Monday I didn’t get up until 8:00. However, I did better today by waking up at 6:45. Hey, I’m getting there!
~Zoe
I am lucky…I have always been an early bird. I am early to bed, early to rise. I usually get up around 5 or so….just naturally. Most people think I am crazy…but I go to bed around 9pm or so…so, I get my 8 hrs of sleep and then I feel great!
Best of luck with your challenge! 