The Keystone
The one practice that holds everything else together
I want to tell you about a tool so simple you’ll almost dismiss it.
And if you dismiss it, this program won’t work.
Forget morning routines. What I’m interested in is a morning ritual. Is there a difference? Yes. A routine is horizontal, self-referential, optimizing toward your own goals. A ritual is vertical, it connects you to something outside and above yourself, it locates you in a story that was running before you were born and will continue after you're gone.
For over forty years of my life I was a night owl. The nighttime was my world. I’d get up in just enough time to get dressed and off to work. Then, no matter what time I went to sleep, I started waking up at 4:30am — wide awake. Initially, I tried to roll over and go back to sleep, annoyed. Then it occurred to me that the Lord was the one waking me up, like He did Samuel. You see, my routine didn’t leave much space for the Lord in my life, because like most of us, once my day started it was largely out of my control, and by the end of the day I was vegging out.
So, like Samuel, I got up at 4:30 and prayed, repeating his word, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.” Do you know how quiet the world is at 4:30am? It seems the whole world is asleep. It was in that quiet, unhurried offering that I found Him. Present. Real.
I found in giving the Lord that space He not only filled my cup to full but also to overflowing. I was able to give to others from overflow rather than running myself dry. In offering the Lord those first hours, meeting with Him before anyone else, I became the best version of myself, a better husband, father, son, Christian, and man.
I didn’t realize it at first, but the Lord was leading me to give Him my first fruits.
We are called to offer the Lord the first fruits of ourselves. But I was throwing Him the scraps — the leftovers of a day that's already spent.
As Christians we are called to a different rhythm than the world. In this running with the Devil world, we are to walk with the Lord. In Mark 1:35 Jesus got up when it was still very early and went to a solitary place to pray.
Jesus knew we'd have things to worry about. In Matthew 6:33 he doesn't dismiss those concerns — he reorders them. Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.
This morning ritual became the lifeblood of my spiritual life. I wanted other men to have access to what I'd stumbled into, so I tried to systematize it — to make it repeatable and transferable. What emerged was shaped by two things: the Lord's Prayer and Philippians 4:6-7.
Paul gives us the formula in Philippians 4: 6-7 — thanksgiving, then petition, then the peace that guards your heart and mind. That's the order. And that’s how I arranged the Journal page.
We live most of our lives on autopilot. We make tens of thousands of decisions every day, and the overwhelming majority of them aren’t conscious choices — they’re the product of old habits, old wounds, old beliefs we’ve never examined. The Journal interrupts that autopilot. It makes what is implicit in our daily routine and thinking, explicit — calling them out for examination and to give an answer.
And self-knowledge is the beginning of change.
I also include an evening journal entry, which is simply a brief reflection on the day. The purpose for this is mainly to write down and acknowledge your wins, no matter how small. Here’s the thing, when you’re trying to change your life there is no such thing as small wins — they’re just wins. I also found, when I didn’t write them down, my mind would literally edit out the wins and focus on the negatives. The evening journal rewrites that.
Psalm 143:8 opens with a farmer’s prayer: “Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I entrust my life.”
That’s what the morning Journal does. It sets our first intention on seeking the Lord — before we’ve made a single decision, before we’ve encountered a single demand, before the noise of the day has begun.
Here is what I know to be true after years of this: the days I skip the Journal are the days I drift. The days I do the Journal are the days I’m grounded. Not perfect — grounded. Groundedness doesn’t mean nothing goes wrong. It means I’m rooted enough to bend without breaking when it does.
Don’t despise this small beginning.
Start Here
You can download the journal page from my website at RDP Coaching, grab a devotional or reading plan — if you don’t have one, start in the Psalms or Proverbs — and show up tomorrow morning with the intention of meeting the Lord. Open the page. Give Him your first twenty minutes.
Next week we talk about the battlefield — and why not every thought that enters your mind belongs to you.