Even in the midst of disappointment, surprise, and mystery, you will discover an amazing thing. You will discover how very reliable and trustworthy God is—and how secure you are in His hands. And oh, how we need that in this day of relativism and vacillation, filled with empty talk and hidden behind a lot of semantic footwork.
Read MoreTag Archives: Psalms
The Secret Place
The psalmist said, “He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty” (Ps. 91:1). Do you have a place of shelter where you seek only His face? Do you spend time in that secret place? Have you given prayer the priority it deserves? And when you pray, do you remember that it is the Lord’s face you seek?
Read MoreGod’s Guidance
Many Christians complain that God doesn’t speak to them when they’re in need of guidance. For some reason they have forgotten the first and most basic way God leads His children—through His written Word!
Read MoreDon’t Take It Easy
Last fall one day at the church, I spotted a visiting gentleman who was shaking hands with a half-dozen folks he’d never met before. Then he looked at me, and with a grin and a twinkle, he whipped out his hand. It was a hand you could strike a match on, toughened by decades of rugged toil.
Read MoreCrucible of Crises
God’s Word is filled with examples of those who believed God and “commenced prayer.” David certainly did. “I waited patiently for the LORD; And He inclined to me, and heard my cry. He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay; And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm” (Ps. 40:1–2).
Read MoreTwo Questions
Comparing the acts of forgiving and forgetting, I think forgetting is the tougher assignment. Why? Because forgetting is something shared with no other person. It’s a solo flight. All the rewards are postponed until eternity . . . but how great they will be on that day!
Read MoreCan We Really Ever Forget?
A question flashes through my head as I write these words: can our minds actually allow us to forget? The way God has made us with that internal filing system we call “memory”—it is doubtful we can fully forget even the things we want to forget.
Read MoreForgiving and Forgetting
“I’ll forgive . . . but I’ll never forget.” We say and hear that so much that it’s easy to shrug it off as “only natural.” That’s the problem! It is the most natural response we can expect. Not supernatural. It also can result in tragic consequences.
Read MoreHow to Make Forgiveness Happen
There is enough in the past few days’ worth of devotionals to keep us thinking (and forgiving) for weeks. But there are a couple of specific applications that need to be considered. First, focus fully on God’s forgiveness of you. Don’t hurry through this. Think of how vast, how extensive His mercy has been extended toward you, like David did when he wrote “Hymn 103.”
Read More