DEVOTIONAL BY BILLY GRAHAM – HOPE FOR EACH DAY

Peace, Perfect Peace I will give you assured peace in this place.  – JEREMIAH 14 : 13

“Worry,” says Vance Havner, “is like sitting in a rocking chair. It will give you something to do, but it won’t get you anywhere.” Worry and anxiety have hounded the human race since the beginning of time, and modern man with all his innovations has not found the cure for the plague of worry.

What is the answer? Imagine in your mind a ferocious ocean storm beating against a rocky shore. The lightning flashes, the thunder roars, the waves lash the rocks. But then imagine that you see a crevice in the rocky cliff—and inside is a little bird, its head serenely tucked under its wing, fast asleep. It knows the rock will protect it, and thus it sleeps in peace.

God promised Moses, “I will put you in the cleft of the rock, and will cover you with My hand” (Exod. 33:22). That is God’s promise to us. Christ is our Rock, and we are secure in His hands forever. The storm rages, but our hearts are at rest.

DEVOTIONAL BY CHARLES STANLEY – ON HOLY GROUND

Anxiety

Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. – Matthew 6:34

In her booklet Overcome Your Worry, Pamela Reeve shares how the character and sufficiency of God are the antidote for every form of worry:

The provision of our God covers the past, the present, and the future. Peace comes from the possession of adequate resources.

God can keep our minds at peace, even as He’s promised, because we have adequate resources to take care of the sin and guilt of the past. We have the cross of Christ…

We have adequate resources for the present: That great Resource, the Holy Spirit, who will give us the wisdom we need, the enablement we need, the control we need—all that we need for the present.

… We have the adequate resources for the future if Christ is our Savior.

… All worry is basically distrust in the character and might of God. Exercising faith in God is the antidote to worry. Faith is believing that God is good.

… Are you worrying about something coming up ahead: Lack of finances, failing health, loss of a friendship? Keep filling your mind with the truth—God knows all about it. He has all the power to handle it for your good, and because He loves you so, He will.

DEVOTIONAL FROM JESUS CALLING – SARAH YOUNG

Water In Dry Land

O God, You are my God; Early will I seek You; My soul thirsts for You; My flesh longs for You In a dry and thirsty land Where there is no water.  – PSALM 63 : 1 (NKJV)

As you get out of bed in the morning, be aware of My Presence with you. You may not be thinking clearly yet, but I am. Your early morning thoughts tend to be anxious ones until you get connected with Me. Invite Me into your thoughts by whispering My Name. Suddenly your day brightens and feels more user-friendly. You cannot dread a day that is vibrant with My Presence.

You gain confidence through knowing that I am with you— that you face nothing alone. Anxiety stems from asking the wrong question: “If such and such happens, can I handle it?” The true question is not whether you can cope with whatever happens, but whether you and I together can handle anything that occurs. It is this you-and-I-together factor that gives you confidence to face the day cheerfully.

Matthew 6:25-34

Do Not Worry

²⁵ “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? ²⁶ Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? ²⁷ Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life^[e]?

²⁸ “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. ²⁹ Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. ³⁰ If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? ³¹ So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ ³² For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. ³³ But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. ³⁴ Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

Psalm 63

¹ You, God, are my God,     earnestly I seek you; I thirst for you,     my whole being longs for you, in a dry and parched land     where there is no water.

² I have seen you in the sanctuary     and beheld your power and your glory. ³ Because your love is better than life,     my lips will glorify you. ⁴ I will praise you as long as I live,     and in your name I will lift up my hands. ⁵ I will be fully satisfied as with the richest of foods;     with singing lips my mouth will praise you.

⁶ On my bed I remember you;     I think of you through the watches of the night. ⁷ Because you are my help,     I sing in the shadow of your wings. ⁸ I cling to you;     your right hand upholds me.

⁹ Those who want to kill me will be destroyed;     they will go down to the depths of the earth. ¹⁰ They will be given over to the sword     and become food for jackals.

¹¹ But the king will rejoice in God;     all who swear by God will glory in him,     while the mouths of liars will be silenced.

DEVOTIONAL FROM MY UTMOST FOR HIS HIGHEST – OSWALD CHAMBERS

Our Careful Unbelief

. . . do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on —Matthew 6:25

Jesus summed up commonsense carefulness in the life of a disciple as unbelief. If we have received the Spirit of God, He will squeeze right through our lives, as if to ask, “Now where do I come into this relationship, this vacation you have planned, or these new books you want to read?” And He always presses the point until we learn to make Him our first consideration. Whenever we put other things first, there is confusion.

“. . . do not worry about your life . . . .” Don’t take the pressure of your provision upon yourself. It is not only wrong to worry, it is unbelief; worrying means we do not believe that God can look after the practical details of our lives, and it is never anything but those details that worry us. Have you ever noticed what Jesus said would choke the Word He puts in us? Is it the devil? No— “the cares of this world” (Matthew 13:22). It is always our little worries. We say, “I will not trust when I cannot see”— and that is where unbelief begins. The only cure for unbelief is obedience to the Spirit.

The greatest word of Jesus to His disciples is abandon.