Be Still and Know Daily Bible Devotion

1 Corinthians 2:1-3 And so it was with me, brothers and sisters. When I came to you, I did not come with eloquence or human wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness with great fear and trembling. I once heard about a church that regularly visited the houses nearby. The...

1 Corinthians 1:18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. Paul was absolutely sure that the cross of Jesus stood right at the heart of his life and ministry. Nothing was more important than the fact that God showed His perfect love for us by sending Jesus to die the most excruciatingly painful death for us. It w...

1 Corinthians 1:4-5 I always thank my God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus. For in him you have been enriched in every way – with all kinds of speech and with all knowledge. If you know anything at all about the church in Corinth, you will know that it was a disaster area. Everything seemed to be going wrong, but look how Paul starts this letter. He gives thanks for them and...

Psalm 123:3-4 Have mercy on us, LORD, have mercy on us, for we have endured no end of contempt. We have endured no end of ridicule from the arrogant, of contempt from the proud. To be treated with contempt is a horrible experience. To be written off as worthless is agonising, and the Bible tells us about many people who knew just how painful it is. Nehemiah certainly had this experience when he wo...

Psalm 122:1 I rejoiced with those who said to me, “Let us go to the house of the LORD.” This verse has a very special place in British history. It has been used upon the entrance of the monarch at every coronation since that of King Charles 1. Since 1902, Hubert Parry’s magnificent choral setting of the psalm has been sung. It captures beautifully the joy and celebration of this special occasion....

Psalm 121:1-2 I lift up my eyes to the mountains – where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth. This is one of the best-known and best-loved of all the psalms. The answer to the psalmist’s question is a resounding: “No!” The mountains might look strong and confident, but our help certainly doesn’t come from them – it comes from the Lord. It’s impossible...

Psalm 120:1-2 I call on the LORD in my distress, and he answers me. Save me, LORD, from lying lips and from deceitful tongues. I love the psalms because they span the full range of human experience. Some are full of praise and worship, but others burst out with anger and disappointment. However you are feeling, there are psalms that will be just right for you, because God meets us where we are. We...

Psalm 119:1-2 Blessed are those whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the LORD. Blessed are those who keep his statutes and seek him with all their heart. This is the beginning of what is by far the longest psalm and the longest chapter in the Bible. It is made up of 22 sections, each one of which begins with a different letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Each of those sections is...

Psalm 118:5-6 When hard pressed, I cried to the LORD; He brought me into a spacious place. The LORD is with me; I will not be afraid. What can mere mortals do to me? The Duke of Wellington said: “The only thing I am afraid of is fear.” He had good reason to say this. Doctors tell us that fear can have a huge effect on our lives. It can lead to accelerated ageing and even premature death. The psalm...

Psalm 117 Praise the LORD, all you nations; extol him, all you peoples. For great is his love toward us, and the faithfulness of the LORD endures forever. Praise the LORD. So reads the whole of Psalm 117. It’s the shortest psalm, but it has an enormous message which embraces the whole of the Bible. Every single person needs to join in praising God. Praising Him isn’t confined to a little group of...

Psalm 115:1 Not to us, LORD, not to us but to your name be the glory, because of your love and faithfulness. It is said that William Wilberforce marked the passing of the bill to abolish slavery in the UK by meditating on this psalm. However great our human successes, it is always our first duty to worship God and to praise Him for His greatness and provision. Everything we have and are comes to u...

Philippians 4:11-13 I have learned how to be content with whatever I have. I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little. For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength. Advertising is a major influence in the modern world. Its deliberate intention is...

Philippians 4:8 And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honourable, and right, and pure, and lovely and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. Never in history have those words been more important than right now. When Sir Tim Berners-Lee invented the world wide web in 1989 no one could have foreseen the way in whic...

Philippians 4:6-7 Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus. The most unhelpful thing you can say to a person who is worrying is: “Don’t worry”. I am sure it is meant in a...

Philippians 4:2-3 Now I appeal to Euodia and Syntyche. Please, because you belong to the Lord, settle your disagreement. And I ask you, my true partner, to help these two women, for they worked hard with me in telling others the Good News. There’s nothing new about people falling out with one another! It has been a feature of life from the very beginning, as we learn from the account of Cain and A...

Philippians 3:17-18 Dear brothers and sisters, pattern your lives after mine, and learn from those who follow our example. For I have told you often before, and I say it again with tears in my eyes, that there are many whose conduct shows they are really enemies of the cross of Christ. Paul didn’t pull his punches did he? He declared that some people were enemies of Christ. This is very harsh lang...

Philippians 3:12 I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me. Perfection is a word that makes most of us shudder, because we are so well aware that we fall very far short of it. But the danger with that kind of response is that we give up even trying. We...

Philippians 3:8-9 Yes, everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that I could gain Christ and become one with him. Oscar Wilde once defined a cynic as the person “who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing”. His observation well describes our cynic...

Philippians 3:1-2 Whatever happens, my dear brothers and sisters, rejoice in the Lord. I never get tired of telling you these things, and I do it to safeguard your faith. Watch out for those dogs, those people who do evil, those mutilators who say you must be circumcised to be saved. There is something incredibly impressive about people who are joyful when everything is going wrong. Paul’s list of...

Philippians 2:22-23 But you know how Timothy has proved himself. Like a son with his father, he has served with me in preaching the Good News. I hope to send him to you just as soon as I find out what is going to happen to me here. Timothy was clearly very important to Paul. Born at Lystra in Galatia (now part of Turkey) Timothy had a Jewish mother and a Greek father. Paul met him on his second mi...

Philippians 2:14-15 Do everything without complaining and arguing, so that no one can criticise you. Live clean, innocent lives as children of God, shining like bright lights in a world full of crooked and perverse people. We probably all complain from time to time, but as a way of life it can be very destructive. It has been wisely said that complaining doesn’t solve problems, it only attracts th...

Philippians 2:12-13 Dear friends, you always followed my instructions when I was with you. And now that I am away, it is even more important. Work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear. For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him. If you have given your life to Christ, confessed your sins and received His forg...

Philippians 2:5-7 You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. These amazing words form the beginning of what many people consider to be a first-century hymn. They beautifully express the fundam...

Philippians 2:1-2 Is there any encouragement from belonging to Christ? Any comfort from his love? Any fellowship together in the Spirit? Are your hearts tender and compassionate? Then make me truly happy by agreeing wholeheartedly with each other, loving one another, and working together with one mind and purpose. One of the biggest problems with unity is that it looks so easy. If you listen to a...

Philippians 1:29-30 For you have been given not only the privilege of trusting in Christ but also the privilege of suffering for him. We are in this struggle together. You have seen my struggle in the past, and you know that I am still in the midst of it. We don’t know the exact nature of the problems in the Philippian church. It had been planted in a hostile environment and was led by new Christi...