Devotion:
Read Psalm 39:6-7.
If we are fortunate, we have people around us in life from whom we learn. My older brother taught me so much, from how to throw and catch a baseball to how to be a good husband and father. Sometimes he taught me with words, but usually it was with quiet actions and setting a good example. I was waiting with his wife and daughters in the waiting room when the surgeon came to tell us the cancer was too advanced for them to complete life-saving surgery. When we spoke with him in the recovery room, he was sad but also so peaceful and calm, smiling to make us feel better. I suspected it was the lingering effects of the anesthesia. But in our conversations in the few months he had left, he spoke with that same touch of sadness about a future that was slipping away; and always, much greater than the sadness, was this beautiful sense of peace and well-being. He had a hope in God through Jesus Christ that was so powerful that it would not be diminished one bit by what faced him. When I think of my brother, his faith and his witness, I am still learning.
This passage reminds us that we can put our hope in lots of things, but many of them are not lasting. God is forever, and our hope in God will never be in vain.
Personal Worship Option:
Give thanks today for those who are good examples in your life, especially for those who have shown you what it means to have hope in God through Christ. Thank God for always being there and for God’s gift to us of Christ, the ultimate reason for our hope.
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