Attention! Let all the people of the world listen!
Let the earth and everything in it hear.
The Sovereign Lord is making accusations against you... ~ Micah 1:2a (NLT)
He said to them, “Go into the whole world and proclaim the good news to every creature." ~ Mark 16:15 (CEB)
KEY IDEA:
The Lord has a good news message for everyone.
PRAYER:
Sovereign Lord, thank you for the good news of Jesus. It sure beats the message of judgment.
Help me to live as a good news person full of your grace. Even though I've heard the good news over and over again, that just makes me want to hear it one more time. And I want to be able to tell it to everyone who will listen.
Amen.
O Lord, you alone are my hope.
I’ve trusted you, O Lord, from childhood. ~ Psalm 71:5 (NLT)
So we do not give up. Our physical body is becoming older and weaker, but our spirit inside us is made new every day. ~ 2 Corinthians 4:16 (NCV)
KEY IDEA:
Since our hope is in the Lord we should continue hoping -- even when we grow old and our bodies don't work as well.
PRAYER:
Lord, thank you for sustaining me for my many years. Like the psalmist, I've trusted in you since I was a child. And you have never let me down. At times I let you down and don't act faithfully. I have no good excuse or explanation for my behavior because you have been so good to me. Please continue to renew my inner life so that I do not become discouraged. I'm going to bank my hope with you. Amen.
Whoever mocks poor people insults their Creator;
gloating over misfortune is a punishable crime. ~ Proverbs 17:5 (MSG)
Watch that you don’t treat a single one of these childlike believers arrogantly. You realize, don’t you, that their personal angels are constantly in touch with my Father in heaven? ~ Matthew 18:10 (MSG)
KEY IDEA:
The lowly are important to God and should be important to us.
PRAYER:
Lord, help me to remember that in the overall scheme of things I'm a pretty lowly person.
But you care about me. I need to care for those who are lowly, too. Save me from my arrogance. Amen.
I write down countless teachings for the people, but they reject them as strange and foreign. ~ Hosea 8:12 (GNT)
I am surprised at you! In no time at all you are deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ, and are accepting another gospel. ~ Galatians 1:6 (GNT)
KEY IDEA:
Listen to and act on God's instructions. They contain the life-giving news of grace.
PRAYER:
Lord, I do appreciate having your teachings. But like so many of the books on my shelf your instructions remain untouched day after day. I need to become a person enthralled with your book because it is the message of Christ's grace. Keep that fire burning in my heart. I'm going to become consumed with the message of the grace of Christ. Amen.
*ABOUT THE
DAILY TEXTS
The Daily Texts have been published by the Moravian Church since 1731. In 2015 I started posting these Bible verses for my spiritual formation students at Pacific Islands University. In the process of responding to the verses, I found the rhythm of looking for a common thread and writing a prayer based on that key idea to be helpful for my own soul. The prayers are more or less modeled on the TRIP method, which is what I ask my students to do in their journaling. ~ Brad Boydston
TRANSLATIONS
ABP = Authorized Boydston Paraphrase — my own freestyle biblical adaptation — somewhere between paraphrase, commentary, and sermon
CEB = Common English Bible (©2011, the Common English Bible)
CEV = Contemporary English Version (©1995, American Bible Society)
MSG = The Message (©1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson)
NIRV = New International Reader's Version (©1996, 1998, Biblica)
NIV = New International Version (©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011, Biblica)
NLT = New Living Translation (©1996, 2004, 2007, 2013, Tyndale House Foundation)
