Daily Bible Verse and Devotion – Ruth 1:16

Do you ever struggle with trying to make people happy? Maybe you even make decisions based on how others feel rather than what you really want to do. The pull to please people can be very real.

And it’s true that as Christians, we shouldn’t be going out of our way to make people mad. However, if we live our whole lives only pleasing others, then we’ve missed the point. We should be living for God. His desires should be our desires, and we should be living to please Him.

But Ruth replied, “Don’t ask me to leave you and turn back. Wherever you go, I will go; wherever you live, I will live. Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God. – Ruth 1:16 (NLT)

Ruth was determined to live for God and for God’s desires. She didn’t go back to her family and her country. Instead, she chose to make pleasing God her priority.

Like Ruth, we should be determined to live for God. Even if it means that we’re not making everyone happy. God should be the one we’re living to please, and it’s His approval we should seek each day.

Today’s Truth: Live to Please God

Live to Please God

Daily Bible Verse and Devotion-Proverbs 3-5

Trust the Lord completely, and don’t depend on your own knowledge. – Proverbs 3:5 (ERV)

You make tons of decisions everyday. You decide what to eat, what to wear, who you’re going to talk to at school, whether you do your homework or not and the list goes on.

Many times, its easy to simply not include God in the decisions you make. Its not like you don’t care about God, its just that its easy to get busy and distracted and forget how important it is to get God’s advice on things.

To really be a success in life, it requires complete trust in God. You’ve got to trust God’s plan for your life and that it is good. You’ve got to trust that God will bring it to pass in your life. This isn’t always easy, but it will set you up for success in the long run.

So today, choose to include God and get His wisdom when you’re making your decisions, you’ll find you’ll be at more peace as you do.

Daily Bible Verse and Devotion – Matthew 5:6

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled – Matthew 5:6

Can you think of a time when you were really hungry? What did hunger make you act like?

Usually, hunger drives you to do something about it. It could make you run to the fridge and get food, or go to the store to buy something to eat. If you’re hungry, you do something about it.

Today’s Bible verse talks about hungering and thirsting for righteousness. A hunger for righteousness should cause you to do something. If you’re hungry for righteousness, you’ll act differently and speak differently. It will change how you live and the decisions that you make.

A hunger for righteousness is something that others can see.

As a Christian, you should be developing a hunger for the things of God. You should be wanting to spend time in the Bible and in prayer. If you don’t, you may need to reevaluate what is important in your life.

Just like hunger for food makes you act, hunger for God should make you act. You should be desiring to get to know God better. Time spent getting to know God is never wasted.

Today’s Truth: Time spent getting to know God is never wasted.

Daily Bible Verse and Devotion – James 1:2

Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles of any kind come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. – James 1:2 (NLT)

Does this verse strike you as being a little crazy? It’s telling us when troubles come our way to consider it an opportunity for joy. That seems crazy. Who gets joy out of troubles?

Today’s verse is telling us that when troubles come we have an opportunity to grow. We can learn from them and become more like Jesus.

Maybe this year has been a tough one for you. Life sometimes can be really difficult and full of storms sometimes.

The thing is in the middle of troubles we can rely on God’s Holy Spirit. The Bible tells us that one of the Holy Spirit’s jobs is to comfort us. So even when we’re pressed and faced with difficulty, we can look to the Holy Spirit for comfort.

We can get through the troubles we’re going through right now and come out stronger and more reliant on God. So today, if you’ve allowed the troubles around you to cause you to doubt God’s faithfulness, know this: God will not leave you in trouble without help.

He will walk with you, lead you and guide you through this all. You will come out of this stronger than before.

Daily Bible Verse and Devotion – Psalm 1:1

Blessed is the one
    who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
    or sit in the company of mockers – Psalm 1:1 (NIV)

Today’s verse talks about how we’re blessed when we don’t walk in step with the wicked. It can be easy to read over that verse and not really think about it. But let’s take a look at it a little bit. A person is blessed when he or she doesn’t walk in step with the wicked.

What does it mean to walk in step with someone? Maybe it could mean that you’re going in the same direction or on the same path as them. It could mean that if everyone on your football team at school is bullying a student, that you join in too, simply to avoid looking strange for not doing that.

We are blessed when we choose to stand up for what’s right and say no to things that are wrong. And while it’s not easy to do that, God always sees to it that we’re blessed when we do. You can be blessed simply by not having to go through the tough things that those who choose to go against God do.

You’re blessed as you follow after God and follow after what the Bible says. It brings peace and contentment into your life like nothing else can. Even though it isn’t always popular, following after God really does bring blessing. As you do things God’s way, love Him and follow after Him it makes life easier and keeps you from some of the heartbreak that the world brings.

So today, choose to follow after God. Choose to make Him first in your life. Even when it seems like everyone is going on a different path, choose to follow God. In the end, you’ll be at peace as you follow after Him.

Daily Bible Verse and Devotional – John 10:4

Daily Devotional and Bible Verse – John 10:4 (NLT)

After he has gathered his own flock, he walks ahead of them, and they follow him because they know his voice.

When a baby is born, it already knows the voice of it’s mother. In a similar way when you believe on Jesus as your Savior the Bible says you’re born into the kingdom of God. As a child of God, you know the voice of the Father God.

Your Father God loves you, and wants to speak to you, and for you to love hearing His voice.

The truth is, you belong to God’s flock and you know the voice of your Savior. So begin to listen for His instructions. He’s going ahead of you and showing you on which way to go. Learn to trust His voice and step out when He tells you to do something. When you do, you’ll see that He’s gone ahead of you and is making a way for you. So begin today by expecting to hear God’s voice in your life.

Today’s Truth: Begin listening to God’s instructions. He wants to show you which way to go.

So today encourage yourself. You can know the voice of God. You can follow what He is leading you to do and you can trust that He will lead you into good things for your life.

Daily Bible Verse and Devotion – 1 Cor 1:18

Teen Devotion and Bible Verse on 1 cor 1:18

The teaching about the cross seems foolish to those who are lost. But to us who are being saved it is the power of God. 1 Corinthians 1:18 (ERV)

When you’re talking to your friends, have you ever felt like others didn’t understand your relationship with God? Did you ever feel out of place or wondered why Jesus just doesn’t seem to make sense to others when it makes perfect sense to you?

There is a reason. Today’s Bible verse says that the “Cross” or the teaching of Jesus seems foolish to those who do not know Him yet. Why is this? It’s because the message of Jesus only makes sense when it’s mixed with faith.

When you hear about Jesus and all that He did and you mix it with faith, it begins to make sense. Christianity completely centers off of this event. The cross completely changed everything and showed all of God’s power.

Everything you need past, present, and future stems from what Jesus did through the Cross. If you’re anxious the cross handles that. If you deal with fear, the cross handles that. Whatever you face, the cross handles it.

This doesn’t mean that you don’t need to share Jesus with others, however. They may not get it, but there is a chance that they could hear the message and choose to believe it as you did. So keep sharing with others and believe that they’ll have an opportunity to be changed by the message of the cross just like you.

Daily Bible Verse and Devotion – Job 39:1

“Do you know when the mountain goats give birth?
    Do you watch when the doe bears her fawn? – Job 39:1 (NIV)

How often do we need answers from God, and yet we forget to go to Him? Have you ever spent time thinking about the fact that God made our world? Not just in the mental consent way, like, yeah, I read Genesis, so yep, God made the world. But have you ever stopped to think about what that actually means?

If God made the world, then that means that any question we have about science and the world around us can be found in Him. So when we don’t understand a concept in science, we could ask God for help. When we don’t get why something works the way it does, we can go to God for help.

Isn’t that an amazing idea? How many questions are left unanswered simply because we forget to ask God? If God really created our world, then every answer about our physical world can be found in our relationship with Him. So when you don’t get why something works how it does, when you wonder about why a bug acts the way it does, why not go to God first?

Why not ask Him about the things that He created? What powerful answers might be available to us, and yet we never ask the questions?

So today, challenge yourself. Realize that if God made the world as He said He did, then He has answers for our questions about the physical world around us. We can go to Him and ask Him about a bug, tree, or any created thing and He wants to teach us.

That’s what today’s verse is saying. It’s saying that God knows when the mountain goat gives birth. He knows where she does too. And if He knows that, what else can we ask Him about? How much knowledge do we not have simply because we never asked the creator?

Daily Bible Verse and Devotion – Lamentations 3:24

I say, “The LORD is my portion, therefore I will put my hope in him.” – Lamentations 3:24 (CSB)

Where you put your hope says a lot about what’s important to you. Perhaps you put your hope in popularity or in your ability to get good grades to get a scholarship to college. Maybe your hope is in your musical skills and that one day you’ll make it big.

Today’s Truth: Where you put your hope says a lot about what’s important to you

There are so many different places to put our hope in. It’s almost easy to forget about putting our hope in God. It’s easy to get so wrapped up in the concerns of life that we forget that God is where our hope should be.

Jesus should be where we are placing our hope. When life gets tough and things aren’t going the way we think they should, having hope in Jesus will help you get through. So take some time today and get real with yourself. Ask yourself where are you putting your hope? Is it in Jesus? Or have you taken your eyes off Jesus and put your hope in something else?

If you realize that you’ve begun to put your hope in something other than Jesus, choose today to put your hope back in Him. Choose to live a life fully devoted to Him.

Daily Bible Verse and Devotion – Matthew 11:28

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. – Matthew 11:28 (NIV)

Life can be crazy and stressful. From navigating relationships, to studying for tests, and even trying to find time to spend with God, life can fee really stressful. However, even in the middle of all the fear and stress in the world, Jesus promises to give us rest. Jesus can be our place of peace in the midst of all the bad things going on around us.

The key is, we have to choose to walk in His peace and His rest each day. That means we have to remind ourselves of how good God is and how much He loves us.

Today’s Truth: We stay at peace when we remind ourselves of how good God is.

God has provided us with everything we need, it’s just up to us to walk in that and live in what He provided us.

So today, if you’ve given into fear and stress about what’s going on around you, choose to look to Jesus. Let Him give you the rest and the peace you crave!