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
Apr 30, 2026, 8:31 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 79-82
Meditation Verses: 79:4-6
Thought
God is primarily concerned about the godliness of His own people, so we get disciplined for things that the nations do without hesitation! The nations can do all kinds of evil and God does little or nothing about it. Because they are not His people. They don't represent Him.
Apr 29, 2026, 7:16 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 75-78
Meditation Verses: 75:4-7
Thought
How easy it is to think we are something when we are in fact nothing. It's easy to be impressed by ourselves or others when we only look among men. That one seems great. Another one seems wise. This one is mighty. That one is clever. When we compare man with man, it is easy to become prideful and boast in this one or that one or even in ourselves.
Apr 28, 2026, 9:13 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 71-74
Meditation Verse: 71:20
Thought
This is the confidence of Job and of every believer. Though the Lord makes us see many troubles and distresses, yet He will revive us again and bring us up from the depths of the grave. This life has its fill of trouble and distress, especially the more we seek and serve the Lord. He does allow us to suffer many hardships.
Apr 27, 2026, 8:36 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 67-70
Meditation Verses: 69:6-9
Thought
This is David's own experience, yet it also fits Jesus. David's enemies were many, and they had no real cause, but what they accused David of stuck more than the truth, so that even what he did not steal, he had to restore. He was not without fault; God knows all his failings.
Apr 26, 2026, 8:19 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 63-66
Meditation Verses: 66:1-4
Thought
In this call to praise God, there is this interesting revelation, that because of God's great power, His enemies will give "feigned obedience." The psalmist calls on all those who love the Lord to sing joyfully to Him, to sing of His glory, to declare how awesome are His works, and to sing that all the earth will worship and praise Him!
Apr 25, 2026, 8:01 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 59-62
Meditation Verses: 62:9-12
Thought
Great men and small, all together are nothing. Success is not with the learned or exalted, nor is it with the small and crafty. Success lies with the Lord. Only He has power to make what is impossible possible, what is unseen seen. Only He has power to make something from nothing. My hope must not be in men, but in God.
Apr 24, 2026, 6:54 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 55-58
Meditation Verses: 56:5-7
Thought
In all these psalms where David recounts the cruelty of his enemies, he never turns and attacks them, but calls out to God to deliver him. They publicly humiliate and attack him, but his response is not to fight fire with fire, but to turn to the Lord to save him from those who have made themselves his enemies.
Apr 23, 2026, 8:02 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 51-54
Meditation Verses: 52:5-7
Thought
The righteous are "weak" before the wicked, they are meek because they trust in the Lord to fight for them. Righteousness does good to those around it; wickedness does whatever it wants because it thinks it can get away with it. Wickedness does not care for the needs or wishes of those around it; it cares only about itself, exalting itself and displaying its power.
Apr 22, 2026, 7:05 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 47-50
Meditation Verses: 50:16-17
Thought
The wicked are not just those who know nothing and care nothing about the Lord, but there is also a kind of wicked man who knows the Law and the promises of God well enough to tell them to others. They use them to rebuke others, to teach others, to appear spiritual, but they do not do them.
Apr 21, 2026, 7:18 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 43-46
Meditation Verses: 44:17-19
Thought
How often it has been that those who follow after the Lord faithfully suffer for it! It is not always the case, but it seems to be more often than not. The psalmist here is aware of no fault, no error that they have committed, yet it seems the Lord has abandoned them. They suffer at the hands of their enemies, but they do not believe they have done wrong.