READ: ISAIAH 41:10; JOHN 14:18; 15:12-15; HEBREWS 13:5 Have people ever let you down so much that you don’t want to get up again? I know I have felt like this many times. Or maybe you see all of your friends hanging out, and you feel like you’re the “backup friend.” Many times in my [...]

READ: MATTHEW 14:22-23; LUKE 5:16; 1 THESSALONIANS 5:16-18 Have you ever had to face the same problem over and over again? I think we all have from time to time. A few months ago, I had a difficult situation at work. It went on for quite some time, and I relied heavily on the Lord [...]

READ: PSALMS 32:1-11; 103:4; JOHN 8:12; ACTS 26:9-18 Blinking open his eyes he looked out into darkness. “How long have I been here?” he asked the darkness. “Innumerable days,” came the melancholy response. “How long shall I stay here?” he asked the darkness. “An insurmountable time,” came the dreary response. “Who shall stay with me?” [...]

READ: JOHN 13:1-17; 2 CORINTHIANS 5:15-21; 1 PETER 2:21-25 A few days after arriving in Romania as a missionary, I discovered two things: First, one of the sandals I had brought along, hoping they would last my entire year overseas, broke. Second, on the ground floor of my apartment building, a family ran a small [...]

READ: EPHESIANS 4:22–5:2; HEBREWS 12:1-3; 2 PETER 1:3-9 Do you have vivid dreams? I dream vividly almost every night. Once, I had a hilarious dream about a team of ostriches flying, pulling me on a sleigh in the sky. We landed in a parking lot so they could take a break and join an exercise [...]

READ: PSALM 10:4; MATTHEW 11:28-30; PHILIPPIANS 2:5-13; 1 PETER 5:5-7 One of the things that gives me the greatest anxiety in life is thinking about what others think of me. I worry about what the other shoppers think of me when I’m in the store, and I worry about what my family thinks of me [...]

READ: MATTHEW 7:1-5; ROMANS 8:1; JAMES 3 Yesterday, we talked about how the little habits we maintain as Christians can make a big difference. I shared the story of how I forgot to post information online prior to an important meeting at work—a responsibility that previously hadn’t felt all that important. After the meeting, I [...]

READ: 1 CORINTHIANS 15:55-58; HEBREWS 10:24-25; JAMES 2:14-26 Do you have a responsibility that feels like it doesn’t matter? Part of my job is updating the township’s website. When we have public meetings, I upload what are called agendas (which describe the meeting’s subject matter) to the website. Not a big deal, right? Well one [...]

READ: LUKE 7:47; JOHN 15:9-15; 1 JOHN 4:19 I don’t know if anyone knows how difficult life is for me, living at the edge of our village. I lost my family long ago and all I can do is spend each day looking for some argoine—the substance we must eat to survive on this planet. [...]

READ: MARK 9:20-25; JOHN 6:25-35; PHILIPPIANS 1:6 Do you truly believe that Jesus’s way of life is the best way of life? I was raised in the church, and when I was presented with this question, my instinct was to say, “Of course!” Upon further examination, however, I began to realize that if I truly [...]