Daily Reading
January 20, 2024
Today’s Daily Reading is an excerpt from Morgan Snyder's book Becoming a King:How we arrange our days and spend our time is central to becoming the kind of king to whom God can entrust his creative power. It is this slow and steady exercise — or bett...
Daily Reading
January 19, 2024
We, too, live in a world that triggers our souls into vigilance far too often. The complexity of modern life is mind-boggling. Thanks to the smartphone and the web, you are confronted on a daily basis with more information than any previous generatio...
Daily Reading
January 18, 2024
Hearing from God flows out of our relationship. That relationship was established for us by Jesus Christ. “Therefore, since we have been justified [made right with God] through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom...
Daily Reading
January 17, 2024
The warrior is hardwired into every man. This is true because he is made in the image of God, who is the Great Warrior. Like Father, like son. It is also true because it constitutes a great part of man’s mission here on earth — to join the Great Warr...
Daily Reading
January 16, 2024
The story that is the Sacred Romance begins not with God alone, the Author at his desk, but God in relationship, intimacy beyond our wildest imagination, heroic intimacy. The Trinity is at the center of the universe; perfect relationship is the heart...
Daily Reading
January 15, 2024
Today’s Daily Reading is an excerpt from Morgan Snyder's book, Becoming a KingToday’s headlines are replete with stories of dethroned monarchs, religious or secular. Scripture is as well. Though the characters change, the story line remains the same:...
Daily Reading
January 14, 2024
When the apostles needed the help of some good men to shepherd the exploding new church, they chose men "full of the Spirit and wisdom" (Acts 6:3). The two go together; we need them both. We need to walk by the inspiration of the Spirit, and we need ...
Daily Reading
January 13, 2024
All masculine initiation is ultimately spiritual. The tests and challenges, the joys and adventures are all designed to awaken a man’s soul, draw him into contact with the masculine in himself, in other men, in the world, and in God, as Father. I mak...
Daily Reading
January 12, 2024
Our acts of remembering must therefore involve both essential truths and dramatic narrative. I believe we need to hold the creeds in one hand and our favorite forms of art in the other. There are films, books, poems, songs, and paintings I return to ...
Daily Reading
January 11, 2024
There is a widespread belief in the church that to be a Christian somehow satisfies our every desire. As one camp song has it, “I’m inright, outright, upright, downright happy all day long.” What complete nonsense! Augustine emphasized, “The whole li...
Daily Reading
January 10, 2024
I am loved. Deeply and truly loved.“I have loved you with an everlasting love” (Jeremiah 31:3). If all the pain of the world were gathered together, and sorted by cause into great basins, the vast majority of tears would fill an ocean entitled, “Unlo...
Daily Reading
January 9, 2024
Once more, lend a mythic eye to your situation. Let your heart ponder this:You awake to find yourself in the middle of a great and terrible war. It is, in fact, our most desperate hour. Your King and dearest Friend calls you forth. Awake, come fully ...
Daily Reading
January 8, 2024
Does God have a good heart? When we think of God as Author, the Grand Chess Player, the Mind Behind It All, we doubt his heart. As Melville said, "The reason the mass of men fear God and at bottom dislike him is because they rather distrust his heart...
Daily Reading
January 7, 2024
A friend of mine wanted to teach English as a second language in an Asian country, as a way of becoming a sort of undercover missionary. A beautiful dream, one that I'm sure she would have been excellent in fulfilling. But she rushed to the field unp...
Daily Reading
January 6, 2024
First, where does Jesus Christ now reside, in the life of the believer? Inside us; more precisely, in our hearts: “For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his g...
Daily Reading
January 5, 2024
Many people have the vague but ominous idea that God destroys the current reality and creates a new “heavenly” one. But that is not what Scripture actually says.For all creation is waiting eagerly for that future day when God will reveal who his chil...
Daily Reading
January 4, 2024
And then, alas, there is the church. Christianity, as it currently exists, has done some terrible things to men. When all is said and done, I think most men in the church believe that God put them on the earth to be a good boy. The problem with men, ...
Daily Reading
January 3, 2024
“All mankind will know that I, the Lord, am your Savior, your Redeemer.” (Isaiah 49:26)Once upon a time the earth was whole and beautiful, shimmering like an emerald, filled with glory, bursting with anticipation. Such wonders waiting to be unveiled,...
Daily Reading
January 2, 2024
Hopefully you will find a few folks who walk with God to also walk with you through the seasons of your life. But honesty — and Scripture — forces me to admit they are a rare breed. Few there are who find it. All the more reason for you to make the n...
Daily Reading
January 1, 2024
By the grace of God, we cannot quite pull it off. In the quiet moments of the day we sense a nagging within, a discontentment, a hunger for something else. But because we have not solved the riddle of our existence, we assume that something is wrong—...
Daily Reading
December 31, 2023
If you woke each morning and your heart leapt with hope, knowing that the renewal of all things was just around the corner — might even come today — you would be one happy person. If you knew in every fiber of your being that nothing is lost, that ev...
Daily Reading
December 30, 2023
And so Screwtape reveals the Enemy's ploy — first make humans flabby, with small passions and desires, then offer a sop to those diminished passions so that their experience is one of contentment. They know nothing of great joy or great sorrow. They ...
Daily Reading
December 29, 2023
Entering into the Sacred Romance begins with eyes to see and ears to hear. Where would we be today if Eve had looked at the serpent with different eyes, if she had seen at once that the beautiful creature with the charming voice and the reasonable pr...
Daily Reading
December 28, 2023
Adam was given the earth to rule, but when the test came — he folded. He didn’t speak, didn’t act on Eve’s behalf. Satan was there, attacking his wife, threatening the whole kingdom, and Adam didn’t do jack squat. He fell through his acquiescence, th...
Daily Reading
December 27, 2023
This is not to say the heart is only swirling emotion, mixed motives, and dark desire, without thought or reason. Far from it. According to Scripture, the heart is also where we do our deepest thinking. "Jesus, knowing what they were thinking in thei...
Daily Reading
December 26, 2023
Forgive God? This idea is going to cause some readers to freak out. Just listen for a moment. If you are holding something in your heart against Jesus — the loss of someone you love, a painful memory from your past, simply the way your life has turne...
Daily Reading
December 25, 2023
Her child was snatched away from the dragon. ... Then there was war in heaven. (Revelation 12:5, 7 NLT) I would pay good money to have a nativity scene with Revelation 12 included. Not only would it capture the imagination, but it would also better ...
Daily Reading
December 24, 2023
The incarnation is one of the greatest treasures of our faith. The world keeps pushing God away, feeling more comfortable with him up in the heavens somewhere. But in the coming of Jesus he draws near. Incredibly near. He takes on our humanity. How c...
Daily Reading
December 23, 2023
The best thing you can do at this point is simply begin to love Jesus.Just love him.It will open up your heart and soul to experiencing him, and to receiving his life. Just begin to make a practice of loving Jesus. As I’m driving in my car, I will si...
Daily Reading
December 22, 2023
A slave feels reluctant to pray; they feel they have no right to ask, and so their prayers are modest and respectful. They spend more time asking forgiveness than they do praying for abundance. An orphan is not reluctant to pray; they feel desperate....