Solomon was overwhelmed with being king of Israel, and the Lord wanted to get him started off on the right foot. The Lord asked Solomon, “What shall I give you?” (1 Kgs. 3:5). The king simply requested “a wise and understanding heart” (3:9, 12), and that is exactly what the all-powerful, all-wise, all-loving God gave to him. Wisdom! Near the end of his days, the…

Sometimes we may wonder if anybody knows or anybody cares what we do for others. Maybe we feel like we’re always the one giving but not very often on the receiving end. Perhaps we are forgetting too much and not remembering enough. The word “forget” is found three times in the book of Hebrews. First, the author wants Christians to remember that “God is not…

The translations vary slightly on the first part of Proverbs 29:18. They say the same thing but slightly different. “Where there is no revelation” (NKJV), “Where there is no vision” (KJV, ASV, NASB), “Where there is no prophetic vision” (ESV). The meaning of the term here usually is connected to the means by which divine revelation is communicated. Hold that thought. The verse goes on to say…

It is so easy to “look at others” and to be jealous (even slightly so) when they “have more” than you do, “have it easier” than you do, “get to do more fun things” than you do, etc. In “looking at others,” it becomes very easy to forget what you have or minimize the value of what you have. In 1897, Johnson Oatman,…

Probably every person who has ever used a phone has heard the recorded message, “Your call cannot be completed as dialed. Please check the number and dial again.” This is an indication that something went wrong with the attempted call, usually on the caller’s end or the phone network. Can something similar happen in our spiritual lives? We may be under the impression that God…

Climbing Mount Everest is a hard thing to do. Going all the way through med school and residency and becoming a full-fledged doctor is a hard thing to do. Carrying a baby for nine months and going through childbirth is a hard thing to do. Add to this list—forgiving someone who has wronged you. That’s a hard thing to do. Can I…

During what had to be a very somber occasion, Jesus said to one of His dear friends, “I tell you, Peter, the rooster shall not crow this day before you will deny three times that you know Me” (Luke 22:34). Peter “spoke more vehemently, ‘If I have to die with You, I will not deny You!’” (Mark 14:31). Only hours later, Peter was…

As Jesus approached the city of Jerusalem in the last week of His life, He sent two of His disciples into a village, “where as you enter you will find a colt tied, on which no one has ever sat” (Luke 19:30). Two verses later, they “found it just as He had said to them” (19:32). A few days later, Jesus sent Peter and…