In today's reading of "Our Daily Bread" entitled; "Beautifully Broken", I am reminded of our God who is in the business of fixing broken vessels, us. Many times, in our lives we feel broken and believe that we are "unfixable". But that is so not true. We worship a God of mercy, grace, and most of all, "great love". His love is everlasting and never fails. But all He ask of us is to come before Him with a "broken heart" and lay down our burdens at His feet. Many times, we want

Circumcision was a covenant God gave to Abraham and to the future Israelite people to show God's commitment and promise to His people. This act was an outward sign of the flesh, but God's purpose was for us to become circumcised of the "heart"...for us to give up our "fleshly desires" to Him and come to worship Him with our "whole heart". Genesis 17: 10-11 This is My covenant which you shall keep, between Me and you and your descendants after you: Every male child among you s

I am reminded of a story told by a pastor long ago about why God calls His people sheep. As this pastor told the story, he said that sheep are not the brightest animals on the earth. And as you think about people in general, we are not the brightest when it comes to understanding God's ways and His direction for our lives. Many people will follow and believe anything they are told or hear. We just accept it as gospel truth without any research or evidence. People will create

I have come to better understand why so many of us, as Christians, struggle with living and walking a good Christian life. We want to do good and please God because of what He has done for us. That is good and commendable, but God does not ask that of us. He wants us to receive His free gift of eternal life, and trust in the work of Jesus, and then leave the rest of the work to Him. If we keep trying to please God with doing these good things, there lies the problem. In the B

This is an interesting question that many Christians have asked over the years. Since God's grace came to all men because of sin, (sin came through the Law of God), that must mean that God has given us the freedom to continue to sin that His grace may continue to abound even more. Read what the Apostle Paul wrote in Romans: Romans 5: 20-21 (NIV) The law was brought in so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, 21 so that, just

As we go through trials, I am sure we sometimes wonder what God is doing in our lives. I am sure we may even question God for what He is doing, I know I do at times. But we have a great God who is "all-knowing" and "always present' in our lives. In the book of 2 Corinthians, the Apostle Paul opens his letter to the Corinthians with the following: 2 Corinthians 1: 3-4 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort,

In the first Book of Corinthians, the Apostle Paul is addressing many issues with the church in Corinth. One of the issues was tolerating sin with other believers and themselves. He uses the example of "leaven and unleavened bread". 1 Corinthians 5: 6-8 Your boasting is not good. Don’t you know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough? 7 Get rid of the old yeast, so that you may be a new unleavened batch—as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been s

Reading a message in "Our Daily Bread" about the sacrifices of God's people and how they would bring blind, lame, and diseased to God as their offerings to Him (Malachi 1: 8-9), reminded me of how we sometimes do the same to God with our own lives. We give to God only a part of ourselves at times and keep hold of the areas in our lives we think we can manage on our own. God wants our whole hearts, our full obedience and sacrifice to Him. Read the following in Malachi and see

I Thessalonians 5: 16-24 (NKJV) Rejoice always, 17 pray without ceasing, 18 in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. 19 Do not quench the Spirit. 20 Do not despise prophecies. 21 Test all things; hold fast what is good. 22 Abstain from every form of evil. 23 Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely; and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 24 He who calls you

Many people who go through trials in their life grit their teeth when they see the trials coming and pray hard that God will help make the trial go away soon. The trials themselves can be very painful and hard to endure, depending on the type of trial it is. But no matter what type of trial whether it be family, personal, financial, or relational, they can be very heart-wrenching. Early in my years as a new Christian, I was unfortunate to go through very many hard trials in m