God of All People
Former Newsboys lead vocalist and songwriter Peter Furler describes the performance of the band’s praise song “He Reigns.” The song paints a vivid picture of believers from every tribe and nation coming together to worship God in unity. Furler observed that whenever the Newsboys sang it he could sense the moving of the Holy Spirit in the gathering of believers.
Furler’s description of his experiences with He Reigns would likely have resonated with the crowds who converged upon Jerusalem at Pentecost. When the disciples were filled with the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:4), things began to happen beyond anyone’s experience. As a…
Standing Firm on the Gospel
Sharing Slices
As a sixty-two-year-old homeless military veteran, Steve made his way to a warm climate where sleeping outdoors was tolerable year-round. One evening, as he displayed his hand-drawn art—his attempt to earn some money—a young woman approached and offered him several slices of pizza. Steve gratefully accepted. Moments later, Steve shared his bounty with another hungry, homeless person. Almost immediately, the same young woman resurfaced with another plate of food, acknowledging that he had been generous with what he’d been given.
Steve’s story illustrates the principle found in Proverbs 11:25 that when we’re generous with others, we’re likely to experience generosity as…
Abby’s Prayer
When Abby was a sophomore in high school, she and her mom heard a news story about a young man who’d been critically injured in a plane accident—an accident that took the lives of his father and stepmother. Although they didn’t know this person, Abby’s mom said, “We just need to pray for him and his family.” And they did.
Fast forward a few years, and one day Abby walked into a class at her university. A male student offered her the seat next to him. That student was Austin Hatch, the plane crash victim Abby had prayed for. Soon they…
Knocking Down Pins
I was immediately intrigued when I noticed a tattoo of a bowling ball knocking down pins on my friend Erin’s ankle. Erin was inspired to get this unique tattoo after listening to Sara Groves’s song, “Setting Up the Pins.” The clever lyrics encourage listeners to find joy in the repetitive, routine tasks that sometimes feel as pointless as manually setting up bowling pins over and over again, only to have someone knock them down.
Laundry. Cooking. Mowing the lawn. Life seems full of tasks that, once completed, just have to been done again—and again. This isn’t a new struggle but an…
AU Opportunities
Our office in Australia currently has an employment opportunities to join us in our mission of making the life-changing wisdom of the Bible understandable and accessible to more people in Australia and beyond.
Job Title: Content Editor/Writer
Work Team: English Content Development Team in Australia
Full-time is preferred but part-time is an option. Flexible start date. Possibility of remote or office-based working.
About the Organisation:
Our Daily…
Don’t Miss the Chance
“Don’t ever miss the chance to show your babies the moon!” she said. Before our mid-week prayer service began, a group of us talked about the previous night’s Harvest Moon. The full moon was especially striking, as it seemed to sit on the horizon. Mrs. Webb was the elder voice in our conversation, a gray-haired lover of God’s grand creation. She knew my wife and I had two children in our house at the time, and she wanted to help me train up them in a way worth going. Don’t ever miss the chance to show your babies the moon!
Mrs.…
Blooming in the Desert
The Mojave Desert includes the expected sand dunes, dry canyons, mesas, and mountains of most deserts. But American biologist Edmund Jaeger observed that every few years an abundance of rain results in “such a wealth of blossoms that almost every foot of sand or gravelly soil is hidden beneath a blanket of flowers.” The Mojave Wildflower Show isn’t a yearly phenomenon, though. Researchers confirm the dry earth needs to be soaked by storms and warmed by the sun, at just the right times, before blooms will cover the desert with vibrant colors.
This image of God bringing forth life despite the…
Finding Treasure
John and Mary were walking their dog on their property when they stumbled on a rusty can partially unearthed by recent rains. They took the can home and opened it, discovering a cache of gold coins over a century old! The couple returned to the spot and located seven more cans containing 1,427 coins in all. Then they protected their treasure by reburying it elsewhere.
The cache of coins (valued at $10 million) is called the Saddle Ridge Hoard, the largest find of its kind in US history. The story is strikingly reminiscent of a parable Jesus told: “The kingdom of…
AU Prayer Needs
Thank you for supporting us in prayer! We rely on God’s grace to help people stay close to Him and His Word through our biblical resources.
Do continue to pray with us:
Australia
- We are holding a Bible Conference in Melbourne on Saturday October 12 with Mike Raiter and, for the first time, Bishop Paul Barker. Pray for people to be moved to…
Can We Relax?
Darnell entered the physical therapist’s office knowing he would experience a lot of pain. The therapist stretched and bent and held his arm in positions it hadn’t been in for months since his injury! After holding each uncomfortable position for a few seconds, she gently told him: “Okay, you can relax.” He said later, “I think I heard those words at least fifty times in each fifteen-minute therapy session: ‘Okay, you can relax.’”
Thinking of those words, Darnell realized they could apply to the rest of his life as well. He could relax in God’s goodness and faithfulness instead of worrying.
As…
A New Take on Serving Christ
Night Watches
During my college days, my summers were spent working at a guest ranch in the stunningly beautiful mountains of Colorado. On a rotating basis, staff members were assigned “night watch” duty—to keep an eye out for forest fires in order to protect the guests as they slept. What initially seemed to be an exhausting and thankless task became a unique opportunity for me to be still, reflect, and find solace in the majesty of God’s presence.
King David earnestly sought and thirsted for the presence of God (Psalm 63:1), even from his bed and through the “watches of the night” (v.…
In God’s Image
When her beautiful brown skin started losing its color, a young woman felt frightened, as if she were disappearing, losing her “self.” With heavy makeup, she covered up “my spots,” as she called them—patches of lighter skin caused by a condition called vitiligo. It’s a loss of skin pigment, melanin, which gives skin its tone.
Then one day, she asked herself: Why hide? Relying on God’s strength to accept herself, she stopped wearing heavy makeup, gaining attention for her self-confidence. Eventually she became the first spokesmodel with vitiligo for a global cosmetics brand.
“It’s such a blessing,” she told a TV news…
