Daily Devotionals

Forward Day By Day - June 23, 2021
Ebenezer comes from Hebrew, meaning stone of help. In today’s passage, Samuel sets up this “stone of help” to commemorate God’s faithfulness in delivering the people from captivity. This happy chunk of the earth’s crust reminds me of a cair [...]
Forward Day By Day - June 22, 2021
I like this Gamaliel fellow. Although scholars express some differences about his character and the details of his life, here he seems to be a voice of caution, reason, and flexibility. When the Pharisees seek to terminate the apostles’ efforts to [...]
Forward Day By Day - June 21, 2021
In this part of Luke, Jesus reveals that things are changing and will continue to change. The phrase “the already but not yet” has been used to describe this dual existence of the kingdom: it’s here already, and it is to come. I was raised in p [...]
Forward Day By Day - June 20, 2021
These words from today’s psalm sting. A staggering polarization sickens the United States of America, my home country, and many other countries. What would it take to bring us together? One might think a large-scale weather disaster could, but the [...]

The Way of Faith - June 17, 2021
In a 2017 World Cup qualifying match that pitted the US against Trinidad and Tobago, the Soca Warriors shocked the world when they beat the US men’s national team, a team ranked fifty-six places higher. The 2-1 upset eliminated the US team from the [...]
The Jesus Chair - June 16, 2021
When my friend Marge met Tami at a Bible study meeting, she noticed that they seemed to have little in common. But Marge befriended her, and she learned a valuable lesson from her new friend. Tami had never been to a Bible study, and she was having a [...]
Our Father’s Care - June 15, 2021
Thwack! I looked up and craned my ear toward the sound. Spotting a smudge on the windowpane, I peered out onto the deck and discovered the still beating body of a bird. My heart hurt. I longed to help the fragile feathered being. In Matthew 10, Jesu [...]
The Power of God - June 14, 2021
Rebecca and Russell’s doctors had told them they couldn’t have children. But God had other ideas, and ten years later Rebecca conceived. The pregnancy was a healthy one; and when the contractions started they excitedly rushed to the hospital. The [...]

“Acquainted With Grief”
He is…a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. —Isaiah 53:3 We are not “acquainted with grief” in the same way our Lord was acquainted with it. We endure it and live through it, but we do not become intimate with it. At the beginning of ou [...]
The Unchanging Law of Judgment
With what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. —Matthew 7:2 This statement is not some haphazard theory, but it is an eternal law of God. Whatever judgment you give will be the very [...]
The Ministry of the Inner Life
You are…a royal priesthood… —1 Peter 2:9 By what right have we become “a royal priesthood”? It is by the right of the atonement by the Cross of Christ that this has been accomplished. Are we prepared to purposely disregard ourselves and to [...]
Have You Come to “When” Yet?
The Lord restored Job’s losses when he prayed for his friends. —Job 42:10 A pitiful, sickly, and self-centered kind of prayer and a determined effort and selfish desire to be right with God are never found in the New Testament. The fact that I am [...]