Devotionals

Proverbs 3:5–6

Years ago, I got a big laugh out of Stephen Erickson’s article “How to Choose a Dentist”:

Never trust a dentist

... who wears dentures

... who has hairy knuckles

... whose drill is driven by a system of pulleys connected to three mice on a treadmill

... who sends you a Christmas card and charges you for it

... who uses the suction hose to empty your pockets

... who is also a barber

... who sprays his equipment with Lysol to sterilize it

You can always trust a dentist

Matthew 11:28–30

Strange, isn’t it, how we tend toward extremes? What begins as self-improvement becomes self-enslavement ... what starts as merely a mellow change of pace leads to borderline fanaticism. We’re nuts! Left to ourselves, we’ll opt for extremes virtually every time. Which explains why God’s Book so often stresses moderation, self-control, softening our sharp-cornered lives with more curves that necessitate a slower pace.

Psalm 46:10

What is it about our modern culture that drives us to the brink of burnout, no matter our age? Just trying to keep up with daily responsibilities if you’re a family of five, with school-age children to manage, a mortgage to pay, and a dog to keep groomed, calls for near supernatural abilities.

It’s bad enough just meeting the daily and weekly deadlines along with fulfilling some people’s expectations—ugh!—but when I include a bunch of other self-assigned projects, the stress level can approach the ragged edge of madness.

Psalm 61:1–5

At times putting words on paper can free our feelings from the lonely prison of our souls. Especially in times of heartache and disappointment.

It was King David who wrote:

O God, listen to my cry!

Hear my prayer!

From the ends of the earth,

I cry to you for help

when my heart is overwhelmed.

Lead me to the towering rock of safety,

for you are my safe refuge,

a fortress where my enemies cannot reach me.

Matthew 16:24–26

Tom Landry, the late great head coach of the Dallas Cowboys, was once quoted as saying something like this: “I have a job to do that is not very complicated, but it is often difficult: to get a group of men to do what they don’t want to do so they can achieve the one thing they have wanted all their lives.”

Coach Landry, in that seemingly contradictory statement, described what discipline is all about ... doing what we don’t want to do so we can accomplish what we’ve always wanted.

2 Corinthians 11:23–28

Imagine reading a ministry job posting like this.

Opening for full-time church planter and pastor. Please read the first-hand account of ministry experience from our former pastor:

Proverbs 27:5–6, 9

Galatians 6:7–10

It’s often best to get straight to the point. Are you facing a trial today? Consider some straight truth from God’s Word:

Lamentations 3:21–24

You’ve heard them. Those all-too-familiar cries of exasperation. Maybe a couple have crossed your mind today sometime between the too-early chime of your smartphone and the too-late racket of the neighbour’s pool party.

Going from bad to worse.

Jumping from the frying pan into the fire.

Between a rock and a hard place.

Why can’t I get a break?

My mother told me there would be days like these, but she never said they would run in packs.

1 Corinthians 10:12–13

If you’re old enough to remember comedian Flip Wilson, then you also remember his famous line, “The Devil made me do it.” It was designed to be funny, not phoney. Whether he believed in an actual Satan is, for the moment, immaterial. All he was interested in was getting a laugh. But the thing that made it so effective was the real-to-life scenario Flip was acting out. It made everybody laugh out loud.