Personal Devotions
Notes from Mark's personal Bible reading and meditation
With a goal to apply one truth from each day's reading to my life that day
Jan 31, 2023, 6:59 AM
Passage Read: 2 Kings 4-7
Meditation Verse: 4:7
Thought
It is a hard thing to get into debt, because it is hard to get out of it. This prophet had felt compelled to go into enough debt that his sons were going to be taken as slaves to pay it off. Yet God was gracious to the widow and provided means to pay off the debt in a miraculous way. I'm in significantly more debt than I want to be in today, while I would love a miracle to pay off my debt, I have the means to take extra work to pay it down.
Jan 30, 2023, 7:00 AM
Passage Read: 1 Kings 22 - 2 Kings 3
Meditation Verses: 2 Kings 1:9-10
Thought
This is probably what James and John were thinking of when the Samaritan town refused Jesus passage and they wanted to call down fire on them. Elijah twice called down fire that consumed a captain and his fifty men. Elisha would soon curse some youths for mocking him, and a bear would maul 42 of them. There is a power available to us that can strike fear into the rebellious. Jesus refused James and John, but they rightly asked Him first.
Jan 29, 2023, 6:45 AM
Passage Read: 1 Kings 18-21
Meditation Verse: 20:28
Thought
Elijah succeeds against the prophets of Baal, then twice the Lord gives Israel success over the Arameans, all to show Ahab that the Lord is God. Yet Ahab makes no changes. Three significant miracles and Ahab continues in his sin. Miracles won't necessarily convince a man that the Lord is God. God must open their heart to believe, and he can do that without miraculous signs. So the signs serve as much as a testimony against all those who refuse to believe.
Jan 28, 2023, 6:47 AM
Passage Read: 1 Kings 14-17
Meditation Verses: 15:3-4
Thought
The Lord is gracious even to sinners, but it is usually not because of them, but because of a promise He made to a previous generation. Indeed, His loyalty to Israel is not so much because of Israel's faithfulness, but because of God's promise to Abraham. The only reason they survive despite their sin is because of God's loyalty to Abraham and the promise He gave him. Yet because of that, future generations who are less than faithful don't understand that the good they enjoy, like the strength of Jerusalem, is not because of them, but because of their forefather.
Jan 27, 2023, 6:48 AM
Passage Read: 1 Kings 10-13
Meditation Verses: 13:16-18
Thought
How easy it is to doubt a word of God, especially when it makes my life a little inconvenient or uncomfortable. Scripture doesn't say how long the journey was for this prophet from Judah, but he was commanded not to eat in Israel, to prophesy against the Jeroboam's altar, then return without food or drink. He was on foot and didn't make it very far on his way home before the second prophet caught up with him.
Jan 26, 2023, 6:49 AM
Passage Read: 1 Kings 6-9
Meditation Verses: 8:38-42
Thought
Whenever trouble comes and people pray to the Lord for deliverance, each man knowing his own heart and his own afflictions, then may the Lord forgive and deal with each one according to his deeds, that each man may fear the Lord all the time. Then foreigners will hear and come and pray to the Lord as well, so that all the peoples of the earth may know the Lord and fear Him.
Jan 25, 2023, 6:51 AM
Passage Read: 1 Kings 2-5
Meditation Verse: 2:40
Thought
Shimei had agreed to the terms to never again leave Jerusalem, but perhaps after three years he'd forgotten why he always remained in Jerusalem. Or maybe he thought just one little trip to fetch his runaway slaves would be all right. Jerusalem was a walled city with gates and surely guards at the gates, and those guards probably had standing orders to watch for Shimei. Evidently no one warned Shimei that he was about to violate the king's command.
Jan 24, 2023, 6:04 PM
Passage Read: 2 Samuel 22 - 1 Kings 1
Meditation Verse: 2 Samuel 24:16
Thought
What provoked the Lord to punish Israel like this, so much that even He was grieved over the calamity? In spite of David's leadership, many of the people must've continued to worship other gods, or else they were not diligent to love their neighbor as themselves. Were they so prosperous that they loved the things of the world too much, forgetting the Lord and thinking they had acquired all their wealth by their own strength?
Jan 23, 2023, 6:13 PM
Passage Read: 2 Samuel 18-21
Meditation Verses: 19:7-8
Thought
David was overwhelmed with grief over Absalom's death; his rebellion and death were two more consequences of David's sin against Uriah. How discouraged he must have been! How ready to give up and be done with everything. But at Joab's insistence, he pulled himself together and honored his troops. As much as he wanted to let go, he understood that he was not his own, but had responsibilities to his troops and to his nation.
Jan 22, 2023, 6:15 PM
Passage Read: 2 Samuel 14-17
Meditation Verses: 16:11-12
Thought
David's humility and faith are remarkable. He is willing to be cursed, because he knows his own sin has brought about these circumstances. He is willing to suffer whatever consequences the Lord determines for Him, trusting that if any consequences goes too far, the Lord may turn and have mercy on him, even repaying good to him for the cursing he received.