Daily Devotionals for January 14, 2024

The unsaintly saints in Corinth had been squabbling over human leaders in the church. To some Paul was the ideal. Others made Apollos their favorite. And still others felt that Cephas was superlative. Paul is telling them that it is ridiculous to limit their choice to one when all these men belong to them. Instead of saying, "Apollos is mine," they ought to say, "Paul, Apollos and Cephas are all mine."

It is a word for us today. We err when we become exclusive followers of Luther,...

Everything below is liable to change; health may give place to sickness, pleasure to pain, plenty to poverty, love to enmity, honour to disgrace, strength to weakness, and life to death.

Remember the days of darkness, for they shall be many. But though all our circumstances and friends should change, there is One who never changes. He is in one mind, and none can turn Him. With Him is no variableness. He is the same yesterday, today, and for ever; and He is...

Every wise merchant will occasionally hold a stock-taking, when he will cast up his accounts, examine what he has on hand, and ascertain decisively whether his trade is prosperous or declining. Every man who is wise in the kingdom of heaven, will cry, "Search me, O God, and try me"; and he will frequently set apart special seasons for self-examination, to discover whether things are right between God and his soul. The God whom we worship is a great heart-searcher; and of old his servants...

His visage was marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men. § But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed.This is your hour, and the power of darkness. § You could have no power at all against Me unless it had been given you from above.The Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil. § [ Jesus] … cast out many demons;...

For Reading and Meditation:     John 2:13-17

We continue thinking about the psalmist's decision to take himself in hand and refrain from relaying his doubts to others. I feel it important at this point to say a further word about repression and expression. Christians, we said earlier, are never to pretend about anything. Whether we worry, covet, resent, hate, we...

Nothing is more beautiful than an ideal home. Love rules in all its life. The members are as one, in their fellowship and association. Each thinks of the comfort, the convenience, the happiness of the others. In the home of Isaac - all these conditions seem to have been reversed. The veil is lifted and the life of this chosen family is revealed as sadly divided, rent by strifes and jealousies. There is no semblance of love in the home...

GARMENT-RENDING and other outward signs of religious emotion, are easily manifested and are frequently hypocritical; but to feel true repentance is far more difficult, and consequently far less common. Men will attend to the most multiplied and minute ceremonial regulations-for such things are pleasing to the flesh-but true religion is too humbling, too heart-searching, too thorough for the tastes of the carnal men; they prefer something more...

When you pray, say: Our Father in heaven. § My Father and your Father, and . . . My God and your God.As the Father gave Me commandment, so I do. § The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority; but the Father who dwells in Me does the works.The Father loves the Son, and has given all things into His hand. § You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him.“Lord, show us the Father, and it...

"Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Matthew 11:28

We who are saved find rest in Jesus. Those who are not saved will receive rest if they come to Him, for here He promises to "give" it. Nothing can be freer than a gift; let us gladly accept what He gladly gives. You are not to buy it, nor to borrow it, but to receive it as a gift. You labor under the lash of ambition, covetousness, lust,...

By a kind of poetic justice, Peter has been the center of a number of historical contradictions, or perhaps we should say traditional, for many of them lack the dignity of authentic history. They are the fabrications of the Roman special pleaders who will make a case for themselves even if they must assassinate truth to do it.

Peter is, for instance, the only man in the world who was never married and yet had a mother-in-law; for the Bible says Peter's wife's mother lay sick of a...

God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Gal. 6:14).

It will save years of frustration and effort for one to understand that prayer can never be learned, or developed. Prayer is the outflow of the new life; as one grows, as the Cross frees the new from the old, there is the...

We can go one step further and come to what I will call the rut, which is bondage to the rote. When we are unable to see and sense bondage to the rote, we are in a rut. For example, a man may be sick and not even know it. The doctors may have confided in the man's wife and said, "We don't want to frighten your husband, but he could drop any minute. He is critically ill,so just expect it at any moment." But the man himself does not know he is seriously ill.He goes about his business as though...

This promise is introduced by a declaration that there is nothing but the want of faith to hinder Christ's disciples from doing works as great as those that Christ himself performed when on the earth; greater works even.

" Whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do. Ye shall do those works nominally, but I really. Understand that I do not deprive the earth of any of my power by my departure. I go to sit upon my Father's throne, that I may do greater works on earth than I have...