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 7, 2025, 6:52 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 15-18
Meditation Verses: 17:2-4
Thought
There are times when those who love the Lord enjoy complete victory over their enemies and other times when they endure the attacks of their enemies. Perhaps it is prayers like this that turn the tide in the favor of the Lord's people. David fled for years from Saul, but in time, the Lord placed him on the throne of Israel.
Apr 6, 2025, 6:37 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 11-14
Meditation Verses: 14:6-7
Thought
Evildoers, those who lie at all times, those who oppress them without fear of God, they frustrate the plans of the poor. The poor seek to free themselves of debt, they seek to get ahead, but at every turn, there is someone else who hates them and takes advantage of them.
Apr 5, 2025, 10:27 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 7-10
Meditation Verses: 10:3-11
Thought
The trouble with discerning wickedness is that even the evil man prospers. The Lord promises to bless the righteous with good things and by prospering all he does. But if the wicked also enjoys prosperity and gets away with all kinds of evil, how can people see that it is bad to be evil?
Apr 4, 2025, 5:02 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 3-6
Meditation Verse: 5:8
Thought
It is because of his enemies that the psalmist cries out to the Lord. Not just for help against them, but for guidance, for clarity regarding the Lord's will and ways. He needs to know what the Lord desires as righteousness, because his enemies are seeking to attack him in one way or another. They want to ridicule and mock him, shame and belittle him.
Apr 3, 2025, 6:43 AM
Passage Read: Job 41 - Psalm 2
Meditation Verses: Psalm 2:9-12
Thought
The Lord has appointed Jesus to rule the nations, and He will rule them with an iron scepter and dash then to pieces. This doesn't seem like the Jesus we talk about in church. The palmist warns the kings of the earth to be wise and be warned: They had better serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling; they had better kiss the Son, bowing the knee in obedience and fealty.
May 8, 2024, 7:11 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 148 - Proverbs 1
Meditation Verse: Psalm 149:4
Thought
That's a twist! The Lord honors His afflicted people with salvation, so His godly ones can rejoice on their beds. Why on their beds? Does he mean morning and evening or are they crippled or utterly exhausted? But then it turns in an unexpected direction: Let the high praise of God be in their mouth and a two-edged sword in their hands, because they will get to execute judgment on the earth!
May 7, 2024, 7:21 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 144-147
Meditation Verses: 147:19-20
Thought
The Lord taught Israel about Himself. He chose Israel to teach of His ways. There was no other nation that received such a gift. And it should be seen as a privilege, one not to be wasted. God didn't speak to the Israelites in order that they would put His book in a glass case and marvel that He spoke to them. He spoke to them that they might diligently read and obey what He had revealed, so that they would know Him as He truly is, and learn to be His people, people who live and walk like He walks.
May 6, 2024, 7:22 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 140-143
Meditation Verse: 140:8
Thought
This is a good prayer, that the Lord keep the arrogant from succeeding, and so further inflate his ego. But it is the Lord's will that the wicked man, whom He has rejected, fill up the measure of their judgment. If the wicked did not grow in confidence and arrogance, he might become humbled enough so as to repent! God is willing for the rejected man to grow in his arrogance and rebellion, to think that he is so great and to have others praise him, so that God is proved right when He overthrows that man.
May 5, 2024, 7:23 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 136-139
Meditation Verses: 139:19-22
Thought
There are those who speak against God wickedly. There are those who take His name in vain. There are those who truly hate the Lord and rise up against Him. Not all hatred is the same: Some is active and outright, some is subtle but determined. Not all taking of the Lord's name is the same: Some is blatant disregard for His holiness, some is claiming to believe but living in disbelief. Without Christ, our natural state is to be at war with God, some outright and violent, some merely ignoring God and going their own way, but all are at enmity toward God.
May 4, 2024, 7:25 AM
Passage Read: Psalm 132-135
Meditation Verses: 135:5-10
Thought
Our God is greater than all gods. There is no one like the Lord. He rules over the affairs of men. He does whatever He pleases on the earth. The world and everything in it belongs to the Lord; they are all His to do with as He pleases; all of it owes Him honor, glory and obedience. So He will slay the wicked when He chooses. He will give one man's land to another because the former rejects Him but the latter He has chosen to bless.