Be Still
Find a quiet place where you won’t be interrupted. Get comfortable. Let your body relax and your mind quiet down. Take a few deep breaths and then ask God to make his presence known to you. Be still. Take some time to sit and soak up God’s presence.
Prayer of Approach
My God, you saw me in my unformed substance and numbered my days before I had lived one of them. Be close to me now, my God, help me yield to you without restraint and to manage all the affairs of my life to the end that when I stand and give an account, I need not to be ashamed. In the name of my Lord, I pray. Amen.
Psalm 3
A psalm of David. When he fled from his son Absalom.
Lord, how many are my foes!
How many rise up against me!
Many are saying of me,
“God will not deliver him.”
But you, Lord, are a shield around me,
my glory, the One who lifts my head high.
I call out to the Lord,
and he answers me from his holy mountain.
I lie down and sleep;
I wake again, because the Lord sustains me.
I will not fear though tens of thousands
assail me on every side.
Arise, Lord!
Deliver me, my God!
Strike all my enemies on the jaw;
break the teeth of the wicked.
From the Lord comes deliverance.
May your blessing be on your people.
Devotional Thought
At the end of the day, review your conversation during the day, and ask yourself some pertinent questions about it.
As a young man, John Wesley calculated that twenty-eight pounds a year (about $65) would care for his own needs. Since prices remained basically the same, he was able to keep at that level of expenditure throughout his lifetime. When Wesley first made that decision, his income was thirty pounds a year. In later years sales from his books would often earn him fourteen hundred pounds a year, but he still lived on twenty-eight pounds and gave the rest away. Wesley, of course, was single much of his life and never had children, so he did not deal with the financial problems engendered by a family; but the idea is a sound one. We can do the same thing. Obviously we have to make adjustments for growing children, savings for college, and inflation, but the principle remains firm. Here is another wineskin. If both the wife and the husband desire to work, discipline yourselves to live on one salary and give the other away. In this way, one couple could potentially support an entire missionary family. Why not? What better investment opportunity could there be than that? Think what would happen to the worldwide missionary enterprise if each Christian couple would determine to give every second salary to missions.
Try still another model. Take a careful look at your income. Are there ways to so simplify your lifestyle that you can live on half of what you make? If so, rather than quit your job so that your earnings drop to half, plan to give away half of your earnings. Here is still another approach. Rather than just giving the money away, invest it for the Kingdom of God. It is usually best to set up a separate checking or savings account. Money put into this account is to be used entirely for Kingdom causes.
— Richard J. Foster
1 Thessalonians 1:1-10
Paul, Silas and Timothy,
To the church of the Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ:
Grace and peace to you.
We always thank God for all of you and continually mention you in our prayers. We remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.
For we know, brothers and sisters loved by God, that he has chosen you, because our gospel came to you not simply with words but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and deep conviction. You know how we lived among you for your sake. You became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you welcomed the message in the midst of severe suffering with the joy given by the Holy Spirit. And so you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. The Lord’s message rang out from you not only in Macedonia and Achaia—your faith in God has become known everywhere. Therefore we do not need to say anything about it, for they themselves report what kind of reception you gave us. They tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead—Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath.
Reflection
Take time to pause and reflect on your time with Jesus through the Scriptures and devotional thought. What thoughts are being drawn out of you? What emotions are being provoked? What might God be saying? Consider using a journal to write as you process, reflect, and pray.
Time for Prayer
God invites us to cast our cares on him because he cares for us. God is all-together good, already knows what we need, and is eager to give us good things. So we don’t need to pray out of anxiety or fear, but confident trust. Spend a few minutes making your requests known to God.
- For the church
- For others
- For myself
Closing Prayer
Hold before my eyes, my Lord, the diminishing number of my fleeting days, that I may receive them as precise gifts and live them in faithfulness and fidelity to you. Amen.