Hebrews 12:2 calls me to fix my eyes on Jesus who endured the cross and now sits at the right hand of God. Today’s reading in His Victorious Indwelling urges me to look away from my own faith and to look to the Living One Himself. When I stare at my faith, I grow anxious and start measuring. When I look to Jesus, the heart quiets and trust becomes simple again. Thank you, Nick Harrison, for curating a gentle reminder that faith is most healthy when it is least self-aware and most Christ-aware.

Acts 7 shows Stephen seeing the heavens opened and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. T. Austin-Sparks reminds us that clear sight of the Lord often brings resistance on earth. When the kingdom breaks in through a believer, it unsettles the patterns that ignore God. That is why faithful witness can draw fire. It is not because we are difficult people. It is because the life of Jesus challenges the current.

Romans 2:1 holds up a mirror. It shows how easy it is to see what is wrong in someone else while missing the same patterns in ourselves. Ray Stedman points out how we dodge this mirror. We miss our own blind spots. We forget what we have done. We rename our faults so they look smaller. The point is not to shame us. The point is to bring us back to Jesus where mercy and truth meet.

David treasures the lovingkindness of God and pictures it like a safe shadow where weary people can rest. Bob Hoekstra points us to Psalm 36:7, where men and women draw near to the Lord and find shelter under His wings. This is not a small comfort. It is the kindness of God in action, mercy holding back what we deserve, goodness pouring out what we need.

John 20:22 shows Jesus imparting the Holy Spirit to His disciples, not as a prize to earn, but as a gracious gift. A. B. Simpson highlights the simplicity of receiving. He encourages us to live open to the Spirit’s present ministry, not clinging to yesterday’s experience, but welcoming His life now.

Galatians 5:1 calls me to stand fast in the freedom that Jesus gives. Miles Stanford reminds me that the Father relates to me on grace ground, not performance ground. I do not stand before God because I finally became fit. I stand because I am placed in the Son. My footing is not my record. My footing is Jesus.

Matthew 6 invites me to live this day with God, not tomorrow and not yesterday. In the Lord’s pattern of prayer, daily bread comes in today’s portion, and mercy flows in relationships as forgiven people forgive. I appreciate how Witness Lee points us here with clarity and care. Thank you, Brother Lee, for calling my heart back to simple dependence and generous grace.

There is a tenderness in Matthew 26. Jesus invites His friends to stay awake with Him in Gethsemane. Oswald Chambers presses that invitation into our present moment. We are not watching for a distant Savior to check in on our plans. We are learning to watch with Jesus, to see what He sees, and to share His heart as the Word shapes our outlook.

Hope is not wishful thinking dressed in church words. In Jesus, hope has substance. E. Stanley Jones points out that the Christian story redeemed the very idea of hope. Because the cross and resurrection are real, hope is no mirage. The God of hope fills us with joy and peace in believing, so that by the Holy Spirit we abound in hope. That is a present-tense gift with Monday morning traction.

Stephen declared that the Most High does not live in buildings made by human hands. He was not tearing down reverent spaces. He was pointing us to something greater that Jesus has brought near. The New Testament keeps opening this window. God is building a living house, not with stone blocks, but with people who belong to His Son.

Romans 1:24 speaks of God giving people over to what they insist on pursuing. It is not God throwing people away. It is God letting a rebellious crowd walk the road they chose so the road itself can teach them it does not satisfy. Ray Stedman helps us see how this plays out in real life. When a culture trades worship of the Creator for worship of created things, the first cracks often show up in how we treat our bodies and each other. The deeper issue is not just behavior. The deeper issue is misplaced worship and empty hearts.

John 17:6 says that the Father gave a people to Jesus. Oswald Chambers presses this tender reality into everyday life. A disciple is not a spiritual showpiece. A disciple belongs to Jesus, learns His heart by the Holy Spirit, and is sent in His life and love. This is not about climbing a ladder to God. It is about trusting union with the One who calls us His own.

Mark 6 shows Jesus inviting tired friends to step aside with Him to a quiet place for a short rest. That scene is tender. It feels like a hand on the shoulder and a kind voice saying, pause with Me. Today’s reading from A. B. Simpson points me back to that simple invitation. Growth is not a race of frantic activity. It is the fruit of staying close to Jesus, letting the Holy Spirit be the source across an ordinary day.

David keeps pointing us to a word that carries the weight of grace in the Old Testament, lovingkindness. It is God’s loyal mercy and daily goodness poured out on those who belong to Him. Bob Hoekstra highlights how David does not lean on resolve or mood. He leans on the Lord’s lovingkindness, asking God to continue it, counting it better than life, and seeking to hear it in the morning.

Ephesians 6:11 calls me to put on the whole armor of God so I can stand against the schemes that tug at my mind and pace. Today’s reading in Abide Above reminds me that my Father reigns, and even what the enemy intends for harm cannot outrun the Father’s boundary or purpose. This is not a call to argue about why hard things come. It is an invitation to rest in who holds me, and to stand in what Jesus has already won.

“Our Father in the heavens” begins with a family word, not a formula. Today’s reading from Witness Lee reminds me that the first three petitions of the Lord’s Prayer turn my attention to the Father’s name set apart, the Son’s kingdom, and the Spirit’s will shaping life on earth as it is in heaven. I am grateful for how Lee points us to this upward posture, then brings it right down into daily steps.

Revelation 1:17 to 18 records John falling at the feet of the risen Jesus, then being lifted by His reassuring hand. Today’s reading in His Victorious Indwelling gathers words from Jonathan Edwards and Jeanne Guyon that echo that same kindness. Edwards describes being overcome by the excellence of the Son of God. Guyon speaks of deep peace when every desire settles in God. Nick Harrison’s curation points our attention to the Living One who steadies trembling hearts and realigns the will in love.

Colossians 3:2 calls me to set my mind on things above, not on earthly things. T. Austin-Sparks reminds us that believers drift when our inner gravity settles on what is passing. The early church kept a living sense of heaven’s call. That vision moved ordinary people to live from Jesus, not from the narrowing pull of this world.

I’ve never been comfortable with the phrase “dying to self.” It’s common in Christian circles, but when you look closely at Scripture, it doesn’t quite line up with what God has already done for us in Jesus. The Bible gives us a far richer and more liberating picture: we don’t keep dying to self. We recognize that the old man has already been crucified, and we deny the self-life (the flesh) as our source.

E. Stanley Jones reminds us that the mind of Jesus was one of complete self-surrender. Philippians 2:5-11 outlines the path of Jesus, who emptied Himself, humbled Himself, and became obedient to death on a cross. From that deepest place of renunciation, the Father exalted Him, giving Him the name above every name. Jones makes clear that when we take on the mind of Jesus, we find our truest self not by clinging to our own importance but by letting go. In losing ourselves, we discover who we were created to be.