Thursday Devotional – Jesus is Worthy to Give Witnesses Power (6/12/25)

After telling my kids to go and pick up everything in their rooms, I usually tell them what the consequence will be if I come and find anything left out. Often I give them another opportunity to go and make sure they didn’t miss anything. Sometimes I send a sibling or two to go and remind their other siblings before I come and inspect.

Jesus has laid out expectations in the Bible for how to live a life pleasing to Him and how best to be ready for His second coming. He didn’t just tell us once but has given us many opportunities. In fact, before the very end of this world, He will send two witnesses with His power. They will teach and perform miraculous signs for 3½ years.

Revelation 11:1-6   I was given a reed like a measuring rod and was told, “Go and measure the temple of God and the altar, with its worshipers. ² But exclude the outer court; do not measure it, because it has been given to the Gentiles. They will trample on the holy city for 42 months. ³ And I will appoint my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth.” ⁴ They are “the two olive trees” and the two lampstands, and “they stand before the Lord of the earth.” ⁵ If anyone tries to harm them, fire comes from their mouths and devours their enemies. This is how anyone who wants to harm them must die. ⁶ They have power to shut up the heavens so that it will not rain during the time they are prophesying; and they have power to turn the waters into blood and to strike the earth with every kind of plague as often as they want.

John may have been asked to measure the temple, altar, and worshipers as a sign that they were to be evaluated on how well they had followed God’s instructions and standards. The Gentiles in the outer courts were already deemed unacceptable by their persistent rebellion against God. The two witnesses, though, would give one last call (possibly during the last 3½ years of the tribulation and the entire earth as we know it). Verse 4 contains references to earlier prophecies in Zechariah 4 about these two witnesses. Here in Revelation 11, the angel offers additional details about the amazing power given to these witnesses.

You and I may not be given power to spit fire from our mouths, but Jesus will give us the power to do whatever work and witness He has called us to do (Matthew 28:18-20 ¹⁸ Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹ Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.) Where is Jesus calling you and me to speak His truths? How will you and I rely on His presence and power?  

Thursday Devotional - Faithful God when Speechless in Prayer (6/1/23)

Last week my nephew, Mark, fell 30+ feet from a tree in his yard. He landed on his back, was knocked out and couldn’t breathe. His sister screamed for their mom (my sister) who rushed over, crying out to God. They called 9-1-1. Firemen and an ambulance came. They rushed him to the hospital, keeping him flat, and ran all kinds of tests.

When I found out, I immediately started crying out to God for help. After cries for help, I started recounting God’s attributes for comfort. Then, when we didn’t know what else to pray, the Holy Spirit brought to mind my memory verses for that week.

Jeremiah 1:17-19   ¹⁷ “Get yourself ready! Stand up and say to them whatever I command you. Do not be terrified by them, or I will terrify you before them. ¹⁸ Today I have made you a fortified city, an iron pillar and a bronze wall to stand against the whole land—against the kings of Judah, its officials, its priests and the people of the land. ¹⁹ They will fight against you but will not overcome you, for I am with you and will rescue you,” declares the Lord.

The Holy Spirit helped me see how I could apply these verses to my nephew’s situation. We didn’t need to be terrified. I prayed for God to make Mark “an iron pillar and a bronze wall” against the impact of the fall. I prayed for Mark, his Mom, Dad, sister and all of us to feel God’s presence. I prayed for God to rescue Mark from permanent damage.

These verses were a promise God made specifically to Jeremiah, but the Holy Spirit helped me pray them for my nephew when I didn’t know what else to pray. God is faithful in all situations, whether we get the answers we want or not. In this situation, He helped me know what to pray!

God also miraculously spared Mark from paralysis, broken bones, and damage to organs!!!! The doctors told my sister that the fall would have killed them or her, but amazingly didn’t kill Mark! He was in excruciating pain, but is making progress. He can’t bend or pick up things yet, but he can read and move some! We keep praising God!!!  

Thursday Devotional - Faithful God Despite Unfaithful Servant (4/13/23)

Would you be motivated to go out and steal after witnessing a magnificent miracle? I think I’m usually motivated to do the opposite – praise God and be generous with others! Well, Elisha’s servant wasn’t too happy with the way Elisha rejected Naaman’s gifts after God miraculously healed Naaman.

II Kings 5:19b-24                After Naaman had traveled some distance, ²⁰ Gehazi, the servant of Elisha the man of God, said to himself, “My master was too easy on Naaman, this Aramean, by not accepting from him what he brought. As surely as the Lord lives, I will run after him and get something from him.”

²¹ So Gehazi hurried after Naaman. When Naaman saw him running toward him, he got down from the chariot to meet him. “Is everything all right?” he asked.

²² “Everything is all right,” Gehazi answered. “My master sent me to say, ‘Two young men from the company of the prophets have just come to me from the hill country of Ephraim. Please give them a talent of silver and two sets of clothing.’”

²³ “By all means, take two talents,” said Naaman. He urged Gehazi to accept them, and then tied up the two talents of silver in two bags, with two sets of clothing. He gave them to two of his servants, and they carried them ahead of Gehazi. ²⁴ When Gehazi came to the hill, he took the things from the servants and put them away in the house. He sent the men away and they left.

Wow! I can’t believe Gehazi! I see a correlation between Gehazi and Judas. Both men watched God/Jesus perform amazing miracles, yet focused on what was in it for them in the short-term. God had been faithful to them and to those around them, yet it wasn’t enough.

How about you and me? Maybe we aren’t motivated to steal, but maybe we  wonder what’s in it for me, when is it my turn or why God doesn’t do something that “big” for me? Instead of focusing on ourselves, let’s praise our faithful God when we see an amazing miracle in the life of someone else!

Alice

Thursday Devotional - Faithful God through a Servant Girl (2/16/23)

 It’s amazing to see God miraculously provide for the needs of His people and His followers (like we have the last few weeks), but what about the enemy of His people? Does God ever miraculously provide for them?

If you know the story of Elisha and leprous Naaman, the answer is “Yes!”

I’d like to pick apart this familiar story over the next few weeks, focusing on how God used many people in small ways as part of His compassionately BIG restoration of Naaman, the foreign enemy.

II Kings 5:1-4     Now Naaman was commander of the army of the king of Aram. He was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded, because through him the Lord had given victory to Aram. He was a valiant soldier, but he had leprosy.

² Now bands of raiders from Aram had gone out and had taken captive a young girl from Israel, and she served Naaman’s wife. ³ She said to her mistress, “If only my master would see the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy.”

⁴ Naaman went to his master and told him what the girl from Israel had said.

Several things stand out to me about the servant girl. She was compassionate and caring (rather than bitter and revengeful about her plight). She was bold and brave to speak up. She was confident in the God of Israel and what He could do through the prophet Elisha. She also must have been trustworthy for Naaman to even consider what she said (as a foreign and female slave).

What about you and me? Where might God want us to speak up and share even a simple truth about Him? Our Faithful God may take a simple truth we speak to be part of accomplishing a BIG plan!  

Alice

Thursday Devotional - Faithful God versus Apprehensive Servant (2/9/23)

Was Jesus the first person recorded in the Bible to miraculously feed a large crown from a tiny bit of food? Surprisingly, no! Elisha was also used by God to miraculously multiply food.

II Kings 4:42-44 ⁴² A man came from Baal Shalishah, bringing the man of God twenty loaves of barley bread baked from the first ripe grain, along with some heads of new grain. “Give it to the people to eat,” Elisha said.

⁴³ “How can I set this before a hundred men?” his servant asked.

But Elisha answered, “Give it to the people to eat. For this is what the Lord says: ‘They will eat and have some left over.’” ⁴⁴ Then he set it before them, and they ate and had some left over, according to the word of the Lord.

Last week we saw this large company of the prophets, that were staying with Elisha, fed by a mysterious pot of stew. This week they are generously and miraculously provided food! God faithfully and compassionately provided for the needs of His followers.

I was apprehensive about how to handle numerous activities this week with sick kids. However, God faithfully and timely answered my prayers for discernment and direction!

How about for you? How has God faithfully provided for your needs this week?

Alice

Thursday Devotional - Faithful God versus Dead Boy (1/26/23)

Have you ever taken something impossible to God and He worked a miracle? That’s what happened to the Shunammite woman for the second time!!! She already experienced the miracle of life by getting pregnant and having a son. Then, she experienced the miracle of life all over again!!!

II Kings 4:18-21, 27-28, and 32-37 ¹⁷ But the woman became pregnant, and the next year about that same time she gave birth to a son, just as Elisha had told her.

¹⁸ The child grew, and one day he went out to his father, who was with the reapers. ¹⁹ He said to his father, “My head! My head!”

His father told a servant, “Carry him to his mother.” ²⁰ After the servant had lifted him up and carried him to his mother, the boy sat on her lap until noon, and then he died. ²¹ She went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God, then shut the door and went out…

²⁷ When she reached the man of God at the mountain, she took hold of his feet. Gehazi came over to push her away, but the man of God said, “Leave her alone! She is in bitter distress, but the Lord has hidden it from me and has not told me why.”

²⁸ “Did I ask you for a son, my lord?” she said. “Didn’t I tell you, ‘Don’t raise my hopes’?”

³² When Elisha reached the house, there was the boy lying dead on his couch. ³³ He went in, shut the door on the two of them and prayed to the Lord. ³⁴ Then he got on the bed and lay on the boy, mouth to mouth, eyes to eyes, hands to hands. As he stretched himself out on him, the boy’s body grew warm. ³⁵ Elisha turned away and walked back and forth in the room and then got on the bed and stretched out on him once more. The boy sneezed seven times and opened his eyes.

³⁶ Elisha summoned Gehazi and said, “Call the Shunammite.” And he did. When she came, he said, “Take your son.” ³⁷ She came in, fell at his feet and bowed to the ground. Then she took her son and went out.

God doesn’t often bring people back to life, but He does continuously work miracles, whether big or small! He knows our situations way before we do and already has a plan in place. What impossible situation will you and I lay before Him today and look for His solutions?

Alice

Thursday Devotional (for 12/5/19) - God's Purposes in Persecution

We saw Peter and John released from prison a few weeks back, but it didn’t take long for the religious leaders to arrest them again.

Acts 5:12, 14, 17-21             ¹² The apostles performed many signs and wonders among the people. And all the believers used to meet together in Solomon’s Colonnade… ¹⁴ Nevertheless, more and more men and women believed in the Lord and were added to their number…

¹⁷ Then the high priest and all his associates, who were members of the party of the Sadducees, were filled with jealousy. ¹⁸ They arrested the apostles and put them in the public jail. ¹⁹ But during the night an angel of the Lord opened the doors of the jail and brought them out. ²⁰ “Go, stand in the temple courts,” he said, “and tell the people all about this new life.”

²¹ At daybreak they entered the temple courts, as they had been told, and began to teach the people.

God could have prevented them from getting arrested in the first place, but He had a purpose in allowing it. His power and presence was seen and felt as His angel released them. Then, the testimony of the apostles in the temple courts was that much more powerful! The rest of chapter 5 also reveals many other purposes God had for their arrest.

My son, James, asked many of the boys in his gymnastics class the other day if they knew God. No one responded positively. They either said God didn’t exist or just made a silly comment (including one of the coaches saying God was just like sand). Like James, I haven’t been arrested for my faith, but I’ve certainly been laughed at and opposed.

Maybe some of you have truly been persecuted for talking about Jesus. Or, maybe our biggest challenges are being bold in the face of laughter and opposition. We have access to God’s unstoppable power! How will you and I trust His power and recognize His presence in spite of opposition, challenges, hardship, and distractions? We don’t need to look at persecution or opposition as a negative thing. God works His purposes through it. Like the apostles, we’re called to obey.

Alice

Thursday Devotional - The Reason for Miracles

Have you ever seen God do an amazing miracle? At another time, did you pray for a miracle and then were disappointed that He didn’t step in and perform in an amazing way like in the past?

God displays His power to accomplish His purposes. We aren’t God and we don’t see the big picture. When God parted the Red Sea, He did so to show the Israelites and the Egyptians He was fighting for Israel (Exodus 14). When God parted the Jordan, He did it to display His power to the new generation of Israelites and to all the Canaanites living along the Jordan.    

Joshua 3:14-17        ¹⁴ So when the people broke camp to cross the Jordan, the priests carrying the ark of the covenant went ahead of them. ¹⁵ Now the Jordan is at flood stage all during harvest. Yet as soon as the priests who carried the ark reached the Jordan and their feet touched the water’s edge, ¹⁶ the water from upstream stopped flowing. It piled up in a heap a great distance away, at a town called Adam in the vicinity of Zarethan, while the water flowing down to the Sea of the Arabah (that is, the Dead Sea) was completely cut off. So the people crossed over opposite Jericho. ¹⁷ The priests who carried the ark of the covenant of the Lord stopped in the middle of the Jordan and stood on dry ground, while all Israel passed by until the whole nation had completed the crossing on dry ground…

Joshua 4:24     He [the Lord] did this so that all the peoples of the earth might know that the hand of the Lord is powerful and so that you might always fear the Lord your God.

The town of Adam is a long way from Jericho. I didn’t realize until recently how many people (besides all the Israelites) would have witnessed God’s power to stop the Jordan River!!! He usually has numerous reasons for displaying His power through miracles.

In looking back over the miracles you have witnessed, think about all the different reasons God may have chosen to work in a might way. Let’s remember those times so we will continue to fear the Lord and trust in His power, even when He doesn’t work when and how we would like in a current situation. He’s God and we are not! His power is displayed to accomplish His purposes, not my whims and wishes.

Alice