Christian Devotionals and Scripture Applied to Everyday Life

In 1956 Johnny Cash wrote and recorded the song I Walk the Line. The famous lyrics express the determination of a previous womanizer, to remain faithful to his true love.

Everyone has down days. You know, the kind of day when nothing goes right. First thing in the morning you stub your toe on the shoes you kicked off by the side of the bed the night before. Then you find out the milk is sour after you already poured it on your cereal. As you run out the door to rush to an important meeting you remember your car is low on gas. These and many other more distressing occurrences can sometimes cause feelings of defeat or failure that follow us through the day. But isn’t it interesting that these “down days” are often softened by a single word of encouragement.

Leadership is a highly sought after position. We dream about it, spend hours preparing for it, and train our children to achieve it. Often we ruthlessly push our way forward, trampling anyone who gets in our way. Recently Abigail observed that many who call themselves leaders are really just bossy individuals who like to be up front and in charge. So what really makes a good leader anyway?

Even the sound of this word creates an unmistakable twinge in the pit of my stomach. It is a feeling I have felt many times over the years and one that we all have to deal with from time to time. As a child the feeling would sometimes come over me when I visited the ocean or a large lake. Looking out over the wide expanse my eye would catch a colorful buoy bobbing up and down in the water. Though I knew it was an inanimate object, something about it looked so small and lonesome bouncing around in an unforgiving sea.

I saw it crouched on the bike path just a few yards ahead of us. The fluffy baby bunny sat still as a statue with not even a twitch. Closer and closer we came and still not even a bat of the eye. I speculated this little guy imagined he was protected and hidden even though he was out in open view.

When it comes to sharing God’s story of salvation, you will run across different kinds of people. Exposing the truth that all men are sinners and deserve God’s punishment will inevitably cause some to object. These objectors will often state that they are good people who follow the laws of the land, try to be upstanding citizens, and treat others how they themselves would like to be treated. They may not feel they need God’s amazing grace.