Author: Dwight Clough

By the word of the LORD one of the sons of the prophets said to his companion, "Strike me with your weapon," but the man refused. So the prophet said, "Because you have not obeyed the LORD, as soon as you leave me a lion will kill you." And after the man went away, a lion found him and killed him. — 1 Kings 20:35-36The man refused to obey. "No," he said, "clearly you are made in the image of God, and you have done nothing wrong, and I have no right to assault you, and my hands will not…

My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods; with singing lips my mouth will praise you. — Psalm 63:5One of the delights of being a father is listening to my children sing. I’m not talking so much about scheduled song — as in a church service. I’m talking about spontaneous expression of joy and peace and security. I don’t know, exactly, how they learn it. They seem somehow to be born with it, because without any prompting on our part, sometimes they just sing, even when they are very small.It isn’t a show. It isn’t a performance.…

O God, You are my God, earnestly I seek You; my soul thirsts for You, my body longs for You, in a dry and weary land where there is no water. — Psalm 63:1I’ve felt a bit intimidated by this passage, to tell you the truth. My desire for God seems pretty weak by comparison. How much energy do I put into seeking God? By comparison, I feel casual, almost shallow. The author, David, must be in a whole different league of spirituality than me. Or so I thought.What is the difference between the "spiritual" and the not so "spiritual"?…

"Don’t ask for just a few." — 2 Kings 4:3Did you ever stop to think of things from God’s point of view. Here He is, limitless love, wanting to pour Himself out into our lives. There’s only one problem: our limited capacity to receive. So what does God do? He increases our capacity. He wants to give us more.In this story, a woman was in a panic. Her sons were about to sold into slavery to cover her late husband’s debt. She had nothing — no money, no power, and very little hope. But God said, "I can turn this…

From birth I was cast upon you; from my mother’s womb you have been my God. — Psalm 22:10The past is part of you. If you’ve read my book, The Gift of Transformation, you know that I spent years trying to divorce myself from my past. I tried to ignore it, to overcome it, to forget it, to pretend it didn’t happen. But none of those things worked.I finally realized the truth: You can try to forget the past, but the past doesn’t forget you.You are that three year old, that sixteen year old. They are part of you. Everything…

If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? — 1 John 3:17God knows that our hearts are smaller than His. He knows that there is only so much room for grief, for empathy, for love. And our money, which is really just an expression of our hearts, is also limited.That’s why God speaks to us. Some of us cry for single moms, others cry for children who are abused, still others cry for the "people of heaven" who live and die in…

Let us fix our eyes on Jesus … who for the joy set before him endured the cross … — Hebrews 12:2… continued from yesterday …Why is it that Richard Wurmbrand’s prison cell would glitter to him like a thousand diamonds? Why would another brother who was tortured with boiling oil see the glory of God? Why was the broken, raspy voice of a fellow prisoner singing the most beautiful song in the world?Isn’t it because in their pain they connected with the One who found joy? Jesus descended into pain, but rose into joy. And so, He holds joy…

Let us fix our eyes on Jesus … who for the joy set before him endured the cross … — Hebrews 12:2Is God happy? At the end of the movie, Schindler’s List, Schindler looks around at his remaining possessions and suddenly realizes what they truly cost in terms of human life. He spent money on a car, for example, and, as a result, that money could not be used to ransom people from the Holocaust.We Christians struggle with the same feelings. No matter how much we give, no matter how much we serve, deeply hurting and desperately needy people remain.…

If, while we seek to be justified in Christ, it becomes evident that we ourselves are sinners, does that mean that Christ promotes sin? Absolutely not! — Galatians 2:17I wish Christians were always a good advertisement for Christianity, but, as you and I both know, that is not the case. Gandhi was turned away from Christ by a man who was supposed to be an ambassador for Christ, but he was an ambassador for racial prejudice instead. Many evil things have been done in the name of Jesus — I go through a catalog of stories in my mind –…

Naaman’s servants went to him and said, "My father, if the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more, then, when he tells you, ‘Wash and be cleansed’!" … 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." — 2 Kings 5:13,20Here we have two different kinds of servants. The servants of Naaman were…