Daily Hope Devotional

The whole world needs Jesus. Jesus said this very clearly over and over, but in Matthew 28:18-20 He gave us the Great Commission: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 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, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (NIV). What is our assignment? It is “Go.” This is not a suggestion! It’s not optional. If you are a child of God, God expects you to go. What’s the task? Go and make disciples. A disciple is someone who does the five things we were put on Earth to do: know and love God, grow to spiritual maturity, serve God with your shape through ministry, share the Good News, and worship God with all your heart. What’s our authority? It’s not some government or the CIA. It’s Jesus. What is our responsibility? Are we supposed to go and make disciples of some...

“I will build my church, and all the powers of hell will not conquer it.”  (Matthew 16:18b NLT, second edition) Only the Church will last forever. Nothing else is going to last. No business is going to last forever. No government is going to last forever. No nation is going to last forever. Only the Church is going to last forever. Jesus said in Matthew 16:18, “ I will build my church, and all the powers of hell will not conquer it ” (NLT, second edition). The Church is the most magnificent idea God or any human being ever thought up. The entire universe was created for God’s family. What’s God’s family called? The Church. The Church is not a building. The Church is the family of God. God wanted a family, so He decided to create the entire universe just so He could create Earth just so He could create human beings just so we could have the free choice to choose or reject Him. He knew that some of us would choose to love Him back, and He’s going to take us to Heaven ...

It’s not about you. It’s not about profit or politics or anything else. It’s all about God. You may know that the first sentence of The Purpose Driven Life is “It’s not about you.” What you may not remember is that the title of the first chapter is “It’s All About God.” Those two go together. The reason it’s not about you is because it’s all about God. Until you understand that, life is never going to make sense. Until you understand that, I am not going to make sense to you. The goal of my life is not pleasure, it’s not possessions, it’s not prestige, it’s not politics, it’s not power, and it’s not popularity. It’s not anything that the world values. The goal of my life is the glory of God. Romans 11:36 says, “ For everything comes from God alone. Everything lives by His power, and everything is for His glory ” (TLB). Everything on the planet and in the universe was created for God’s glory. What’s the implication of that? If it’s all about God and it’s not all about you o...

God will never, ever, ever, ever stop loving you. You will always be loved. Nothing can destroy your relationship with God. If you grasp this fact, it will change your life. Romans 8:38-39 says, “ I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from His love. Death can’t, and life can’t. The angels won’t, and all the powers of hell itself cannot keep God’s love away. Our fears for today, our worries about tomorrow, or where we are — high above the sky, or in the deepest ocean — nothing will ever be able to separate us from the love of God demonstrated by our Lord Jesus Christ when he died for us ” (TLB). When you put your hand in God’s, He grasps it, and He’s never letting go. There may be times you might like to let go. But He never will. You are eternally secure. Once you are born into a family, you can’t be unborn out of it. Once you’re born again, you can’t be unborn out of the family of God. Once your name is written in the eternal book of life, it can’t be erased. It’s in...

“For His Spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God’s children. And since we are His children, we are His heirs. In fact, together with Christ we are heirs of God’s glory.”   (Romans 8:16-17 NLT, second edition) If you were the son or the daughter of Bill Gates, it would probably stand to reason that you were going to receive a large inheritance. But you have a father that is wealthier than Bill Gates. Your heavenly Father has prepared an inheritance for you as one of his children. The Bible says in Romans 8:16-17, “For His Spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God’s children. And since we are His children, we are His heirs. In fact, together with Christ we are heirs of God’s glory” (NLT, second edition). That is one of the most amazing verses in the entire Bible. Everything that God has given to His Son Jesus Christ He’s given to you also. You’re going to share in His glory. That is limitless! In Heaven, you will have unlimited access to the un...

As believers, we have hope because we are going to live forever. Death is not the end. There is more to the story! One day your heart will stop beating, and that will be the end of your body. But it’s not going to be the end of you. You were made in God’s image. You were made to last forever. This is not all there is. Why do we have hope? Because no matter how bad it seems on Earth, it’s just for a while. We’re going to spend trillions of years on the other side of eternity with no more sorrow, no more sadness, no more sickness, no more suffering. The Bible says in Romans 8:11, “The Spirit of God, Who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, He will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you” (NLT, second edition). As a pastor, I’ve stood at the graveside of hundreds of families, and I know the difference between people with hope and those without. You can see it in their eyes. I’ve seen the terror ...

You can give by reason or by revelation. If you’re going to become a person of faith, you have to learn to give by revelation. When you give by reason, you say, “This is what I can reasonably give.” It doesn’t require any faith to give by reason. Giving by revelation is when you say, “God, what do you want to give through me? How much do you want me to trust you for in this particular instance?” My wife Kay and I have been tested many times on giving when we didn’t have it. One of the most dramatic examples was when we raised money to build Saddleback Church’s building back in 1993. We were meeting in a tent and decided that we would have an offering to build a building. People would make commitments to give over a three-year period. So Kay and I prayed about what we would give, and we came up with an amount that certainly wasn’t reasonable. In fact, it was more than we could afford. But we trusted God for that amount. Then one day I was reading in 1 Chronicles 29 about how th...