24 Feb 2026c
May we not be counted amongst the wicked, amongst those who do not fear God. May we choose to be on God’s side and to live for Him. May the words of our mouth and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable to God. Psalm 14:1-7.
23 Feb 2026
In 2 Kings 9:14-37, 2 prophecies that God had made concerning Joram and Jezebel come to pass. This goes to show the greatness of God and the power of His word. May the Lord grant us peace and may we fear Him enough to obey Him.
26 Feb 2026
With God’s help, let us avoid what would lead us into sin and do what His word prescribes. Let us flee like Joseph if we have to and avoid moral filth as James 1:19-25 states. May we strive to avoid anger and evil and meditate on God’s word which can save us.
Once for Him, Once for Us!
‘Jesus is my beloved Son. What he says not only pleases me, but it is my fullest truth.’ My heart filled with joy as I ended our long-distance video chat. Zach and Sarah (not their real names, but they are real people) told me about an upcoming conference for church leaders they were hosting in southern Asia. “Just remember to be tender with each other,” I told them. Their quizzical and surprised expressions suggested they were either confused, embarrassed or misunderstood. I quickly clarified. “You remember how tender the Father was with Jesus after his baptism,” I reminded them. They quickly responded by quoting the Father’s words to his Son at his baptism: This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased (Matthew 3:17). I tried to explain to them the importance I see in the Father’s tender words. I emphasized that as a couple newly married, they need to follow God’s example. The Father affirmed his relationship, love, and pleasure in his Son. “Remember the words we hear almost immediately from Satan as he sought to tempt the Son? “If you are the Son of God, then…” (Matthew 4:2). Now we don’t know when the evil one will try to drag down our precious loved ones, but we know he will. Like the Father did for Jesus, we can prepare them before Satan attacks them by affirming our relationship, love, and delight in them. Be tender with each other. Make a point to affirm each of these three things at least once each week!” “Those are good words of us; we will try to do just that each week,” Zach said as we concluded our conversation. Sarah smiled knowingly and gently shook her head, yes. This story of the Father’s affirmation is something I have shared many times as I have spoken and written. My wife, Donna, is an excellent affirmation-giver. I learned how to do it from her. I learned the importance of it from what the Father did for his Son! No matter where or how we come to see the power of this simple gift of genuine affirmation, we must recognize how important it was for Jesus as he began his ministry. God declared him his Son. He legitimized his ministry as Son of God and King of Israel. At a very human level, he did it to prepare Jesus for forty days of testing in the wilderness. The first time we hear these words of affirmation in the Bile, they were for Jesus. John the baptizer and others nearby may have heard them, but these words were tenderly given by the Father to the Son, for the Son! The second time these words were spoken, were for us. Peter, James, and John were with Jesus in the mountains. Moses and Elijah appeared in the glory of Jesus’ Transfiguration. Peter and the two other apostles who witnessed this holy moment were quite shaken and amazed. Once again, the Father spoke these words over his Son: This is my Son, whom I love; with him, I am well pleased. Listen to him! (Matthew 17:5). This time, however, the Father’s affirmation wasn’t for Jesus. The Father gave it to the apostles present, but the message was both for them and us! The Father did affirm his relationship with his Son, called the Son his “my beloved” (Matthew 17:5 ESV), and emphasized his delight and pleasure with his Son. However, God had a clear command for all of us who have heard about the Transfiguration: “Listen to him!” It’s as if God is saying: Yes, Moses brought you my truth, the Torah, given on the mountain directly from me. Yes, Elijah was the greatest of prophets who spoke my truth with clarity and power. BUT Jesus is my beloved Son. What he says not only pleases me, but it is my fullest truth. Listen to what his life and words say. Listen to Jesus. Listen to him! The rest of the New Testament echoes what God spoke over his Son on the Mount of Transfiguration. Jesus is God’s ultimate and clearest message; he is God’s word in human flesh, God who lived among us (John 1:1-18). While God spoke in the past through many kinds of messengers and messages, in these last days, he has spoken most definitively, through his Son (Hebrews 1:1-3). Jesus was the truth of God embodied in human flesh, and the apostles were witnesses to the truth: Jesus is the source of everlasting life (1 John 1:1-4). God’s words of affirmation over Jesus were important both times. The first time God spoke them for Jesus. The second time, they were for us. God was pointing us to Jesus. The Father was making clear that as significant as the Bible is, as wonderful as the Law given to Moses was, and as powerful as the words and ministry of Elijah were, Jesus is God’s voice. His words must fill our hearts and define our lives. We must listen to him! When I was barely thirty years old, a university invited me to speak to a group of more than 270 preachers. I was scared to death. Many of those preachers were my heroes. Several were my mentors. Some had been my professors. I felt the Holy Spirit was calling me to do something I was afraid to do. However, I feared that we had lost sight of Jesus in our preaching, writing, and church life. With nervous trepidation, I asked all those preachers to take out their Bibles. (Remember, this was well before cell phones and online Bibles.) Then I urged them to look at the pages of their Bibles and open them to the most worn place, the place where they had spent their time studying and reading the most. Then I asked this one simple question: “If you are in one of the four gospels,[NOTE] please raise your hand.” I waited nervously to see what would happen. Accompanying the
Today’s Verse – Matthew 22:37-39
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. —Matthew 22:37-39 Thoughts on Today’s Verse… Some things are just not complicated to understand. However, that doesn’t mean putting them into practice is easy for me. Jesus was clear in what he said. Living for God can be boiled down to two principles: Loving God with everything I am and have. Loving others and treating them as I would like to be treated. Those principles are certainly not too hard to understand. It’s the living of them that is our challenge. So, let’s not just understand these two principles of love; let’s live them out in our daily lives: Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. … Love your neighbor as yourself. My Prayer… Dear Father, the one true and living God, please accept the work of my hands, the words of my mouth, the moments of my rest, and the love of my heart as my worship to you this day. I pray that these are pleasing and refreshing to you as I seek to live out your two love commands in my life today. In the name of your Son, the LORD Jesus, I pray. Amen. All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House.
24 Feb 2026
Let us therefore depend on the Holy Spirit to make us sensitive to sin. This will hopefully help us avoid it. Sin may have many consequences. We all sin. The believer in Christ has the benefit of His sacrifice on the cross at Calvary as a remedy for sin. May we not readily sin because of that benefit. Romans 3:21-26.
Finding Jesus’ Heart for Ministry: Touch
Without the personal touch, full healing never comes. Touch has always been important to me. As a boy with a touch of ADD – or maybe a lot more than a touch of ADD – I was never good at sitting still. (Some people believe I became a preacher because I had difficulty being still in church during a sermon.) When I was a little boy, my dad would set me on his lap, and I would be still for 5 or 10 minutes at a time. His secret? He would lightly stroke the lines on my hands. His gentle touch would calm me. I would gladly be still, sit quietly, and sometimes go to sleep feeling his loving touch on my hands. This little secret worked on both of my children, who, when restless, would hold their hands up to me and say, “Lines, daddy, lines!” Years later, nothing calms my soul quite like my wife, Donna, gently stroking my back or tousling my hair as I go to sleep. Donna’s gentle and soothing touch reaches all the way down into my soul! I feel loved. I feel safe. I feel relieved of my problems, responsibilities, and deadlines. I fall fast asleep, joyous and unburdened from the world and its pressing demands. Jesus was a toucher. He offered to let his apostles touch his wounds received during his crucifixion to validate his physical resurrection. When you read the stories of his life in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, you see him touch all sorts of people – like a dead little girl to raise her from the dead, a blind man’s eyes, and the dirty, stinky feet of the apostles. He also allowed people to touch him – like a sinful woman of the city and a woman with a flow of blood who pushed through the crowd. John, the beloved disciple, speaks beautifully of Jesus’ ministry of touching and being touched with these words: We want to tell you about the One who was from the beginning. We have seen Him with our own eyes, heard Him with our own ears, and touched Him with our own hands (1 John 1:1).[THEVOICE] Jesus is our tactile Savior. He touched and was touched by the mess of our humanity. He didn’t run away. He didn’t jump up and wash his hands. He stayed. He touched. He felt. He healed. He made whole. He allowed himself to be soiled by the very dust of our existence. Once I realized that Jesus was a toucher, I was totally captured by Mark’s story of Jesus touching a man with leprosy:[TOUCHING] Jesus: It’s time we went somewhere else – the next village, maybe – so I can tell more people the good news about the kingdom of God. After all, that’s the reason I’m here. So He traveled to the next village and the one after that, throughout the region of Galilee, teaching in the synagogues and casting out unclean spirits. A leper walked right up to Jesus, dropped to his knees, and begged Him for help. Leper: If You want to, You can make me clean. Jesus was powerfully moved. He reached out and actually touched the leper. Jesus: I do want to. Be clean. And at that very moment, the disease left him; the leper was cleansed and made whole once again (Mark 1:38-42). I cannot over-emphasize the profound impact this event in Jesus’ ministry had on my heart when I heard it clearly for the first time. Jesus touched the man with leprosy BEFORE he healed him. Jesus did what he was prohibited from doing; he touched a leper. He became unclean. He willingly exposed himself to a man and his illness even though the man was shunned and feared by the crowds because of his illness. Jesus entered into the world of ostracism, brokenness, illness, isolation, and death to rescue a person and make that person fully whole again. Jesus never saw a leper. Instead, he saw a man with leprosy who needed to be loved and healed. He loved this man personally – a man who had been pushed to the brink of survival and isolated to the outskirts of humanity by religious laws. Jesus’s humanity and compassion – placing human need above the religious law – stirs something deep inside me. We see the gospel demonstrated; the truth of God’s grace told beautifully, simply, succinctly, and fully in a single touch. God came to earth in Jesus. Jesus has touched us! Jesus was born as one of us. Jesus lived as one of us. Jesus touched the worst of us and the worst that life throws at us. Jesus now brings us back to God cleansed, whole, and holy (Colossians 1:15-23). The example of Jesus beckons us to join our Lord and Savior in touching the unlovable, the marginalized, the sinful, the forgotten, the isolated, and the sick. We need to ask ourselves each morning, “Who am I going to touch with the grace of Jesus today?” [THEVOICE] For this series, unless otherwise indicated, the Bible verses will come from The Voice translation. The references are also linked to the NIV for comparison.[BACK2POST] [TOUCH] This post is part of a series focused on learning to touch the broken and impact their lives in ways similar to Jesus’ ministry to the man with leprosy (Mark 1:35-45). [BACK2POST] Images complementary of Free Bible Images and The Lumo Project. Finding Jesus’ Heart for Ministry Series: Look Prayer Purpose Touch Raised Proof About the author: Phil Ware has authored 11 years of daily devotionals, including VerseoftheDay.com, read by 500,000 people a day. He works with churches in transition with Interim Ministry Partners and for the past 21+ years, he has been editor and president of HEARTLIGHT Magazine, author of VerseoftheDay.com, God’s Holy Fire (on the Holy Spirit), and aYearwithJesus.com. Phil has also authored four books, daily devotionals on each of the four gospels.
Sawdust and Two-by-Fours
What are we overlooking in ourselves to criticize others? Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in someone else’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say, “Let me take the speck out of your eye,” when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from the other person’s eye (Matthew 7:3-5 TNIV). Firefighters at a fire station in Nagoya City, Japan, are a little embarrassed this week. Seems they’re responsible for burning down a building. Their own firehouse, as a matter of fact. Everyone was out answering multiple alarms, it seems – including the firefighter who was cooking dinner for the rest of the crew. In a hurry to answer the call of duty, he apparently forgot to turn off the stove. Ten trucks from other stations responded to put out the fire. Seiji Hori, spokesperson for the Nagoya City Fire Department, articulated the embarrassment they feel about the incident: “We are an institute that should be in a position to educate people about fire, so we are extremely sorry that such an incident happened.” He added that they might consider ordering out for dinner from now on. In fairness to those firefighters, they’re embarrassed about their mistake. They see the inconsistency. Imagine, though, that they didn’t. What would you think if the next time they went out on a call, they berated a homeowner for using a faulty space heater or burning a candle too close to the curtains or overloading an outlet? What would you say? “Physician, heal thyself?” “Practice what you preach?” You’d see the inconsistency, even if those firefighters didn’t. “Wait, didn’t you burn down your own station with your carelessness?” you might rightfully ask. And you probably wouldn’t hear anything they had to say very well, even though they might be right. A police officer who commits a crime, a doctor whose negligence harms or kills a patient, a judge who takes a bribe, a broker who steals his client’s money are people who especially should know better than to do the things they do. They don’t see the inconsistency, or more likely they see it and choose to live with it. Like those firefighters in Japan, they should be embarrassed. For whatever reason, they’re not. They continue to do things that contradict who they say they are and what they’re supposed to be doing. And when everything comes to light, they’re left with no credibility. Who trusts a hypocrite, after all? To point accusatory fingers only at others, though, is to miss the point entirely. Jesus probably knew first-hand what it was like to have sawdust in his eye. I’m fairly sure that Joseph didn’t use safety goggles. So when he wanted to address the human tendency to pass judgment on others while giving ourselves a pass, the sawdust metaphor would have been a natural one. Imagine two carpenters working. One gets a little sawdust in his eye. It hurts, his eye starts tearing, his vision is obscured. His buddy notices that speck of sawdust, points it out, and appoints himself “Official Sawdust Remover.” But, he never even mentions his own little problem: he has a whole plank hanging out of his eye. The absurdity of the situation makes the point: the carpenter with the plank needs to deal with own problem before he starts pointing out his buddy’s sawdust issues. What is it about us that wants so desperately to find the faults in each other? How many marriages have been left dead and cold by husbands and wives who carefully note every sin of their spouses and are blind to their own? How many churches have been split by self-appointed “guardians of truth” diligently searching out doctrinal specks in others without noticing how their own lack of love and grace blinds them? How many people who feel the tug of the Holy Spirit on their hearts have been pushed away from Jesus forever by fault-finding Christian Pharisees whose own sins are secret only to themselves? How many preachers have battered their churches into submission for every speck in their lives while remaining unable to acknowledge the splintered, rotting lumber of their own sins and shortcomings? It’s easier, isn’t it? That’s the reason, when we’re honest, for our tendency to prefer magnifying glasses turned on others to mirrors turned on ourselves. There’s something satisfying, gratifying, in a twisted sort of way, about discovering dirt on other people. It’s the reason people buy the publications in the grocery store checkout line, and it’s the reason other people can look down on them for it. And it’s the reason hypocrisy still lives in the church. That’s what Jesus called it, of course: Hypocrisy. I know, it’s kind of an ugly word. It’s pretending, play-acting, and the only way to eliminate hypocrisy is to end the show and take off the mask, make-up, and costume that we’ve used to camouflage our sins and pretend to be something we’re not. It’s to admit that we’re only playing at being perfect, and that we’re no better than the people at whom we’ve delighted in pointing fingers. There are times, of course, when letting something someone has done go by unchallenged can have deadly consequences. Sometimes love demands that we speak up and speak out, that we take someone aside and call him on something we’ve seen. But when those times come, they should not cause me joy. And if those times seem to come often, then maybe I should ask why I feel compelled to judge others so often. “In the same way you judge others, and with the measure you use,” Jesus says, “it will be measured to you” (Matthew 7:2). The truest measure of my attitude toward others is whether or not I would want God to judge me by
He Entered Your World
God drew near to us in Jesus, so why would we not come to him with our challenges, troubles, and trials? I once waded into the Jordan River. On a trip to Israel, my family and I stopped to see the traditional spot of Jesus’ baptism. It’s a charming place. Sycamores cast their shadows. Birds chirp. The water invites. So I accepted the invitation and waded in to be baptized. No one wanted to join me, so I immersed myself. I declared my belief in Christ and sank so low in the water I could touch the river bottom. When I did, I felt a stick and pulled it out. Well, what do you know-a baptism memento! Some people get certificates or Bibles; I like my stick. It’s about as thick as your wrist, long as your forearm, and smooth as a baby’s behind. I keep it on my office credenza so I can show it to fear-filled people. When they chronicle their anxieties about the economy or concern about their kids, I hand them the stick. I tell them how God muddied his feet in our world of diapers, death, digestion, and disease. How John told him to stay on the riverbank, but Jesus wouldn’t listen. How he came to earth for this very purpose, to become one of us. “Why, he might have touched this very stick,” I like to say. As they smile, I ask, “Since he came this far to reach us, can’t we take our fears to him?” For our high priest [Jesus] is able to understand our weaknesses. When he lived on earth he was tempted in every way that we are, but he did not sin. Let us, then, feel very sure that we can come before God’s throne where there is grace. There we can receive mercy and grace to help us when we need it (Hebrews 4:15-16 NCV). Does this miracle matter? It does if you are bedridden. It does if you battle disease. It does if chronic pain is a part of your life. The One who hears your prayers understands your pain. He never shrugs or scoffs or dismisses physical struggle. He had a human body. Does this miracle matter? If you ever wonder if God understands you, it does. If you ever wonder if God listens, it does. If you ever wonder if the Uncreated Creator can, in a million years, comprehend the life of a truck driver, housewife, or immigrant, then ponder long and hard the promise of the incarnation. God says: I understand you and I always will. Are you troubled in spirit? He was, too (John 12:27). Are you so anxious that you could die? He was, too (Matthew 26:38). Are you overwhelmed with grief? He was, too (John 11:35). Have you ever prayed with loud cries and tears? He did, too (Hebrews 5:7). Some have pointed to the sinlessness of Jesus as evidence that he cannot fully understand us. After all, if he never sinned, they reason, how could he understand the full force of sin? Simple, he felt it more than we do. We give in! He never did. We surrender. He never did. He stood before the tsunami and never wavered. In that manner, he understands it more than anyone who ever lived. And then, in his grandest deed, he volunteered to feel the consequence of sin. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21 NIV). The greatest pain of the cross was the pain of sin. Jesus didn’t deserve to feel the shame, but he felt it. He didn’t deserve the humiliation, but he experienced it. He had never sinned, yet was treated like a sinner. He became sin. All the guilt, remorse, and embarrassment – Jesus understands it. Does this miracle matter? To the hypocrite, it does. To the person who can’t remember last night’s party, it does. To the cheater, slanderer, gossip, or scoundrel who comes to God with a contrite spirit, it matters. It matters because they need to know: For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are-yet he did not sin. Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need (Hebrews 4:15-16 NIV). Because Jesus is human, he understands you. Because he is divine he can help you. But he does neither if you don’t go to him. He didn’t remain aloof; why would we? He didn’t keep his distance; why would we keep ours? Let this be the day you draw near to him. He entered your world so that you could enter his. © January 31, 2017 by Max Lucado. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Special thanks for the use of images related to Jesus’ ministry from The Lumo Project and Free Bible Images. About the author: Max is the best selling author of many many Christian books, a sought out speaker, and loving husband, father, and grandfather. Max is in real life what you see in his book — someone who loves Jesus and loves the same kind of people that Jesus loves!
Today’s Verse – Ephesians 2:4-5
Because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in our transgressions — it is by grace you have been saved. —Ephesians 2:4-5 Thoughts on Today’s Verse… God is rich in mercy and generous with grace! Isn’t that wonderful for us? I don’t know about you, but I sure know I have failures, shortcomings, sins, and transgressions. Without God’s mercy, I would be lost in my sins (Romans 3:23-25). Without his grace, I would be cut off from the life God longs for me to have (Romans 5:6-11). God is rich in mercy and generous with grace! He acted on our behalf when he sent Jesus to show us his love (1 John 4:9-10). Now, because of his rich mercy and generous grace, we are dead to that old sinful self, and our lives are now tied to Jesus’ glorious future (Colossians 2:12, 3:1-4). “God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ”! My Prayer… Father of all grace and mercy, thank you. Thank you for being who you are – the Father of mercy and the God of all grace (1 Peter 3:13, 5:10)! Thank you for extending your grace when we did not deserve it. Thank you for giving mercy when we most needed it. Thank you for blessing us with life when we thought our lives were doomed and hopeless. May we be rich in mercy. May we be people of grace. We desire to be wealthy in these ways, like you, more than being rich in earthly riches that are destined to perish (Matthew 6:19-20). Help us, O LORD, to be more like you, to be rich in mercy. In the name of Jesus, I pray. Amen. All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House.