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 6, 2025, 6:37 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? The righteous are often victims of the wicked, and the wicked get away with it for a whole lifetime.
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.
Apr 2, 2025, 7:01 AM
Passage Read: Job 37-40
Meditation Verses: 38:1-4
Thought
Knowing all He allowed to happen to Job, knowing how righteous Job has been, God still comes in like a flood! He is not soft and gentle. He is not compassionate and understanding. He blasts Job with question after question, illustrating how much greater God is than even the most righteous of men. It is sad that in all Job's understanding, he did not realize that we exist to honor and glorify God, in whatever circumstances that come upon us.
Apr 1, 2025, 7:12 AM
Passage Read: Job 33-36
Meditation Verses: 33:29-30
Thought
Elihu believes he can explain to Job exactly what is going on, and where Job is wrong. He believes he can do so better than Job's three friends, men older and wiser than him, who failed to bring Job to repentance. His argument is that God warns men all the time of their sin and need for repentance. Perhaps in a dream or in a quiet voice in the heart or through trial and suffering. So the terrible things that have happened to Job are obviously God's way of telling him he needs to repent.
Mar 31, 2025, 6:56 AM
Passage Read: Job 29-32
Meditation Verse: 31:23
Thought
The fear of God was so great and so real to Job, that's what kept him from doing evil of any sort. He dreaded the destruction God could bring, and the ultimate destruction of eternal torment. He knew enough of the splendor of God that He feared to rouse the Lord against himself. The greatness and glory of God struck Job with fear and dread that kept him from doing evil and drove him to do what was right.
Mar 30, 2025, 7:15 AM
Passage Read: Job 25-28
Meditation Verses: 27:2-6
Thought
Job understands that the fear of the Lord is wisdom and shunning evil is understanding. He understands that better than most. What many pay lip service to, Job has lived out. Such that he declares here that he will never admit he has sinned, as his friends accuse. He will never lie, even if he thought it would turn the hand of God away from him. He has done everything right, to the best of his understanding of what God desires. He has feared the Lord and shunned evil.
Mar 28, 2025, 6:55 AM
Passage Read: Job 21-24
Meditation Verse: 24:1
Thought
This is a good question. If God had regular days of holding court and hearing cases, the world would be a different place. The wicked would be regularly rebuked, punished, perhaps even destroyed. Who would dare to do wrong? It even causes me a bit of fear to think about such a thing. Would I go unpunished?
Mar 27, 2025, 7:04 AM
Passage Read: Job 17-20
Meditation Verses: 19:28-29
Thought
Perhaps in many cases, the root of trouble that comes upon us is our own sin. Of course, if we believe that evil only befalls the wicked, then there is no reason to think otherwise! And if we believe that men cannot stop sinning, then there is always cause to look within for the reason for suffering. But what if the reason for a man's suffering is his righteousness? What if things have gone sideways in his life because Satan has received permission to sift him like wheat and see how he fares?