Are You Hungry Now?
Thomas knew what he needed to do. Having been born to a poor family in India and adopted by Americans, upon a return trip to India he witnessed the dire needs of the children in his hometown. So he knew he had to help. He began making plans to return to the US, finish his education, make a lot of money, and come back in the future.
Then, after reading James 2:14–18 in which the apostle asks, “What good is it . . . if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds?,” Thomas heard a little girl in his…
Through a New Lens
“It’s amazing to look at a tree and see the individual leaves instead of just a blur of green!” my dad said. I couldn’t have said it better. I was eighteen at the time and not a fan of my new need to wear glasses, but they changed the way I saw everything, making the blurry beautiful!
When reading Scripture, I view certain books like I do when I look at trees without my glasses. There doesn’t seem to be much to see. But noticing details can reveal the beauty in a boring passage.
This happened to me when I was reading…
When Sharks Won’t Bite
My children were thrilled, but I felt uneasy. During a family vacation, we visited an aquarium where people were encouraged to pet small sharks kept in a special tank. When I asked the attendant if the creatures ever snapped at fingers in the water, she explained that the sharks had recently been fed and then given extra food. They wouldn’t bite because they weren’t hungry.
What I learned about shark petting makes sense according to a proverb in the Bible: “One who is full loathes honey from the comb, but to the hungry even what is bitter tastes sweet” (Proverbs 27:7). Hunger—that…
Divine Diversions
It can be difficult when we’re told “no” or “not now,” especially when we sense God has opened a door for us to serve others. Early in my ministry, two opportunities came my way where I thought my gifts and skills matched the churches’ needs, but both doors eventually closed. After these two disappointments, another position came along, and I was selected. With that ministry call came thirteen years of life-touching pastoral labors.
Twice in Acts 16 Paul and company were redirected by God. First, they were “kept by the Holy Spirit from preaching the word in the province of Asia”…
Reading John
The Gospel of the Son Who Reveals the Father
John and the Synoptics
While each of the four gospels is unique in…
Reading Luke
The Gospel of the Savior for Lost People Everywhere
Have you ever walked out of a movie or finished a book…
Reading Mark
The Gospel of the Suffering Son of God
Sometimes the best stories have surprising twists in their plots. In Agatha Christie’s…
Untying the Rope
A Christian organization works to promote the healing nature of forgiveness. One of their activities involves a skit in which a person who has been wronged is strapped back to back with a rope to the wrongdoer. Only the one sinned against can untie the rope. No matter what she does, she’s got someone on her back. Without forgiveness—without untying the rope—she cannot escape.
Offering forgiveness to someone who comes to us in sorrow for their wrongdoing begins the process of releasing us and them from the bitterness and pain that can cling to us over wrongs we’ve suffered. In Genesis,…
Introducing the Gospels
We all love getting good news. Sometimes good news comes that only makes a good situation better. Sometimes we get…
Reading Matthew
The Gospel of the Messianic King of the Jews
When I was growing up, the most anticipated day of the year…
Pray
26th April - 2nd May
Prayer to live to the praise of God’s glory
Good and faithful Father,
We praise You for Your love and blessings. Your mercies are new each and every morning! Forgive us for shrinking back when this world becomes dark and foreboding. You have made us to be lights, not hidden but shining forth so that all may…
Your Eulogy
My heart is full from attending the funeral of a faithful woman. Her life wasn’t spectacular. She wasn’t known widely outside her church, neighbors, and friends. But she loved Jesus, her seven children, and twenty-five grandchildren. She laughed easily, served generously, and could hit a softball a long way.
Ecclesiastes says, “It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting” (7:2). “The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning” because there we learn what matters most (7:4). New York Times columnist David Brooks says there are two kinds of…
Stories of God at Work Volume 2 (DVD)
At Our Daily Bread Ministries we love hearing our readers’ stories of God’s faithfulness and provision. And we love sharing their stories too. We have chosen six of these stories to encourage you with their witness of God working in their lives.
You can find more stories of how God’s grace and love is transforming people all over the world…
Vanity on Fire
In February 1497, a Monk named Girolama Savonarola started a fire. Leading up to this, he and his followers spent several months collecting items that they thought might entice people to sin or neglect their religious duties—including artwork, cosmetics, instruments, and dresses. On the appointed day, thousands of vanity items were gathered at a public square in Florence, Italy, and set on fire. The event has come to be known as the Bonfire of the Vanities.
Savonarola might have found inspiration for his extreme actions in some shocking statements from the Sermon on the Mount. “If your right eye causes you…
