Proverbs 3:5-8

1 Passage: Proverbs 3:5-8

1 Verse: Verse 6. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.

1 Prayer: Thank You, Father, for being familiar with all my ways -- both the ones that seem right to me and the ones that seem to me to be dead-ends. Help me to acknowledge Your presence walking beside me along each one. Help me to stay on the narrow path -- the one that is level and straight and lit by Your Word and leads me nearer to You. Sometimes I feel like I am stumbling about in many ways, weaving to and fro as the wind blows. I fear that, when I come to a fork and paths diverge, I might not be the best judge of which one to take. Thank You for guiding me. Thank You for not deserting me -- even if I take the path that leads through the valley of the shadow of death. I will continue to acknowledge You as best I can. I will wait to see even that path made straight. I love You.

1 Person: Now, it's your turn! Please click "COMMENTS" below to add your own favorite verse and to share your own personal prayer from today's passage. (Your favorite verse and prayer might even be the same as mine, but we'd still love to hear from you. Feel free to just drop us a note so we know you stopped by.) Thanks!

Tomorrow's passage: Ephesians 5:18-21

Proverbs 3:1-4

1 Passage: Proverbs 3:1-4

1 Verse: Verse 3. Do not let kindness and truth leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart.

1 Prayer: Father, You are love. Your Word is truth. Any kindness or truth I might have comes from You -- it is You. Thank You for promising to never leave me nor forsake me. You are written on my heart -- my new heart that is a new creation in You. Help me today to love You with all my heart and to love others with all Your heart.

1 Person: Now, it's your turn! Please click "COMMENTS" below to add your own favorite verse and to share your own personal prayer from today's passage. (Your favorite verse and prayer might even be the same as mine, but we'd still love to hear from you. Feel free to just drop us a note so we know you stopped by.) Thanks!

Tomorrow's passage: Proverbs 3:5-8

Psalm 1:1-6

1 Passage: Psalm 1:1-6

1 Verse: Verse 6. For the LORD knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.

1 Prayer: Thank You, Father, for knowing me. It all comes down to that. After everything is said and done, the thing in which my blessing lies is Your knowledge of me. Your knowledge is infinitely perfect and complete, but it is also intimately caring and infinitely compassionate. If I were only to meditate on Your Word -- humbly implanted within my soul -- I would realize how blessed and prosperous and well-watered and firmly planted and fruitful and leafy green I am. Help me today to not forget that You are intimately acquainted with all my ways, that You walk with me in them, that You are near to the brokenhearted and to all who call on You.

1 Person: Now, it's your turn! Please click "COMMENTS" below to add your own favorite verse and to share your own personal prayer from today's passage. (Your favorite verse and prayer might even be the same as mine, but we'd still love to hear from you. Feel free to just drop us a note so we know you stopped by.) Thanks!

Tomorrow's passage: Proverbs 3:1-4

Luke 6:35-38

1 Passage: Luke 6:35-38

1 Verse: Verse 36. "Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

1 Prayer:

There’s a wideness in God’s mercy,
Like the wideness of the sea;
There’s a kindness in His justice,
Which is more than liberty.

There is no place where earth’s sorrows
Are more felt than up in Heaven;
There is no place where earth’s failings
Have such kindly judgment given.

There is welcome for the sinner,
And more graces for the good;
There is mercy with the Savior;
There is healing in His blood.

There is grace enough for thousands
Of new worlds as great as this;
There is room for fresh creations
In that upper home of bliss.

For the love of God is broader
Than the measure of our mind;
And the heart of the Eternal
Is most wonderfully kind.

There is plentiful redemption
In the blood that has been shed;
There is joy for all the members
In the sorrows of the Head.

’Tis not all we owe to Jesus;
It is something more than all;
Greater good because of evil,
Larger mercy through the fall.

If our love were but more simple,
We should take Him at His word;
And our lives would be all sunshine
In the sweetness of our Lord.

Souls of men! why will ye scatter
Like a crowd of frightened sheep?
Foolish hearts! why will ye wander
From a love so true and deep?

It is God: His love looks mighty,
But is mightier than it seems;
’Tis our Father: and His fondness
Goes far out beyond our dreams.

But we make His love too narrow
By false limits of our own;
And we magnify His strictness
With a zeal He will not own.

Was there ever kinder shepherd
Half so gentle, half so sweet,
As the Savior who would have us
Come and gather at His feet?

Fred­er­ick W. Fa­ber, Or­a­to­ry Hymns, 1854

1 Person: Now, it's your turn! Please click "COMMENTS" below to add your own favorite verse and to share your own personal prayer from today's passage. (Your favorite verse and prayer might even be the same as mine, but we'd still love to hear from you. Feel free to just drop us a note so we know you stopped by.) Thanks!

Tomorrow's passage: Psalm 1:1-6

Ephesians 4:14-16

1 Passage: Ephesians 4:14-16

1 Verse: Verse 16. from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.

1 Prayer: Thank You, Father, for giving each one of us a part in the makeup of Your body. May You cause our love for one another to increase in scope and deepen in maturity as we grow up in You and grow into one another. Your Spirit fits us together and knits us together through the unique contributions each one of us makes. Help us all, Father, to be faithful to perform the proper working of our individual part -- however big or small, honored or overlooked -- so that the whole which we share with You can also do Your work properly. Keep us from hoarding from others the blessings You have given us for the purpose of sharing. Help me today to supply to others what they need from that which You have provided to me.

1 Person: Now, it's your turn! Please click "COMMENTS" below to add your own favorite verse and to share your own personal prayer from today's passage. (Your favorite verse and prayer might even be the same as mine, but we'd still love to hear from you. Feel free to just drop us a note so we know you stopped by.) Thanks!

Tomorrow's passage: Luke 6:35-38

1 Peter 4:7-11

1 Passage: 1 Peter 4:7-11

1 Verse: Verse 8. Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins.

1 Prayer: Thank You, Father, for covering over my many sins with Your great love. Forgive me for sometimes thinking that Your love for me is anything less than fervent -- passionate, enthusiastic, ardent, zealous. I'm afraid I sometimes imagine that Your love is grudging, tentative, measured and calculated. Maybe because that is how my love for others so often appears to me to be. Please forgive me, Father, and help me to love as You love me. Keep me ever mindful of the fervency -- the intensity -- of Your great love, and help me to show the same sort of passion in my love for others.

1 Person: Now, it's your turn! Please click "COMMENTS" below to add your own favorite verse and to share your own personal prayer from today's passage. (Your favorite verse and prayer might even be the same as mine, but we'd still love to hear from you. Feel free to just drop us a note so we know you stopped by.) Thanks!

Tomorrow's passage: Ephesians 4:14-16

Philippians 4:6-9

1 Passage: Philippians 4:6-9

1 Verse: Verse 8. Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.

1 Prayer: Father, please help me today to dwell on good things. Give me an eye to see what is excellent and praiseworthy -- in You, of course, and also in others. Help me not to overlook the pure and lovely -- however small they may be. Help me to notice things that are right and reputable and worthy of honor. Help me to give the honor that others deserve -- Yourself included. Father, so often I think I am obeying this verse when I dwell only on what I believe to be true. And usually to my eyes, the truth looks anything but good. Usually, the truth seems to be that most things are false and wrong and imperfectly pure and far from excellent or worthy of praise, regardless of the reputation they may acquire. But even if things are like that, even if the truth hurts, even if there is now more wrong than right, You call me not to dwell only on that. You call me to dwell on whatever is good, however small and and beleaguered and feeble and frail -- if there is even only one tiny little thing. Father, please help me to obey that part of this verse today, and to give You credit for all the blessings You surround me with, even in the midst of many sorrows.

1 Person: Now, it's your turn! Please click "COMMENTS" below to add your own favorite verse and to share your own personal prayer from today's passage. (Your favorite verse and prayer might even be the same as mine, but we'd still love to hear from you. Feel free to just drop us a note so we know you stopped by.) Thanks!

Tomorrow's passage: 1 Peter 4:7-11