The following devotions are written and shared weekly by Pastor Steve Harmon.
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Day One
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
The focus of today’s devotion was 1 Peter 1:1-2. Peter writes: “To God’s elect, strangers in the world, . . . who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and sprinkling by his blood: Grace and peace be yours in abundance.” In his greeting, Peter reaffirms what is true – what he shares together with all those to whom he writes this letter. He and they (and we) have been chosen by God. They (and we) have been saved by grace – by God’s choice. He and they (and we) are being sanctified by the Holy Spirit – we are all God’s workmanship as He conforms us to the image of Jesus. He and they (and we) have been washed clean in the blood of the Lamb. Jesus has come to us through the waters of Baptism to claim us as His own – to mark us with His name. Clothed in Jesus’ righteousness, we have become an adopted child of God. This is more than a greetings. This is more than a “hi, how are you” kind of thing. This is a reminder of the gracious work of God that has rescued us from the power of sin and death and given us a place at His table. We have been united together in that gift. And every time we greet each other, we would do well to remind ourselves of whose we are.
Day Two
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Today’s devotion is based on 2 Corinthians 13:14. It is probably familiar to many because it is often used as a benediction to our worship together on a Sunday. It brings our worship together to a close. It is a blessing that goes with us out into the world. And it’s not a hoped for blessing. We don’t hope that God goes with us. We know that He does. When we hear this as a benediction, God is saying to us that all we have received from His hand through His Word proclaimed and heard, goes with us. We have once again heard of God’s grace revealed to us through Jesus’ saving work. We heard it spoken to us in the words of absolution – the forgiveness of our sin. We heard it in Jesus’ invitation to join Him at His table in the Lord’s Supper. We have been reminded of the promises of God attached to the waters of Baptism – promises that are ours by virtue of our being united together with Jesus in His death and life. Those promises tell us that not only are we God’s dearly loved child, He is always with us. There is nothing that can separate us from Him. So this benediction is not just a hope. It is our reality. God goes with us to guard and keep us in His care – to keep us steadfast in His Word and the hope that is ours in Jesus and the resurrection that He shares.
Day Three
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Today’s devotion from Portals of Prayer is pretty good. It is entitled “Uncreated God: Nothing to Everything.” It focuses on God’s creative work and His re-creative work made necessary because of Adam’s sin. I reprint it for your reading and meditation. “By His spoken Word, God created. In the beginning, there was only God. He spoke: light, heaven, water! And it was good. God spoke: dry land, seas, plants, stars, seasons, time, order, animals – creatures for land, sea, and sky – all things! And it was good. Out of nothing, God spoke: people – man, woman, us. And it was very good. Yet, since the fall, on our own, we are nothing but selfish, wretched creatures. We cannot believe without the Spirit’s gift of faith. God loves life and loves His people. God spoke a word of promise in Genesis 3:15. By His Word, the Father conceived His Son in the womb of Mary in order to fulfill His promise. Still today, Jesus’ Word creates the reality of sins forgiven through the Sacraments and through our pastors in Confession and Absolution: ‘Your sins are forgiven.’ When God speaks, there is life. All creation, Jesus, forgiveness, the resurrection, eternal life – it is good. You and I enter this world with nothing. As nothing. Thanks be to God for His deluge of overflowing love for us! He creates, redeems, and sanctifies us. He keeps us in the one true faith. This faith is the most important gift; it is truly the difference between life and death – and that is everything.”
Day Four
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
The author entitles his devotion “Infinite God.” And God is indeed infinite. He has always existed. He has no beginning or end. And that’s impossible for us to comprehend. Our existence has a beginning and it will have an end (at least in this world). So we can’t really relate to infinity. And maybe that’s why the author focuses instead on God’s omnipresence. That’s still a concept that is difficult for us to comprehend, but at least we have some points of reference. We can see mountains and valleys, rivers and oceans, the sun and the moon and the stars. So that gives us a frame of reference for thinking about God being present everywhere. In Jeremiah, the focus is on the desire of us all to do like Adam and Eve and try to hide our sin. We often make decisions in secret – do things in behind closed doors – and truly believe that no one is the wiser. But tells us that there is no place we can go where He can’t see and know. There is no secret hidden from Him. We could say (and often do) that God’s omnipresence has a positive and a negative side. It’s a comfort to know that God is everywhere. And it’s also a fearful thing when we consider that He knows our secret thoughts and sees our secret deeds. The reality is that it’s all positive. He sees it all so that He can work to deliver us from those secret places where we hide our sin. He does that because sin is like a cancer. If it remains hidden, it will consume us. If it is brought out into the open and confessed, then that cancer can be removed through the forgiveness won for us and given to us by Jesus.
Day Five
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
I am reprinting today’s devotion from Portals of Prayer for your reading and meditation. Enjoy. “When my parents got married fifty years ago, they processed to the hymn ‘O God, Our Help in Ages Past.’ On a day full of joy for the future, their future hope rested on God’s past faithfulness. John’s Revelation reminds us that confidence in God rests on the past and on the eternal nature of God. John identifies God as ‘the Alpha and the Omega,’ the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet, ‘who is and who was and who is to come.’ God has no beginning and no end. Fifty years of marriage is a long time, but God is eternal: past, present, and future. God knows our past sins and our unkind thoughts today. He sent Jesus to cover our sins, once for all, with His death and resurrection. Take comfort! Because God is eternal, we have a secure identity: we know who we are because we know who He is. We are His people, claimed by Baptism. We are forgiven, redeemed, and loved. In the words of the hymn, ‘Under the shadow of Thy throne Thy saints have dwelt secure.’ We praise the name of Him who is ‘our shelter from the stormy blast,’ ‘our guard while troubles last.’ When this life ends, we’ll forever praise God, ‘our help, . . . Our hope, . . . And our eternal home!’”
Day Six
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Today’s devotion entitled “Almighty God,” focuses on Abram (later renamed Abraham) who walked before the Lord blameless. The author makes a distinction between being blameless and being perfect. He writes: “Almighty god told Abram to ‘walk before Me, and be blameless.’ He calls us to do the same. Blameless denotes one who acts with integrity. A blameless person is not sinless; Jesus is the only perfect human. Rather, a blameless person is one who seeks to obey God because seeking God means faith, which receives the promise of God, namely the righteousness of Christ given us as gift.” While I agree with much of what he writes, I’m not sure that seeking God means faith. There are many people who are seeking God – Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and on and on (even those with no religious connections). And that calls to my mind what Luther says in the Large Catechism concerning the 1st Commandment. He says that we will believe in something. If what we cling to is the one true God, then our faith is true. If not, then our faith is false. I guess I would say there is a distinction between faith that trusts in a false god and faith that trusts in the one true God. The latter is saving faith and the other is not. And because the tomb is empty, I will trust in the Word of God – God as He is revealed in the Scriptures – because the Word of God who is living and active, who took on human flesh and died to make atonement for our sins, rose from the dead just like He said. I will cling to the promises of God that have all been made YES in Jesus’ saving work done for me and given to me.
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
The focus of today’s devotion was 1 Peter 1:1-2. Peter writes: “To God’s elect, strangers in the world, . . . who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and sprinkling by his blood: Grace and peace be yours in abundance.” In his greeting, Peter reaffirms what is true – what he shares together with all those to whom he writes this letter. He and they (and we) have been chosen by God. They (and we) have been saved by grace – by God’s choice. He and they (and we) are being sanctified by the Holy Spirit – we are all God’s workmanship as He conforms us to the image of Jesus. He and they (and we) have been washed clean in the blood of the Lamb. Jesus has come to us through the waters of Baptism to claim us as His own – to mark us with His name. Clothed in Jesus’ righteousness, we have become an adopted child of God. This is more than a greetings. This is more than a “hi, how are you” kind of thing. This is a reminder of the gracious work of God that has rescued us from the power of sin and death and given us a place at His table. We have been united together in that gift. And every time we greet each other, we would do well to remind ourselves of whose we are.
Day Two
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Today’s devotion is based on 2 Corinthians 13:14. It is probably familiar to many because it is often used as a benediction to our worship together on a Sunday. It brings our worship together to a close. It is a blessing that goes with us out into the world. And it’s not a hoped for blessing. We don’t hope that God goes with us. We know that He does. When we hear this as a benediction, God is saying to us that all we have received from His hand through His Word proclaimed and heard, goes with us. We have once again heard of God’s grace revealed to us through Jesus’ saving work. We heard it spoken to us in the words of absolution – the forgiveness of our sin. We heard it in Jesus’ invitation to join Him at His table in the Lord’s Supper. We have been reminded of the promises of God attached to the waters of Baptism – promises that are ours by virtue of our being united together with Jesus in His death and life. Those promises tell us that not only are we God’s dearly loved child, He is always with us. There is nothing that can separate us from Him. So this benediction is not just a hope. It is our reality. God goes with us to guard and keep us in His care – to keep us steadfast in His Word and the hope that is ours in Jesus and the resurrection that He shares.
Day Three
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Today’s devotion from Portals of Prayer is pretty good. It is entitled “Uncreated God: Nothing to Everything.” It focuses on God’s creative work and His re-creative work made necessary because of Adam’s sin. I reprint it for your reading and meditation. “By His spoken Word, God created. In the beginning, there was only God. He spoke: light, heaven, water! And it was good. God spoke: dry land, seas, plants, stars, seasons, time, order, animals – creatures for land, sea, and sky – all things! And it was good. Out of nothing, God spoke: people – man, woman, us. And it was very good. Yet, since the fall, on our own, we are nothing but selfish, wretched creatures. We cannot believe without the Spirit’s gift of faith. God loves life and loves His people. God spoke a word of promise in Genesis 3:15. By His Word, the Father conceived His Son in the womb of Mary in order to fulfill His promise. Still today, Jesus’ Word creates the reality of sins forgiven through the Sacraments and through our pastors in Confession and Absolution: ‘Your sins are forgiven.’ When God speaks, there is life. All creation, Jesus, forgiveness, the resurrection, eternal life – it is good. You and I enter this world with nothing. As nothing. Thanks be to God for His deluge of overflowing love for us! He creates, redeems, and sanctifies us. He keeps us in the one true faith. This faith is the most important gift; it is truly the difference between life and death – and that is everything.”
Day Four
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
The author entitles his devotion “Infinite God.” And God is indeed infinite. He has always existed. He has no beginning or end. And that’s impossible for us to comprehend. Our existence has a beginning and it will have an end (at least in this world). So we can’t really relate to infinity. And maybe that’s why the author focuses instead on God’s omnipresence. That’s still a concept that is difficult for us to comprehend, but at least we have some points of reference. We can see mountains and valleys, rivers and oceans, the sun and the moon and the stars. So that gives us a frame of reference for thinking about God being present everywhere. In Jeremiah, the focus is on the desire of us all to do like Adam and Eve and try to hide our sin. We often make decisions in secret – do things in behind closed doors – and truly believe that no one is the wiser. But tells us that there is no place we can go where He can’t see and know. There is no secret hidden from Him. We could say (and often do) that God’s omnipresence has a positive and a negative side. It’s a comfort to know that God is everywhere. And it’s also a fearful thing when we consider that He knows our secret thoughts and sees our secret deeds. The reality is that it’s all positive. He sees it all so that He can work to deliver us from those secret places where we hide our sin. He does that because sin is like a cancer. If it remains hidden, it will consume us. If it is brought out into the open and confessed, then that cancer can be removed through the forgiveness won for us and given to us by Jesus.
Day Five
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
I am reprinting today’s devotion from Portals of Prayer for your reading and meditation. Enjoy. “When my parents got married fifty years ago, they processed to the hymn ‘O God, Our Help in Ages Past.’ On a day full of joy for the future, their future hope rested on God’s past faithfulness. John’s Revelation reminds us that confidence in God rests on the past and on the eternal nature of God. John identifies God as ‘the Alpha and the Omega,’ the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet, ‘who is and who was and who is to come.’ God has no beginning and no end. Fifty years of marriage is a long time, but God is eternal: past, present, and future. God knows our past sins and our unkind thoughts today. He sent Jesus to cover our sins, once for all, with His death and resurrection. Take comfort! Because God is eternal, we have a secure identity: we know who we are because we know who He is. We are His people, claimed by Baptism. We are forgiven, redeemed, and loved. In the words of the hymn, ‘Under the shadow of Thy throne Thy saints have dwelt secure.’ We praise the name of Him who is ‘our shelter from the stormy blast,’ ‘our guard while troubles last.’ When this life ends, we’ll forever praise God, ‘our help, . . . Our hope, . . . And our eternal home!’”
Day Six
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Today’s devotion entitled “Almighty God,” focuses on Abram (later renamed Abraham) who walked before the Lord blameless. The author makes a distinction between being blameless and being perfect. He writes: “Almighty god told Abram to ‘walk before Me, and be blameless.’ He calls us to do the same. Blameless denotes one who acts with integrity. A blameless person is not sinless; Jesus is the only perfect human. Rather, a blameless person is one who seeks to obey God because seeking God means faith, which receives the promise of God, namely the righteousness of Christ given us as gift.” While I agree with much of what he writes, I’m not sure that seeking God means faith. There are many people who are seeking God – Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and on and on (even those with no religious connections). And that calls to my mind what Luther says in the Large Catechism concerning the 1st Commandment. He says that we will believe in something. If what we cling to is the one true God, then our faith is true. If not, then our faith is false. I guess I would say there is a distinction between faith that trusts in a false god and faith that trusts in the one true God. The latter is saving faith and the other is not. And because the tomb is empty, I will trust in the Word of God – God as He is revealed in the Scriptures – because the Word of God who is living and active, who took on human flesh and died to make atonement for our sins, rose from the dead just like He said. I will cling to the promises of God that have all been made YES in Jesus’ saving work done for me and given to me.