Good Words for Today

"Christ has no velvet crosses." Samuel Rutherford

“But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord" (Joshua 24:15). Here Joshua speaks as the God-appointed leader of his family. He claims the right to speak for his wife, his children, his grandchildren, his great-grandchildren, and even for his servants. “As the leader of this clan, I hold their proxy in my hand. I hereby declare that my entire household will serve the true and living God.” Every Christian man ought to make a similar statement about the family God has given him.

The whole Christian life in 11 words: What God demands, he provides. What we receive, we give away.

When the memory of your sin overwhelms you, remember also that Jesus says, "You are my child. My blood covers your sins. You are welcome in heaven forever. Come and enter my Kingdom."

"I was dead in the grave I was covered in sin and shame I heard mercy call my name He rolled the stone away." Matt Maher

"The world never burned a casual Christian at the stake." John R. Rice

"I am convinced that every death, of whatever kind, through which we are called to go, must lead to a resurrection. This is the core of Christian faith." Elisabeth Elliot

"Only desperate people learn to pray." Erwin Lutzer

Lord Jesus, we pray today for those who are struggling to know you. Pull back the curtains of unbelief so that they might be filled with faith to believe in you. Amen.

Do you desire to be holy? Do you want to please the Lord? Is there a hunger in your heart to know Jesus and to love him? Do you desire to live a higher and better life even though you cannot seem to attain it? If you answer yes, that is strong evidence you are born again. Despite your personal failings, do you truly want to do what God wants you to do? Then you may rest in the knowledge that you are a child of God. Your struggle with sin is proof of your divine heritage. If sin is a burden, at least it is a burden and not a joy.

"The Christian life is a series of new beginnings." Alexander Whyte

"I don't want to stand before God one day and have to say to him, 'You were clear, and I was a coward.'" Bill Hybels 

Did you wake up worried? God is large and in charge. He can handle the details that scare you to death.

"I will call upon Your name And keep my eyes above the waves When oceans rise." Hillsong "Oceans (Where Feet May Fail)"

If God chose only well-rounded people with no character flaws, some of the credit would inevitably go to the people and not to the Lord. By choosing flawed people with a bad past, a shaky present, and an uncertain future, God alone gets the glory when they accomplish amazing things by his power.

“We draw people to Christ by showing them a light that is so lovely that they want with all their hearts to know the source of it.” Madeleine L’Engle

"What are Christians put into the world for but to do the impossible in the strength of God?" Samuel Chapman Armstrong

"Understanding the deep truths of God's Word does not give a man a big head; it gives him a broken and contrite heart." Warren Wiersbe

"What people want is an easygoing syncretism, a truce in inter-religious competition, a mishmash of the best from all religions. But we Christians cannot surrender either the finality or the uniqueness of Jesus Christ. There is simply nobody else like him." John Stott

"What you do for yourself dies with you. What you do for others lasts for eternity." Lin Dunn

When you are discouraged, remember God’s faithfulness. Quote the great promises. Remember how God has answered your prayers. Reflect on his mighty deeds. Consider who it is who fights for you. Then pick up five smooth stones and get ready to defeat the giant.

"Fightings and fears within, without, O Lamb of God, I come, I come." Charlotte Elliott, 1835

"The Church of Christ is not a social club. It is not a literary society nor a saint's everlasting rest. It is an army moving on the high enterprise of making Jesus Christ known, loved, and obeyed throughout the whole world. Have you enlisted your all?" Halford Luccock

Lord, help me to learn from my mistakes so that I won’t have to make them all over again. Amen.

"Live like someone died for you." Lecrae

No one becomes godly by accident.

"You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God; or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him or kill Him as a demon, or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to." C. S. Lewis

"O beautiful for heroes proved In liberating strife, Who more than self their country loved, And mercy more than life!" Katharine Lee Bates, 1895

He takes dead men and raises them. He takes enslaved men and seats them with Christ in heaven. He takes condemned men and saves them from judgment. Grace is thus God’s total answer to the moral ruin of the human race. It is such a complete answer that nothing else could ever be added to it.

Thank God for the Bible because without it, we would never know about Jesus. And without Jesus, we could never be saved.

The secret to my success? It is simple. It is found in the Bible, “In all thy ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct thy paths.” George Washington Carver

"When all things seem against us To drive us to despair, We know one gate is open, One ear will hear our prayer." Oswald Allen

Lord Jesus, grant that we would not be even slightly disappointed at the conditions around us. You have made us for times like these. Give us a new vision of the difference we can make in our world. Amen

“I go now from a prison to a palace.” Presbyterian preacher Christopher Love, to his wife on the day of his beheading in the Tower of London, August 22, 1651.

"Souls in danger look above, Jesus completely saves, He will lift you by His love, out of the angry waves." James Rowe

"When I feel the serpent at my heel may I remember him whose heel was bruised, but who, when bruised, broke the devil’s head." From "The Valley of Vision"

This is no time for compromise. Speak up for the Savior. Let your voice be heard so loudly that no one can doubt whose side you are on.

"Through many dangers, toils and snares, I have already come; ’Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far, And grace will lead me home." John Newton, 1779

“The earth will be the scene of the final triumph of Christ and his church and the scene of Satan’s final defeat. It is the dust of this earth that shall season Satan’s diet forever.” Donald Grey Barnhouse

“I have no use for cranks who despise music, because it is a gift of God. Music drives away the Devil and makes people happy; they forget thereby all wrath, unchastity, arrogance, and the like. Next after theology, I give to music the highest place and the greatest honor.” Martin Luther