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Day 6 - Friday | Daily Devotions | Connect the Testaments | Morning and Evening: Daily Reading | My Utmost for His Highest | Thoughts for the Quiet Hour |

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  May 15: Small Starts 1 Chronicles 2:1–55; 1 Timothy 3:1–7 ; Psalm 75:1–76:12 In Paul’s qualifications for overseers, he mentions a necessary trait for anyone who wants to lead in a community: “He must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive, for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God’s church?” (1 Tim 3:4–5). Though Paul speaks to overseers, his words tell us something about our own witness. Living like Christ, showing grace, and acting with wisdom toward the people who are closest to us are often more difficult than serving on a larger scale. It’s more challenging to serve those who know our failings than it is to serve anyone else. By learning to be faithful in these relationships—by serving unselfishly and with dignity—we prove ourselves capable of serving others. Paul understands that humility and love must be practiced at home before they can be adequately practiced in the community. By e...
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Day 5 - Thursday | Daily Devotions | Connect the Testaments | Morning and Evening: Daily Reading | My Utmost for His Highest | Thoughts For the Quiet Hour |

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  May 14: A Sense of History 1 Chronicles 1:1–54 ; 1 Timothy 2:1–15; Psalm 74:1–23 When I was in sixth grade, my teacher assigned our class a family genealogy and history project. At first it was frustrating. It seemed like unnecessary work. But eventually I became obsessive over it as I discovered our family stories. Many of us share this same experience; we’ve uncovered ancestors who have done great things. Through this process, we can begin to understand not just these people of history, but also ourselves. Although we may be especially interested in our own family history, who doesn’t skip (or at least think about skipping) the genealogies of the Bible? Even if we’re serious about reading biblical books front to back, we prefer to skip over the long lists of names. But that would be a mistake in the case of 1 Chr 1:1–54. This genealogy is about human history leading up to a monumental person: King David. The lineage also makes the book of Ruth incredibly relevant: Boaz, Ruth...
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Day 3- Wednesday | Daily Devotions | Connect the Testaments | Daily and Weekend: Daily Reading | My Utmost for His Highest | Thoughts for the Quiet Hour |

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  May 13: Shipwrecked Ruth 3:1–4:22; 1 Timothy 1:12–20 ; Psalm 73:11–28 “I am setting before you this instruction, Timothy my child, in accordance with the prophecies spoken long ago about you, in order that by them you may fight the good fight, having faith and a good conscience, which some, because they have rejected these, have suffered shipwreck concerning their faith” (1 Tim 1:18–19). Paul had experienced being shipwrecked multiple times in his life, and in this passage, he metaphorically ascribes his experience to that of people who turn from faith in Christ. The imagery of being shipwrecked captures the spiritual state of aimlessness that results from a misguided conscience—one that isn’t grounded in faith. Among those who experienced this shipwreck were Hymenaeus and Alexander, former believers who became blasphemers. They had known the truth of Jesus but were now publicly opposing it (1 Tim 1:20). Paul admits he had once been a blasphemer himself, but he was “shown mer...
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Day 3 - Tuesday | Daily Devotions | Connect the Testaments: Morning and Evening | My Utmost for His Highest | Thoughts for the Quiet Hour |

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  May 12: The Bible in the Developed World Ruth 1:1–2:23 ; 1 Timothy 1:1–11; Psalm 73:1–10 In our developed world, we don’t often think about famines. If there were a famine in our lands, we could navigate through it because of our importing infrastructure. This isn’t the case for the developing world: famines mean walking miles to find food and water, and often dying or suffering terrible violence just to stay alive. (Currently, there are two major famines in Africa bringing these desperate situations to life.) When I used to read about famines in the Bible, I thought of hunger, but I didn’t necessarily think of pain and persecution. Now that I’m more aware of what’s happening in the world, stories of famine in the Bible are very vivid for me. Consider Naomi, whose husband died during a famine, and the pain she must have felt over that loss and the loss of her two sons (Ruth 1:1–7). She was left with her daughters-in-law. As widows, they were completely desolate. Women were con...
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