Daily Devotions

Wednesday, April 15, 2026

How Blessed is the Man

Romans 13:1 - Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities.  For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God.

Most people in the United States don't look forward to April 15.  It is the msot dreadedd day of the year: Tax Day.  Not only do we have to labor through the tax forms (or pay someone else to do it for us), but we have to bid farewell to a portion of our hard earned money.  And yet it would pay us well to be cheerful givwers on this day since God's will for every Christian is to "be subject to the governing authorities" (Romans 13:1).

There is always a blessing, directly or indirectly, in submitting to the will of God even when it seems undesirable - like paying taxes.  Blessed are those, Jesus said, who manifest a submissive spirit toward God as Lord in their lives: humble in spirit, mourning over sin, meek, hungering and thirsting after righteousness, merciful, pure in heart, making peace (Matthew 5:3-9).  To obey the governing authorities is just one more way of submitting to the will of God and living a blessed, or happy, life.

On Tax Day or any day, find ultimate happiness by submitting to the will of God in all things.

Thursday, April 16, 2026

Crown Him With Many Crowns

Matthew Bridges, 1800-1894 and Godfrey Thring, 1823-1903

Revelation 19:12-13 - His eyes are like blazing fire, and on His head are many crowns . . .He is dressed in a robe dipped in blood, and His name is the Word of God.

The One who bore the crown of thorns while on the cross is now crowned with "many crowns' as the reigning monarch of heaven.  Each crown in this hymn text exalts Christ for some specific aspect of His person or ministry: Stanza one for His eternal Kingship; stanza two for His love demonstrated in redemptive suffering; stanza three for His victorious resurrection and ascension; stanza four as a member of the Triune Godhead ever worthy of worship and praise.

This wonderful text is the combined effort of two distinguished Anglican clergymen, each of whom desired to write a hymn of exaltation to our suffering but now victorious Lord.  Matthew Bridges' version first appeared in 1851 with six stanzas.  Twenty-three years later Godfrey Thring wrote six additional stanzas, which appeared in his collection Hymns and Sacred Lyrics. The hymn's present form includes stanzas one, two, and four by Bridges and the thired verse by Thring.  The tune, "Diademata" (the Greek word for crowns), was composed especially for this text by George Elvey, a noted organist at St. George's Chapel in Windsor, England, where British royalty often attend.

Let your soul rejoice in the truth that you are related to the One "who died eternal life to bring and lives that death may die."  Worship and praise Him even now with these musical lines - 

Friday, April 17, 2026

Adjust Your Feelings

Ephesians 2:8 - By grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God.

Adjust you feelings to fit the facts. You are saved, made holy, and sanctified by faith in the Lamb of God.

Don't allow Satan to control you via your feelings.  Your emotions can be toxic, completely detrimental to your success.  And Satan will use whatever he can get ahold of to control you, to destroy you.  But I have great news! Faith is the victory that overcomes the world, the flesh, and the devil.  And you are an overcomer through the shed blood of Jesus Christ!

Everyone has a bad day now and then.  But once you get down, do you stay there?  Or do you start singing a song of praise and asking God to saturate your day with His peace and His joy?  Don't allow the circumstances that you are in right now to dictate your mood, good or bad.  Circumstances come and go, but true joy comes from the Lord.

God is good. He is faithful and full of grace.  With God on your team, you can charge the gate of hell with a water pistol and come out victorious! You are saved and redeemed by the blood of the Lamb! Don't allow negative emotions to consume you.  You have too much going for you to be controlled by toxic emotions and temporary circumstances!

Saturday, April 18, 2026

Be Merciful!

Matthew 18:33 - Should you not also have had compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had pity on you?

Mercy is a gift.  It is undeserved.  Punishment and consequences are sin's just reward, but the merciful person does not demand justice for the guilty person.  If it were not for God's mercy, we all would have faced His terrible judgment long ago.  If not for His mercy, He would have condemned us after our first offense.  If not for His mercy, He would punish us each time we sin.  But rather than lettin us bear the full punishment for our sin, God demonstrated His mercy when He paid the penalty for our sin Himself.

Do you find it hard to show mercy?  It may be that you do not comprehend the mercy that God has shown to you.  Jesus commanded His disciples to extend the same mercy to others that they had received from God.  When they considered the incredible, undeserved mercy they had been granted, how could they reuse to extend the same unconditional mercy to others?

Could anyone sin against us to the same degree that we have sinned against God?  Could any offense committed against us be as undeserved as th abuse hurled against the sinless Son of God?  How quickly we forget the mercy that God graciously bestowed on us,  only to focus on the injustices we endure from others!

If you find it difficult to forgive others, you may need to meditate on the mercy of God that prevents you from experiencing God's justifiable wrath.  Scripture describes God as "Ready to pardon - Gracious and merciful - Slow to anger - Abundant in loving kindness" (Neh. 9:17b).

Sunday, April 19, 2026

Recognizing Prophets by Their Fruit

2 Peter 1:16 - We did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty.

In our days, as ever in the past, there have been those whose teaching and preaching differs widely from the truth otrevealed in God's Word.  Because of the great number and wide variety of such prophets, some people are led to believe that this is what we should expect.  They think that Christian denominations are so diverse in their beliefs and the Bible so imprecise that evey intepretation is equally as authentic, true, and tenable as the other.

But this is a delusion.  False prophets are no more the product of the Chrisitan Church and of the Holy Scripture that are conterfeit bills the product of the United States mint.

Our Lord, Himself the true Prophet, makes it very clear that there are prophets who teach contrary to His Word and whom we can know as such.  "By their fruit you will recognize them," He said (Matt 7:20).  What a prophet teaches and preaches and the kind of life he lives and advocates - this is his fruit.  If in an orchard we see a tree bearing peaches, then we know it is a peach tree.  When the fruit of a prophet's lips is the true and pure Gospel, then we know he is a true prophet.  Always we must  compare his utterance and action with God's written Word which reveals Christ's Gospel to us.

Jesus Christ, who bears witness to the Holy Scripture (John 10:35) and to whom the Holy Scriptures testifies (John 5:39), must be the heart and center of all our teaching.  "Anyone who runs ahead and doe not continue in the teaching of Christ does not have God," writes the apostle (2 John 9).  When we abide in the biblical teachings of Christ and about Christ - that He was born of a virgin, suffered and died for our sins, and rose again - we have Him as our Savior and God as our Father.

Prayer Suggestion: Pray that the Holy Spirit may lead you deeper into the Holy Scriptures, which bear true witness of Christ.

Monday, April 20, 2026

Praise the Lord, O My Soul

Psalm 103:1-5 - Praise the Lord, O my soul; all my in most being, praise his holy name. Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits - who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your lie form the pit and crowns you with love and compassion, who satisfies your desire with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's.

Soar like an eagle! Who can soar like an eagle? The true Christian can! For he has been born agian to "lively hope" through the Gospel of God.

In olden times the eagle had a reputation for quick recovery and the ability to make a fresh start, with energy, wings and feathers renewed.  And such also is the rebirth which the Holy Spirit accomplishes in God's people.  That is why their jubilation and thanksgiving are not a sometime thing, but a way of life.  "Praise the Lord, O my soul!"

Outside of Christ it is hard to think of life as a celebration of God's benefits.  For the eye of reason surveys the ruin of human nature caused by the Fall: everywhere there is greed and strice, disease and death.  Yes, even within ourselves we sense the corruption and weakness which come from sin.  Deep in their hearts all men tremble at the ripening judgment of God the Holy One!

What, then, is different about the Christian, that his heart alone brims over with praise to the Holy One?  Nothing but the exceeding charity of God in Christ.  For through Jesus Christ God has bought our lives back from damnation and eternal death.  God has satisfied his justice with that one precious death upon Calvary's cross - there need be no more.  The Christian lives in this truth.

Now if God's love is the great, active reality in my heart, then all of life wears a new face.  There is healing when I need it and ask for it, in order that I may live and praise the works of the Lord.  There are good gift at every turn: parents, spouse, family, friends, food, shelter, the air, the earth, the land I love.  Even hardship and heartache become forms of grace when I think about God's tender care.  And at the last, the crown of eternal life! "Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits!"

I will sing my Maker's praises, and in Him most joyful be,

For in all things I see traces of His tender love to me . . .

All things else have but their day, God's great love abides for aye.  Amen.

Tuesday, April 21, 2026

Rejoice - Or Grumble

1 Peter 1:6 -  In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials.

I think all of us meet Christian men and women who always seem to look on the gloomy side and are never able to do anything with life's problems but grumble about them!  I meet them often and when I do, I wonder: "Can these people be reading and trusting the same Bible I have been reading?"

The Apostle Peter wrote to the tempted, suffering and persecuted believers in his day and noted with thanksgiving that they could rejoice because they counted God's promsies and provisions greater than their trials!

We do live in a sinful and imperfect world, and as believers in Christ we acknowledge that perfection is a relative thing now - and God has not really completed a thing with us, as yet!

Peter testified that the persecuted and suffering Christians of his day were looking, in faith, to a future state of things immeasurable better than that which they knew, and that state of things would be perfect and complete!