Isaiah 58:4 Nothing is more unattractive than hypocrisy. When I have talked to people who don’t go to church, time and again they have pointed out the gap between churchgoers’ faith and actions. This was precisely the situation that Isaiah was ad...
Isaiah 57:20-21 It was Augustine of Hippo (354–430) in his famous Confessions who observed: “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in you.” There is no doubt that Augustine was reflecting on his...
Isaiah 56:9-11 As a church leader I find these words both incredibly challenging and agonisingly sad. I am sure that we have all known church leaders who have worked extremely hard and rightfully earned people’s love and respect. But there are la...
Isaiah 56:6 In the Old Testament, God’s people were often told to be welcoming to foreigners. God’s love was not confined to the Jews and they were reminded that, as a nation, they used to be foreigners in Egypt so it was only right that they sho...
Isaiah 56:1-2 Justice is a major theme throughout the book of Isaiah. From the first chapter, God declares his hatred of every form of injustice and his unwillingness to receive the worship of people who refuse to act justly. God is incredibly bl...
Isaiah 55:10-11 There is something about me that you need to know, and that is that I am incredibly excited writing these daily devotionals. Believe me, that’s got nothing to do with my abilities as a writer but everything to do with the fact tha...
Isaiah 55:8-9 Life is full of mysteries. Every day, tragedies occur and people scream out to God that life is not fair. As we reach out to others in their times of deepest need we would love to be able to offer an explanation, but we cannot. The...
Isaiah 55:1-2 Much of Isaiah’s prophecy is dominated by the theme of judgement. The people had wandered away from God and lived lives that were a complete disappointment to him. They had worshipped other gods and had neglected to care for the poo...
Proverbs 12:15 There is all the difference in the world between hearing and listening. Hearing is a physical process, and it happens all the time whether we like it or not. Listening however is a matter of choice. When we listen we deliberately t...
Proverbs 12:10 I need to be honest with you. I have read this chapter many times but I have never stopped and thought about this verse before now. The writer seems to be saying that a person who follows God will show a caring attitude in every pa...
Proverbs 11:28 We hear a lot about money in the book of Proverbs. In many ways the writer speaks very positively about it. The acquisition of money is often seen as a sign of God’s blessing and he encourages his readers to work hard so that they...
1 Corinthians 14:1 1 Corinthians 13 is a really famous chapter and rightly so. But Paul didn’t write in chapters. Chapter divisions arrived about 1,200 years later! So, whenever we see a chapter division, we need to, at least, peer at what happen...
1 Corinthians 13:8,13 I don’t know about you, but I don’t like throwing things away. I am writing this on a new laptop, but I hung on to the last one for as long as possible. It was starting to run very slowly, and sometimes didn’t want to start...
1 Corinthians 13:11-12 When I was about four years old I can recall being very confused when I met new people. I presumed that they had just been made, because I had never seen them before! I had recently realised that people die – probably becau...
1 Corinthians 13:4-7 I am sure that you have often heard these famous words. They give us the most beautiful description of love and, understandably, they are often read at weddings. Love sounds incredibly attractive doesn’t it? We all long to be...
