Today’s reflection from Abide Above reminds us that every hardship, trial, and season of suffering is a custom-tailored expression of God's love and divine purpose for us. We are not left to drift through affliction aimlessly. Rather, we are being formed—conformed—into the image of Christ through every valley we walk. The trials of life are not blemishes on the journey but burnishings that reveal the solid gold of Christ’s life in us.

This morning’s devotional paints a vivid picture from Genesis 49:11 and Revelation 19:8, inviting us to see our behavior—our daily walk—as garments that can be saturated with the wine of Christ’s life. In Scripture, wine and grape juice are not just metaphors of His provision but expressions of both satisfaction and joy. Grape juice quenches thirst; wine stirs excitement.

Few biblical scenes strike the heart with such gravity as the fiery judgment of Sodom and Gomorrah. And for many believers, one question lingers long after the smoke clears: What about the children? Were there no innocent lives among the rubble? Why would a good and sovereign God allow their deaths?

It’s one of the most sobering questions a believer can ask:
If God is good and sovereign (and He is), why did He rain down fire on Sodom and Gomorrah, yet He seems to delay judgment on nations or groups today that traffic children, endorse slavery, or revel in brutality?

Ephesians 6 brings Paul's letter to a powerful conclusion, tying together relational submission, spiritual identity, and divine readiness. He first addresses practical relationships: children are to obey their parents, not just because it’s traditional, but because it reflects the moral order of God's creation—an obedience that honors, preserves peace, and leads to flourishing. Fathers, representing leadership in the home, are urged not to provoke their children with harshness but to nurture them with wisdom, instruction, and Christlike guidance.

John 11 draws us into one of the most emotionally rich and theologically revealing moments of Jesus’ earthly ministry. The chapter begins with a quiet, desperate plea from Mary and Martha. They know Jesus loves Lazarus, and they trust that if He comes, He can heal him. Yet Jesus delays. Not from indifference, but with divine intention—to glorify the Father through a resurrection more awe-inspiring than a healing.

If God is good (and He is), why doesn’t He immediately destroy the evil institutions man creates?

It’s a question as old as the fall—and as urgent as the headlines. Why would God allow something like slavery to persist in the ancient world? Or allow unjust governments to rise? Or corrupt hierarchies to maintain power? Why not abolish them outright?

E. Stanley Jones draws our attention to a truth that many believers overlook in their practical walk: that self-surrender is not a repeated ritual but a once-and-for-all response to God's call. Yet, in that singular surrender, there are countless daily, even moment-by-moment, expressions of the same heart posture. He compares it to a good marriage—you don’t re-enter the covenant every day, but you do live out that covenant in countless small ways daily.

In Immeasurably More, Ray Stedman draws from Leviticus 17 to highlight a forgotten truth that undergirds all of human behavior: life does not belong to us. God required the Israelites to bring their sacrifices to Him—offering them not in secret places or to mythical goat idols, but publicly and properly at the tent of meeting. This wasn’t mere ritual. It was a visual declaration: all life—animal and human—belongs to God, and we dare not try to manipulate or redirect it through superstition, control, or self-will.

Today’s reflection from A.B. Simpson takes us to the quiet place Jesus Himself invited His disciples to inhabit—a place of stillness, rest, and deep trust. In the Gospel of Mark, often called the Gospel of action or service, we are surprised by this tender call from Christ: “Come away by yourselves… and rest.” It’s a reminder that the most fruitful workers in God’s kingdom are not those who are frenzied or self-driven, but those who move from a place of divine stillness.

So much of modern Christian teaching can subtly drift into the realm of information—principles to memorize, doctrines to debate, definitions to defend. But the Scriptures keep pulling us back to relationship. Grace and peace aren’t academic subjects; they are multiplied to us in relationship with Christ. The divine provisions of life and godliness aren't trophies for the shelf of our theological knowledge—they are treasures to be drawn upon for daily living.

Oswald Chambers draws us into the life of Joab—a man who had faithfully served David for years and resisted an obvious threat like Absalom’s rebellion. Yet, at the end of David’s reign, Joab surprisingly sides with Adonijah, a seemingly lesser threat. What happened? Chambers wants us to recognize that spiritual failure often doesn’t come crashing in through the front door. It slips quietly through a window we left cracked open.

Today’s Abide Above devotional reminds us that we no longer live under the law of Moses, which governed external conduct, demanded compliance, and exposed our inability to live righteously. Instead, we now live under a new, internal reality—the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus.

This morning’s devotional from eManna paints a vivid picture of Christ not merely as our Savior, but as the triumphant, resting Lion of Judah. The lion imagery drawn from Genesis 49 and Revelation 5 invites us to see Christ not just in His power but in His posture—victorious and at rest. He descends from the mountain, seizes His prey, and ascends again in full dominion. What is His prey? All that once hunted us—anger, sin, weakness, fear, shame. Once devoured, these enemies no longer roar in our ears. Christ has overcome them, and now He couches, satisfied.

Nehemiah 8 paints a vibrant picture of revival—but not the kind brought by music or emotion, but by the hearing of God’s Word. After the physical restoration of the city walls, something even more vital happens: the spiritual restoration of the people. Ezra, who had been working quietly for over a decade, reemerges just in time to lead this sacred moment.

Ezekiel 39 continues the vision of Gog’s devastating defeat—this time with even greater detail. What begins as a terrifying confrontation ends in a sweeping declaration of God’s holiness and restoration. The nations that once threatened God’s people are utterly crushed, not by Israel’s might, but by the Lord Himself. His reputation, tarnished in the eyes of the world due to Israel’s exile, is now gloriously vindicated.

Job 41 presents a terrifying portrait of the Leviathan, a monstrous creature beyond human control. But this is no mere sea creature—it is symbolic of Satan, the many-headed serpent mentioned throughout Scripture (Ps 74:12–14; Isa 27:1; Rev 12:9; 20:2). God isn’t describing an exotic animal for sport; He’s pulling back the veil to reveal the spiritual adversary Job has been facing all along. Job’s suffering wasn’t just physical or relational—it was deeply spiritual, a direct assault from the prince of this world.

E. Stanley Jones invites us to abandon the burden of self-improvement and instead rest in the liberating truth of belonging to Christ. He uncovers the subtle trap of pursuing “self-perfection”—a path that may seem noble but ends in frustration, alienation, and inner turmoil. The secret, he says, is not in refining the self, but in surrendering it.

In this reflection on Leviticus 16, Ray Stedman guides us to see Christ pictured in the Day of Atonement ritual, specifically in the scapegoat. As the high priest laid his hands upon the goat and confessed all the sins of the people, those sins were symbolically transferred and carried away into the wilderness. Stedman beautifully shows how this act foreshadowed Jesus Christ, who bore the total weight of our guilt, not just to satisfy God’s justice but to make way for uninhibited love to flow toward us.

A.B. Simpson draws our attention to a beautiful and often misunderstood pattern in our walk with God. So many long for the soaring moments—the times when we “mount up with wings like eagles”—forgetting that these are not the norm but the preparation. They’re grace-filled seasons that give way to the more ordinary paths of running without growing weary and walking without fainting.