Posts with the category “daily-devotionals”

Are you the type of person who must finish what you start? I'm not. In fact, I'm really bad at finishing certain things. I've been known to start books and never finish them. Start projects and never ...  Read More

In Colossians 3:16, the Apostle Paul writes,“Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing wit...  Read More

Two weeks ago I awoke in bed at 2am. Despite my best memory verse practices and prayer, I laid awake fretting for three hours. It started with some struggles in the church, then moved to stresses at h...  Read More

(Note: Welcome to my on-going devotional series in Acts 16-28. I encourage you to look back at past devotionals and stay current. Today we end with Acts 28).Acts 28:30-31 “And he stayed two full years...  Read More

At our VBS program this year, I had one second grade student who could not wrap his head around the concept of Bible memory. He did a great job reading the verse from the whiteboard, but when I told h...  Read More

God has written and is continuing to write the chapters of my life.  Each chapter has its significance and challenges.  Some of them were special times with family and ministry.  Others were difficult...  Read More

A number of years ago my parents gave me a loan to help me buy a car.  It came at a time when I wasn’t making a lot of money, but every month I sent them my monthly payment. Like so many of us, I was ...  Read More

This verse is the end of a parable that Jesus is telling his disciples about watching for the return of the Master, alluding to His return, Jesus’ second coming. We are reminded here to be ever watchi...  Read More

Some of you may remember the phrase, "And now for the rest of the story." It was made famous by Paul Havey's radio show that revealed unknown elements about personalities or historical elements, many ...  Read More

I was shocked to see how the weeds were taking over my garden. After putting on my grubby clothes, I got down on my knees to fight the war of the weeds. An especially difficult weed is called Spurge. ...  Read More

Every generation has its version of slang. In the 1920s, for example, "The bees knees" was an extraordinary person or thing, "Putting on the Ritz" meant to do something with style, and "iron one’s sho...  Read More

Occasionally I will open my small group with the question, “What is your favorite season of the year?” Overwhelmingly, the season people pick most often is fall. When I ask why, most say, “Because it ...  Read More

I prepared lunch for Lynn today; I also brought home prepared things for dinner. It was the third day of VBS, and I knew she would come home tired. She loves the kids and their energy, but also gets w...  Read More

(Note: Welcome to my on-going devotional series in Acts 16-28. I encourage you to look back at past devotionals and stay current. Today we come to Acts 27).Acts 27:23 “For this very night an angel of ...  Read More

The last five Psalms of the Book of Psalms are glorious worship hymns that exhort us to praise our God.  They bring into focus the reality that our lives are to bring glory to God, and that we should ...  Read More

Samuel has got to be one of my favorite characters in the Bible.  The story of his birth and Hannah’s desire to dedicate him to the service of the Lord is inspiring (1Sam 1:1–28).  As a young boy, he ...  Read More

How well do you understand the principles of electricity and how it works to power the lights and devices around your home? If you saw a bunch of loose wires coming out of your wall sparking and crack...  Read More

What’s your favorite Bible story? Is it the Exodus? David and Goliath? Noah and the Ark? I love all of these narratives, but my favorite Bible “story” is actually fictional. It’s a story Jesus told – ...  Read More

I spent all of last week at Stanford Hospital with my friend who had major back surgery. For those of you who know me you may be asking yourself, "Oh my goodness, why would she have Laurel do that?" Y...  Read More

So many people I talk to are struggling with loneliness. These conversations have prompted me to share an experience I had as a JARON missionary in the Czech Republic in 2019. I hope my experience can...  Read More

How do you respond when under attack? Everyone who knows me knows that I'm a big movie guy. But even if you’re not that big into movies, most have seen or heard of the classic Karate Kid. One of the m...  Read More

If you happen to stop by my office anytime during the year, there’s a good chance you’ll hear Christmas music playing. I think it was during my ‘choir days’ that I got hooked on playing Christmas musi...  Read More

After Jesus’ resurrection, having already appeared to His disciples twice, Peter says to his fellow disciples, “I am going fishing.” They declare that they would go along with him also. They fished al...  Read More

(Note: Welcome to my on-going devotional series in Acts 16–28. I encourage you to look back at past devotionals and stay current. Today we come to Acts 26).In Acts 26 we find the apostle Paul now stan...  Read More

I grew up in northern California, near the small town of Vina, 18 miles north of Chico.  My father was a farmer, and he moved onto our family farm in December of 1939.  There wasn’t an evangelical chu...  Read More

Recently I began reading through the Book of 2 Corinthians, and I was struck by the way Paul began his letter.  He uses a very interesting word in the opening section – affliction.  In Greek, the word...  Read More

This verse is often quoted and I think many times misunderstood. This verse does provide comfort and confidence to we who follow and love God, but I think it often can be misinterpreted to mean that o...  Read More

“There’s always a light at the end of the tunnel,” says the truism. In other words, no matter how bad things are, they will get better eventually. But that’s not always true, is it? Perhaps that light...  Read More

“There’s always a light at the end of the tunnel,” says the truism. In other words, no matter how bad things are, they will get better eventually. But that’s not always true, is it? Perhaps that light...  Read More

This is one of my favorite passages. It shows me that the priests demonstrated their faith by walking into the water. And as soon as they did the waters were cut off. Sometimes it takes us walking int...  Read More

A decorative plaque resides on my piano that says, “My grace is sufficient for you.” I have walked by this  and glanced at the words scores of times. Today I stop. My attention is riveted to the words...  Read More

Have you ever played Two Truths and a Lie? It's a fun get-to-know-you, icebreaker game that I often play in situations when I'm around new people, where the objective is to spot the lie. Let's try it....  Read More

If I came up to you right now and asked, “Are you experiencing peace in your life right now?”, what would you say? When we gather at church, we look at each other with a smile on our face and say “God...  Read More

I was shocked today (June 21)! I asked the Lord to help me with today’s NT passage in Ephesians 4, noting how many times I have read it in five decades. It was also in the NKJV, which is not my norm. ...  Read More

(Note: Welcome to my on-going devotional series in Acts 16–28. I encourage you to look back at past devotionals and stay current. Today we come to Acts 25).In Acts 25 we are back at the trial of “Paul...  Read More

I have read through the book of Isaiah numerous times.  On one of the last times reading through the book, the Lord drew my attention to these verses in the 46th chapter.  Maybe my mind was drawn to t...  Read More

This is one of the best-known and most-quoted verses in the Bible on parenting.  On the surface there is a precious promise here: if we train our children in the ways of the Lord, when they get older ...  Read More

This is part of the vision given to John on Patmos about the end of all things. Revelation is a prophetic book and is full of wild imagery and symbolism and it can often be hard to discern and interpr...  Read More

You can tell a lot about a person by the spaces they inhabit. Let me give you a tour of one of my spaces—my office here at Maple. It’s nestled in the back corner of C Building, down a few doors from J...  Read More

You know that feeling you get when you have messed up and you feel so bad and just want forgiveness but know you really don’t deserve it? I hate that feeling! But for some reason it can take me awhile...  Read More