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
Nov 20, 2025, 6:55 AM
Passage Read: Hebrews 13 - James 1
Meditation Verse: Hebrews 13:4
Thought
It's interesting that this instruction is addressed to everyone, which would include the married and the unmarried. Marriage is to be honored by all, and if it isn't, that means there is some kind of adultery or sexual immorality practiced or permitted by those who fail to honor it. For the married to dishonor marriage means they're willing to commit or have committed adultery.
Nov 19, 2025, 6:53 AM
Passage Read: Hebrews 11-12
Meditation Verse: 12:15
Thought
The writer here gives many things to watch out for, to "be sure that no one...." Two of them are missing the grace of God and allowing a root of bitterness to spring up. Missing the grace of God is behind all of these warnings, because it is the grace of God that allows us to endure and accept difficulties and trials, and it is the grace of God that enables and empowers us to do all things righteously.
Nov 18, 2025, 10:51 AM
Passage Read: Hebrews 9-10
Meditation Verses: 10:32-36
Thought
This is what the writer is referring to when he earlier told them that they need to hold to the confidence they had at first to be sure they have come to share in Christ! It was not just a sure feeling that the Gospel was true, but they believed so firmly that they held fast to faith in Christ in the midst of suffering and persecution!
Nov 17, 2025, 9:03 AM
Passage Read: Hebrews 7-8
Meditation Verses: 7:18-19
Thought
Wow! I'm offended by this statement about the Law! I'm more like the palmist who wrote Psalm 119, who praises the beauty of the Law and all its wisdom. But the writer of Hebrews is right in that the Law made nothing perfect, and in that way it was weak and useless. It has value in revealing the character and nature of God, in showing what God calls righteousness.
Nov 16, 2025, 8:36 AM
Passage Read: Hebrews 5-6
Meditation Verses: 6:9-12
Thought
The writer has expressed some disappointment with his audience. They should by now be teachers, clear and confident in the basics of Christ and faith in Him, able to help others, but he finds them still needing milk. He fears he needs to lay again the foundation of the elementary teachings about Christ, repentance, heaven and hell, faith, baptisms and gifts.
Nov 15, 2025, 9:27 AM
Passage Read: Hebrews 3-4
Meditation Verses: 3:12-14
Thought
This is about salvation and eternal condemnation. Those who share in Christ are those who hold firmly to the end their confidence in the Gospel, in God, in God's Word and ways. They are the ones whose confidence leads them to fear the Lord and listen to His voice to do as He commands. The ones who perish, who are eternally condemned, are those who do not fear God and correct their ways.
Nov 14, 2025, 7:18 AM
Passage Read: Hebrews 1-2
Meditation Verse: 2:10
Thought
It was fitting, says the writer of Hebrews, that God made Jesus perfect through suffering. How was it fitting? How are the two connected, bringing many sons to glory and perfecting Jesus through suffering? So it is not just that suffering is the path to glory, but bringing others to glory is also through suffering!
Nov 9, 2024, 8:09 AM
Passage Read: Hebrews 11-12
Meditation Verses: 11:1-2
Thought
By faith, the men of old gained approval. By faith, believing God, they not only adjusted their thinking, but changed their lives, their behavior, attempted impossible things and succeeded. Because they believed God when He spoke and did what He asked. They believed that He was God and had authority to command them and to fulfill what He promised--even when they did not see those promises fulfilled in their own lifetimes!
Nov 8, 2024, 8:11 AM
Passage Read: Hebrews 9-10
Meditation Verses: 10:26-31
Thought
A few verses earlier, the author reminds us that we have had our consciences sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. We have been made holy by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ once for all. We have been remade in order to walk in the righteousness that God always desired from mankind. We have nothing to keep us from doing so, but our own old willfulness.
Nov 7, 2024, 8:12 AM
Passage Read: Hebrews 7-8
Meditation Verses: 8:9-11
Thought
The Old Covenant was given with fire and smoke and earthquake and the sound of a trumpet. Very impressive and frightening, to impress God's Words onto the hearts of the people, to impress His greatness into their hearts. God was very near to them as they traveled between Egypt and Canaan, but still they did not honor or obey Him. And once they entered the promised land, they sometimes did better, but gradually became worse, until the Lord eventually drove them out of the land.