The 260 Journey

Day 12 Today’s Reading: Matthew 12 While I am writing today’s devotional, a television show about Jack Ryan, the fictional CIA analyst, is trending online. Some knew him as Harrison Ford; for others, he was Chris Pine; and for us old folks, we knew him as Alec Baldwin. Jack Ryan is Tom Clancy’s creation. And those actors portrayed him in the movie versions of Clancy’s thriller books, such as The H...

Day 11 Today’s Reading: Matthew 11 Conditions or circumstances can affect perspectives.  What goes on in our lives can determine our points of view and how we define important things—most seriously, our view and definition of God. Sometimes our circumstances can take us from living an exclamation-mark life to living a question-mark life. Let me give you an example of what I mean. John th...

Day 10 Today’s Reading: Matthew 10 I want to tell you the history of two groups of people who are in the New Testament—the tax collectors and the zealots. The tax collectors were Jews who collected taxes from fellow Jews for the Roman Empire. They made their living by charging an extra amount on top of what everyone owed. Some of them made more than a living. They exacted any amount they could and...

Day 9 Today’s Reading: Matthew 9 Matthew 9 is a chapter that is spilling over with healing and faith. A paralyzed man is brought to Jesus by his friends in verse 2 and Jesus sees the faith of the friends and the paralyzed man walks. A woman with a twelve-year disease is free in an instant. Jesus says to her, “Your faith has made you well” (verse 22). Two blind men finally see through their eyes af...

Day 8 Today’s Reading: Matthew 8 Her name was Agnes and she was from Albania. In 1928, at age eighteen, she went to Ireland and became a nun. Almost twenty years later, in 1946, she received what she described as a call within the call. As she was riding on a train, her heart heard the Lord tell her to help the most rejected people in society, the poorest of the poor—the throw-away people of Calcu...

Day 7 Today’s Reading: Matthew 7 A concerned husband went to see the family doctor. “I think my wife is deaf,” he said. “She never hears me the first time I say something. In fact, I often have to repeat things over and over.” “Go home tonight,” the doctor suggested. “Stand about fifteen feet from her, and say something. If she doesn’t reply, move about five feet closer and say it again. Keep doin...

Day 6 Today’s Reading: Matthew 6 In the first part of chapter 6, Jesus spoke about three personal disciplines that are part of every Christian’s life: giving, praying, and fasting. Note that I said, these three disciplines are part of every Christian’s life. If you are a Christian, then they are to be part of your life as well. How do we know they should be part of our lives? Because as Jesus spok...

Day 5 Today’s Reading: Matthew 5 Several years ago, the Wall Street Journal reported a story on happiness in different nations around the world. The newspaper’s title gave away the happiness level of people living in the United States: “Richest Country, Saddest People—Any Coincidence?” According to a study jointly conducted by the World Health Organization and Harvard Medical School, and based on...

Day 4 Today’s Reading: Matthew 4 It seems Jesus can’t even towel off and get dressed after being water baptized in the Jordan River before Satan shows up and challenges what Jesus has heard. We ended yesterday’s reading in Matthew 3 with hearing God speak. Today’s reading in Matthew 4 opens with hearing Satan speak. Remember that in Matthew 3 at Jesus’ water baptism, God said, “This is My beloved...

Day 3 Today’s Reading: Matthew 3 A little brother was jealous that his older brother was getting water baptized and he wasn’t. As his father instructed the older brother on what it meant and how special it was, the little guy left the room in tears because he wasn’t being baptized. His father followed him to find out why he was so upset. When the father asked the four-year-old what was wrong, the...

Day 2 Today’s Reading: Matthew 2 Obedience to God is such a powerful tool. Obedience to God will always keep you one step ahead of the enemy. Obedience to God brings you blessing. And it brings protection and puts you in the right place at the right time—exactly where God wants you to be. When we don’t obey God, we withhold from ourselves all that God has in store for us. An old friend, Joy Dawson...

Day 1 Today’s Reading: Matthew 1 The whole of the New Testament starts with today’s reading in Matthew 1. This is the story of stories—and it starts off all wrong. Most adventure stories begin with the wondrous “Once upon a time” so we know we’re in for something truly amazing. That’s the way the New Testament should begin, right? After all, what is more adventurous and exciting than the story of...