CREATED BY

REAGAN ROSE

MORNING ROUTINE
P LA N N E R
Simple Steps for Starting A God-Honoring Day
 – WHERE IT ALL BEGINS –

Why a Morning Routine Matters

How you start the morning determines the quality of the rest of your day.

If a builder tried to construct a house on top of a crooked foundation, his

building would not come out level. It’s the same with our days. Mornings
are the foundation. And we can either set ourselves up for a successful day
by establishing and performing a morning routine that prepares us to hon-
or God, or we can prepare ourselves to fail by failing to plan. You need a
morning routine.

The goal is not to keep perfect plans

but to glorify God in our work,
relationships, and lives.
A good morning routine helps you get your heart right, your mind orga-
nized, and sets your day on a trajectory toward God-honoring productivity.

This guide will walk you through three steps to plan a morning routine that
honors Christ. And at the end there’s a printable planning sheet that you
can use to put it all together.

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 1 Determine the Duration
The first thing you’re going to want to do is to figure out the math. But
don’t worry, this is fun math! This is math that leads to you having a more
productive day.

Don’t skip this step. It may seem Redeem the time,

obvious, but most people’s morn- because the days
ing routines fail because they didn’t
count the cost before jumping in with are evil.
both feet. EPHESIANS 5:16

Do the Math
To figure out what activities we can put in our routine, we first need to get
some base-line numbers. Go ahead and jot these down.

• Start Time (ST): I need go to start my day at ______

This may be when you need to leave for work, for example. It’s when your morning routine needs to end.

• Sleep Hours (SH): I need ______ hours of sleep to be at my best.

Be honest. If you don’t know this number, download a sleep tracking app and use it for a week.

• Morning Routine Duration (MRD): Ideally, my morning routine will be ______

hours long hours long.

Put your numbers into these formulas to determine when you’ll sleep:

Wake Time (WT) = _____ - _____ Bed Time = _____ - _____

ST MRD WT SH

Tip: Count backwards on a clock to calculate these (e.g. 6am wake up - 7 hours of sleep = 11pm bed time)

Now add these times to the “Schedule” sheet at the end of this packet. If
you’ve been over-ambitious, start with a shorter routine.

Okay, you’ve got the time carved out. Now let’s fill in your routine!

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 2 Choose the Elements
Now that we know how long we want our morning routine to be, and how
we are going to ensure that time is
carved out for it each day, let’s choose Commit your work
what we want to do in our morning
routine.
to the LORD, and
your plans will be
A good morning routine helps
you get your heart right and your
established.
mind organized; it sets your day on PROVERBS 16:3
a trajectory toward productivity that
honors Christ. Every morning routine will look a little different. But as a
general guideline, a Christian’s morning routine should follow this
pattern: Orient, organize, obey.

Orient
By orient, I mean orient your mind and heart. You need to orient your heart
toward God through time in His Word and prayer, and you need to orient
your mind toward the day through being ready for what the day has to of-
fer.

Sadly, most of us are likely among the 80% of smartphone

users who check their phones within 15 minutes of wak-
ing up. That’s orienting your heart toward the things of the
world. You’re about to spend the whole day in the world, you
really need to begin by seeking the things which are above.
This happens through Bible study and prayer.

Even if it’s short and sweet, start the day with a passage from the Word of
God or a good devotional, and pray!

Literally putting your first priority chronologically first sets a power-

ful precedent for the rest of your day.

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Depending on how long your morning routine is, you might consider im-
plementing some of these other activities during the orient phase of your
routine. These help you orient not just your heart, but your mind and body
as well.

• Exercise
• Journaling
• Reading a book

So, let’s plan out our morning on the schedule sheet. Start plugging your
orient activities into your morning routine.

Now, let’s move on to the second phase of a morning routine that honors
Christ.

Organize
Organize means looking ahead at the tasks you need to accomplish, the
people you need to meet with, and generally just considering what your
plan for the day is. This includes activities like reviewing your calendar,
planner, and to-do list.

But organize begins with first organizing yourself—by which I mean get-
ting ready. Eat your breakfast, shower, brush your teeth, do your make-up.
Just get ready to go out the door. Schedule these into your routine.

Now that you’re in “go mode,” it’s time to take a look at the day ahead. For
me, that means checking my work calendar for meetings and looking over
outstanding tasks I have on my to-do list.

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I take this time to decide the three most important tasks of the day, and

come up with a plan for the day.

At this point, I’ll usually say a brief prayer over my plans in the spirit of
Proverbs 16:3, “Commit your work to the LORD, and your plans will be es-
tablished.”

Obey
By obey, I mean just get going. Your heart and mind are oriented, you have
organized a plan for the day, now go serve the Lord with vigor! Whatever
the day brings, do it with all your might (Ecclesiastes 9:10).

The plans of the diligent lead surely to

abundance, but everyone who is hasty
comes only to poverty.
PROVERBS 21:5

Try and execute on that plan you made, remembering to do it all with a
Godward orientation and a desire to serve others. Be ready unexpected
emergencies to blow up your plans. It happens. But remember that the goal
is not to keep perfect plans but to glorify God in our work, relationships,
and lives.

Now, let me give you just a couple of other brief steps to make sure this
plan lasts you for the long-haul.

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 – GET TO WORK –

3 Putting It All Together

Okay, now that we’ve decided what we want to do for our morning routine
and we’ve mapped it to our day. We can plan the rest of our day around
that.

Feel free to use the attached day-planning sheet as a way to record what
you do during the phases of your morning routine and as a tool to time-
block your tasks.

A good day plan consists of tasks

aligned with priorities mapped to time
REAGAN ROSE

And don’t be afraid to try different versions of your morning routine. It’s
something that you are constantly improving. If something doesn’t work,
drop it.

For more resources on a biblical approach to productivity

check out the articles, podcasts, and videos on [Link]

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Morning Devotion
BIBLE READING .........................

PERSONAL REFLECTION AND APPLICATION

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..... ....................................................................................

PRAYER POINTS FOR TODAY

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Plan for the Day (ESSENTIAL TO-DO LIST )

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Schedule
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04 AM
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05 AM
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06 AM
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07 AM
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08 AM
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09 AM
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10 AM
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11 AM
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12 PM
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01 PM
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02 PM
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03 PM
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04 PM
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05 PM
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06 PM
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07 PM
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08 PM
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09 PM
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10 PM
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