Jesus said, “When you pray, do not be like the hypocrites” (Matthew 6:5). Don’t focus on the last part of that verse, but the first part – when you pray. When. Not if. When you pray. When, when, when. Maybe you are at a loss for words sometimes, and that’s why you don’t pray more.…
One summer, Bob Bartlett, an explorer, filled a boat with rare birds, put them in cages, and began to transport them to America. Somewhere in the Atlantic, the boat encountered rough water, and one of the birds got away. They watched the bird fly away to apparent “freedom.” But, several hours later, the bird came…
“Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God” (Psalm 20:7). Corrie Ten Boom said, “Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.” And Ralph Waldo Emerson added, “All I have seen teaches me to trust the creator for all I…
An American art teacher by the name of Judson W. Van DeVenter wrote the following words, which would be published as a hymn in 1896. Living out these words would change the trajectory of his life forever. All to Jesus I surrender, All to Him I freely give. I will ever love and trust Him, …
Wounds outlast the disease. The Bible promises, “He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds” (Psalm 147:3). Notice the two-step process here: The wound represents the effects of the disease, not the disease itself. So when someone tells me, “I’m healed of my sexual addiction,” my response is, “Great! You’re halfway home!” It is…
From the Sermon on the Mount we read these words: “Until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, nor the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is fulfilled” (Matthew 5:18). Jesus said that even “the least stroke of the pen” from God’s Word matters. The…
There were two hunters who were each offered $5,000 for every wolf they could capture and deliver alive. One night, when they were on their way up in the mountains, they woke up to discover that they were surrounded by 50 wolves with glaring eyes and bared teeth. One man punched his buddy and said,…
On this date in 1965, the Beatles’ hit song, Yesterday, reached #1 on the charts, a position it held for the next four weeks. Yesterday would be voted the best song of the 20th century in a 1999 poll of musical experts across the globe. Written by Paul McCartney, Yesterday was a ballad written about…
Take a breath. Few things are more mundane than breathing, yet few things are more miraculous. With every breath, we inhale half a liter of air, which contains 12.5 sextillion molecules. That’s more molecules than all the sand on all the seashores on planet Earth, including sandcastles. Take another breath. The surface area of your…
“When you move past self, life is simpler and less stressful.” (Tom Rath, It’s Not About You) In 1543, the Polish polymath Nicolaus Copernicus published a book that identified the sun as the center of our solar system. Until that point, it was widely assumed that everything in the universe revolved around the earth. Copernicus’s…