Good Words for Today
A staff may not seem like much, but when you place it at God’s disposal, it can be part of a miracle. Everyone has “something” in their hands. Your “something” won’t necessarily be the same “something” your neighbor has. God has placed “something” in your hands. Use it for his glory!
Choose your friends wisely because you will become like your friends and your friends will become like you. The right friends make it easier for you to grow in the Lord, and the wrong friends make it much harder.
When I fear my faith will fail, Christ will hold me fast; When the tempter would prevail, He will hold me fast. I could never keep my hold Through life’s fearful path; For my love is often cold; He must hold me fast.
Here’s one thing you learn whenever you start to do anything for the Lord: It won’t be as easy as you think. Why should it be so? Couldn’t the Lord set it up another way? Yes, he could—and sometimes he does. But often God lets us struggle and sweat so that we learn to trust Him at a deeper level than ever before. Sooner or later we all end up facing a wall of impossibility. The bad news is that it really is impossible. The good news is that God loves to start with an impossibility.
Slow me down, Lord, so I can hear your still, small voice again. Amen.
"A greedy man brings trouble to his family, but he who hates bribes will live" (Proverbs 15:27). No shortcuts! That’s the message for today, Bribery is a fast train to destruction. Stay away from it. Don’t take bribes. Don’t offer bribes. Play by the rules. And let God take care of the results.
When God calls you, it will work out one way or the other. All your little “what ifs” are just so much wasted time. And that really is the issue, isn’t it? If you need a miracle, you’ll get one. If you need an answer to prayer, it’s on the way. You'll get whatever you need as long as you obey God.
May the joy of the Lord be my strength so that I may have a merry heart no matter what happens today. Amen.
Our missionaries are on the field because they didn’t try to “what if” God. They didn’t make any deals. They didn’t demand any assurances in advance. God called and they obeyed. And the miracles followed after them. Where does that leave us? We gaze silently, baffled and amazed by those who have chosen the path of obedience. They have blazed a trail for us to follow. Will we obey, or will we stall for time, making silly excuses while the world burns and God waits for his sleeping children to wake up?
Repentance starts when we say, "Lord, you were right all along, and I was wrong." But that should not be hard for us to say because when we sin, we are always wrong, and God is always right.
“I AM” has sent me to you” (Ex. 3:14). That simple phrase contains the essential truth about who God is. He is the personal, eternal, self-existent God of the universe. He always was, he always is, he always will be. He is above all things, beneath all things, behind all things, and in front of all things. By him all things hold together. In him all things have their being. Without him, the universe does not exist. He's big enough for whatever problems you face today.
"Whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say It is well, it is well, with my soul."
When we get to the end of all our excuses, God says to us what he said to Moses: “Trust me. I can do more through you than you can imagine. Make yourself available to me, and I will do amazing things in your life.”
Success isn’t final and failure isn’t fatal. Popularity is overrated and jealousy doesn’t satisfy. Pray every day to become the person God wants you to be.
Do the hard thing. Do the right thing. Do the next thing. Everything else is just details.
God's work in your life is chipping away at your weak points and slowly developing the character of Jesus Christ within. But that means there are tremendous grounds for optimism—even in the worst situations—because the hard times mean God is hard at work in you to make you more like his Son.
Lord Jesus, raise me above the smiles and frowns of this world so that my only concern will be your approval. Amen.
"Then man goes out to his work, to his labor until evening" (Psalm 104:23). How we work is as crucial as how we pray. What you do on Monday is as sacred as what you do on Sunday. The man who gets up in the morning, goes to his job, and works all day in the marketplace, and the woman who cheerfully pursues her daily tasks at home or in the workplace—these are the ones who make an impact for Christ in the world.
All of us are works-in-progress. We’re not finished, not glorified, not perfected, not completed. We’re all “under construction.” If you’ve ever visited a construction zone, you know that it is noisy and looks messy. While the hammering and sawing continues, it’s hard to imagine what the final result will be. But God never stops working on us because there is so much work that needs to be done.
God’s sovereignty is a soft pillow for the soul. It gives us comfort when we face unrelenting opposition and unexpected difficulty. God is sovereign! Never forget that.
What’s the First Rule of the Spiritual Life? He’s God and We’re Not. Until you get that, you are still in spiritual kindergarten.
Every important decision you make starts in your heart. It’s the “real you,” the place where life makes up its mind. Proverbs 4:23 says, “Keep your heart with all diligence because out of it flow the springs of life.” The heart must be “kept,” or else it will run away from us. If we do not “keep” the heart properly oriented, it will lead us in the wrong direction.
Truth demands a response. Every step leads to the light or the darkness. Your heart is like a flowing river. It goes in one direction or another. Light received leads to more light. Light rejected leads only to the darkness.
Only God sees the big picture. We get impatient. We want progress. We demand action. God says, “Check back with me in a hundred years.”
God is in the transformation business, and you can’t tell where you will end up or what plans God has for you and me tomorrow.
Long-held habits can be changed, but it won’t happen overnight. Patterns of sin can be broken, but it will take more than a quick prayer at the end of a worship service. You can see significant growth in your spiritual life, but it won’t come without a cost.
Some glad morning when this life is o'er I'll fly away To a home on God’s celestial shore I'll fly away (I'll fly away)
No one will ever be able to escape judgment by saying, “The devil made me do it.” No, he may have tempted you, but you did the sinning all by yourself.
Here’s some news you can use. You don’t have to say everything you’re thinking.
Omnipotent God, the nations are but a drop in the bucket to you. Open my eyes to see beyond the headlines to the hurting hearts in every land. Amen.
True believers constantly accuse themselves (in the sense of being deeply aware of their own sinfulness) and simultaneously rejoice in God their Savior. They are like wheat when the husk of self-trust is broken off, leaving only the sweet fruit of Christ within.
The good that may come from the treachery of others is not planned by the hand of man, is not seen in advance, and is not seen at all except by faith.
Every worship service ought to be a great object lesson to teach our people, “We are not like the world. This is who we are. This is why we exist. This is what we believe. This is how we live.”
God will do whatever it takes to bring us to the place where we remember him. He’ll stop at nothing. Whatever it takes to get us on our knees is good for our spiritual growth.
Am I willing to hear the truth even when I don’t like it? Do I need to tell the truth to someone who doesn’t want to hear it? It is not easy either way, but both are absolutely necessary for healthy spiritual growth. God repeatedly puts us in places where we have to speak the truth and where we have to hear the truth. Blessed are the truth-tellers—and the truth-hearers—for they shall be set free.
In the death of Jesus, all our sins are fully paid for—past, present, and future. As a result, those who believe in Jesus find that their sins are gone forever. This is the heart of the gospel. God's holiness demands that sin be punished. God's grace provides the sacrifice. What God demands, he supplies. Salvation is a work of God from first to last. It is conceived by God, provided by God, and applied by God.
Father, show me the truth about myself so that I will cling tightly to your grace. Amen.
When the foundations are being destroyed, we need a fresh view of God and a long view of history. The God who sees all things will judge the wicked and bring them down in the end, and the righteous will see God’s face. When the foundations of society are destroyed, we can say to men and women everywhere, “Christ is the firm foundation, the cornerstone that will never be shaken.”
"When He shall come with trumpet sound, Oh, may I then in Him be found; Dressed in His righteousness alone, Faultless to stand before the throne." Edward R. Mote, "The Solid Rock," 1834.