Daily Devo

Listen to today’s devo!

Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.” (John 4:26)

Expanded Passage: John 4:4-26, 39

Sometimes I’ll use a funny anecdote while teaching to make a point. The story will later be recounted by a student without any reference to why I told the story. Pastors stand at the church exit hoping that the sermon had some profound impact on the attendees, only to hear how the illustration they used reminded someone of something unrelated to the intended topic. We get so wrapped up in our own busy thoughts that we don’t always see the truth that is right in front of us.

There are many distractions in the story of the woman at the well. Did Jesus go through Samaria because it was a shortcut, or did he have divine knowledge? Was she there during the day because she was ostracized, or was it the first opportunity she had to fetch water? Was she divorced five times because she was a sinner, a widow, or did she just have bad luck, since a man could write a certificate of divorce if he disliked his wife (Deut. 24:3)?

The Samaritan woman acknowledged the coming Messiah, to which Jesus responds, “I am he.” Don’t become distracted and miss the point. When sharing the good news, our purpose should be aligned with John’s purpose—“that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name” (20:31).

Share your belief so that others might live.

Priscilla Hammond is an ordained pastor and associate professor in the Benson School of Business at Southern Wesleyan University (SC).

© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.

Listen to today’s devo!

Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony. (John 4:39)

Expanded Passage: John 4:39

Years ago, a student in my Sunday school class asked for a meeting, where she said I was a poor teacher in whose class she could barely remain awake. She lobbed harsh criticisms at me. She had been a member of a new age cult for twenty years and seemed skeptical of basic scriptural teachings. I had tried to share the good news but didn’t believe it was getting through.

The Samaritans practiced a form of Judaism, using a modified Torah and worshiping God on Mt. Gerizim, not the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Their temple had been destroyed by the Jewish high priest. There were centuries of distrust between the sects. They would be skeptical of a Jewish rabbi sharing a theological conversation with a Samaritan woman. But Jesus did, she shared the good news as the first Christian evangelist, and many believed.

My student messaged me an apology a year later. I shared that I hoped she had continued to seek God. She had joined the church’s recovery ministry, had grown in her faith, and was stepping into a leadership role. Not everyone whom Jesus taught believed in him, and we also may not see whether our evangelism will be productive. May you experience the growth of that long-dormant seed sown and watered in faith that only God can germinate (1 Cor. 3:6).

Believe that God can use you to sow the good news.

Priscilla Hammond is an ordained pastor and associate professor in the Benson School of Business at Southern Wesleyan University (SC).

© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.

Listen to today’s devo!

“True worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.” (John 4:23)

Expanded Passage: John 4:20-26

I grew up in a high church tradition. Our worship was marked by formal liturgy, rituals, and sacraments. I memorized prayers and creeds in catechism class and learned our duty to attend weekly worship. As a young adult, I moved far from home and far from my faith, but the need to connect to the body of believers was a habit that I never broke. Eventually, I found a contemporary Wesleyan church whose style was extremely different from the church of my youth.

In conversation, Jesus learned that the Samaritan woman understood worship and was interested in theological ideas. She understood that worship was important, but she also associated worship with a place. The Samaritans were Jews who had intermarried with the Assyrians, so they were not allowed to worship in Jerusalem. They developed their own style of worship on Mt. Gerizim, which they believed to be the location of Abraham and Jacob’s altars.

We will encounter people who are different from us in our cultural backgrounds, languages, and worship styles: singing hymns or choruses, reading the creeds or experiencing concerts of prayer, practicing contemplative solitude or attending youth group lock-ins. Worship is not a place or a style. Moving Christians from one church or worship style to another isn’t our goal. Our evangelistic assignment is to reach those who are not following the one true God in the Spirit and in truth.

Discuss faith with someone from a different background.

Priscilla Hammond is an ordained pastor and associate professor in the Benson School of Business at Southern Wesleyan University (SC).

© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.

Listen to today’s devo!

“What you have just said is quite true.” (John 4:18)

Expanded Passage: John 4:16-19

In 1738, Charles Wesley wrote that the Spirit of God “chased away the darkness of my unbelief,” and a few days later, his brother John declared his own newly found freedom from sin as “the free grace of God in Christ.” A year later, John’s sermon and Charles’ hymn, both entitled “Free Grace,” were published.

When Jesus told the Samaritan woman to go get her husband, she replied, “I have no husband” (v. 17). Jesus said she had told the truth and that he knew her history. Later she said he knew “everything I ever did” (John 4:29). According to the hymn, renamed “And Can It Be That I Should Gain,” the Wesleys had been bound in sin and darkness, but now could sing, “Amazing love! how can it be / That Thou, my God, should die for me?” I imagine the woman running to her town, loudly singing, “No condemnation now I dread; / Jesus, and all in Him is mine! / My chains fell off, my heart was free; / I rose, went forth and followed Thee.”

The woman, a worshiper of God, honestly sought the truth. She evangelized her whole town. The Wesley brothers, products of a Christian home and Christian university, honestly sought the truth. Charles wrote 6,500 hymns. John preached 40,000 sermons. Before we can share our faith, we need to allow the Holy Spirit to evaluate our hearts.

Grow your faith and witness with honest confession.

Priscilla Hammond is an ordained pastor and associate professor in the Benson School of Business at Southern Wesleyan University (SC).

© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.

Listen to today’s devo!

If you knew the gift of God . . . you would have asked him and he would have given you living water. (John 4:10)

Expanded Passage: John 4:8-15

Children must learn to understand consequences. Conditional statements like, “If you do this, then this happens” safeguard them and help develop emotional maturity. Scripture uses many of the same if/then phrases to help parent us spiritually. Jesus said if the Samaritan woman knew “the gift of God,” (4:10) then she’d ask for and receive a “spring of water welling up to eternal life” (4:14).

We visited Jacob’s Well two thousand years later and drank the same cold, clear water. Afterward, walking in the desert of Mt. Gerizim, we were soon thirsty again. If you drink well water, then you will not quench your thirst for long. But the gift of God is not physical water. John 7:39 clarifies that streams of living water are a reference to the Holy Spirit. Isaiah used the same if/then phrasing: “If you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,” then you will be “like a spring whose waters never fail” (58:10–11). The Samaritan woman was hungry for spiritual truth and Jesus spent time in conversation with her.

Jesus spent his ministry having if/then conversations. We can model his conversational evangelism, telling spiritually hungry people, “If you declare with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Rom. 10:9). That is the gift of God.

Have a spiritual conversation and allow the Holy Spirit to flow.

Priscilla Hammond is an ordained pastor and associate professor in the Benson School of Business at Southern Wesleyan University (SC).

© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.

Listen to today’s devo!

Now he had to go through Samaria. (John 4:4)

Expanded Passage: John 4:4-8

My favorite part of human resources is assessing knowledge, skills, and abilities to determine job fit. I brought that into the church, teaching believers to find their fit in the kingdom using various methods such as the APEST test (apostle, prophet, evangelist, shepherd/pastor, teacher—Eph. 4:11). I was excited to learn my score, expecting teacher to be at the top. Nope. Evangelist. Evangelist? John the Evangelist wrote a whole book explaining why you should believe, and I’ve never even drawn a cross-bridge on a napkin.

In John 4:4, Jesus “had to go through Samaria.” Intentional in his ministry, he didn’t just have to take the quickest route to Galilee. He had to tell the woman her story so that she could tell his story. He had to surprise the disciples by talking to an unexpected audience. Jesus desires that his disciples will be just as intentional in our ministry. After his resurrection, he told his disciples, “You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria” (Acts 1:8). Jesus had to witness in Samaria because we have to witness in Samaria.

Jesus talked to people. He told stories. The APEST test’s description of evangelist includes being able to talk to anyone and being full of great stories that people want to hear. What greater story is there than how Jesus has transformed you? Who is waiting for you to tell your transformation story so that they can tell theirs?

Share the story of how Jesus transformed your life.

Priscilla Hammond is an ordained pastor and associate professor in the Benson School of Business at Southern Wesleyan University (SC).

© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.

Listen to today’s devo!

He remembers his covenant forever, the promise he made, for a thousand generations. . . . He brought out his people with rejoicing, his chosen ones with shouts of joy. (Ps. 105:8, 43)

Expanded Passage: Psalm 105:8-45

It seems the older we get the more we long for what we remember as the best times of our lives. A time when life was simple and carefree. A time when the burden of responsibility was lighter than what it is now. We recall our high school days as easy, when the only thing we were responsible for was getting our homework completed on time. There seemed to be no other care in the world at that time. And now, our world appears bigger than a homework assignment.

But God . . . God is the same yesterday as he is today! His promise for joy everlasting is the same now as it was then. We can live longing for those joy-filled, carefree days of yesterday and miss out on the joy he has for us now and for our futures. Remember when you first met God? Oh, the joy, peace, and freedom of a burdened lifted! God is still the God of joy and peace and still gives freedom from whatever burden is weighing you down.

A football team, behind in the first half, comes out of the tunnel with their coach shouting for joy and rejoicing with renewed hope for the second half as the coach promises he is with them on the playing field. God is that coach!

Remember God’s faithfulness and shout for joy!

Carol Jimerson is a wife, mother, and grandmother who loves writing, the outdoors, and mentoring. She is an ordained minister in The Wesleyan Church, Penn York District.

© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.

Listen to today’s devo!

“You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony.” (John 3:10–11)

Expanded Passage: John 3:1-21

Never underestimate the wonder of church camp and the teaching of a believing saint.

Miss Kay’s teaching gave this thirteen-year-old a deeper love for Jesus and that love has grown and matured over many decades. I still look back to that short week so many years ago with great delight and fondness.

Perhaps Nicodemus went to a Jewish version of a church camp in his early years. Being a ruler of Israel, he was steeped in the Hebrew scriptures from the time he was a young boy. He would have read and reread and probably written scroll after scroll, deciphering the words of the Pentateuch, the book of Isaiah and Jeremiah, and many other sacred writings. What a treasure trove of knowledge he would have learned from the rabbis. He could have said along with the psalmist, “I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you” (Ps. 119:11). This man, Jesus, stirred something in Nicodemus’ heart. He wanted to know more. But how? Being a member of the ruling class that was against Jesus, Nicodemus would have to meet him in secret.

Spend time, like Nicodemus, in Jesus’ presence to grow your faith. When the Spirit moves you, act like Miss Kay and share your love for Christ with the world.

Open your heart to receive and spread God’s Word.

Lora Goff-Pitts has taught Bible classes for forty years at her local Wesleyan church. She is a mother, grandmother, author, and retired teacher. She and her husband, Rex, reside in Noblesville, IN.

© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.

Listen to today’s devo!

This is the verdict: Light has come into the world. (John 3:19)

Expanded Passage: John 3:19-21

Instead of improving after a less-than-perfect surgery to remove cataracts, my eyesight began to deteriorate. Adding more light and using a magnifier was helpful, but I wanted to see more clearly. I have always been one to read wherever I see words: cereal boxes, headlines, road signs, titles, instruction booklets. You name it. I have many books on my shelves ready to be read, and many more days of devotions to study. I long to be able to see!

That’s why this portion of Scripture resonates with me. Even though my written thoughts above deal with the flesh, and Jesus is of the Spirit, it excites me to know that he has come into the world bringing light to shine through the darkness. He’s calling out the evil of sin that has done its work in darkness and under cover. No more will sin have free rein through spiritual blindness. No longer will sin be hidden, but it will be exposed in the light and magnification of Jesus’ truth.

Joy and gladness ring in the hearts of those who have run to that light and allowed it to burn out the darkness that kept them in bondage and despair. Though my physical sight may deteriorate, in the warm light of salvation, my spiritual sight grows stronger.

Improve your spiritual vision by spending time in the light of truth.

Lora Goff-Pitts has taught Bible classes for forty years at her local Wesleyan church. She is a mother, grandmother, author, and retired teacher. She and her husband, Rex, reside in Noblesville, IN.

© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.

Listen to today’s devo!

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16)

Expanded Passage: John 3:13-18

When my children were young, I wanted them to know about the God who loved them. And to know how he gave the precious gift of his only Son to show the depth of his great love. I posted Scripture on index cards and taped them to the mirrors, the fridge, and throughout our home. Deuteronomy 6:7, 9 says, “Impress them [the Lord’s commandments] on your children. . . . Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.” It is important to God that his children, young and old, know his Word and how deeply he loves.

Today we see John 3:16 posted on billboards, cars, trucks, buses, at baseball parks, at football arenas, and even in secluded areas. This verse for us is not unlike the commandments were for the Israelites: we keep it on our doorframes, on our gates, and impress it upon our children. I wonder, do people understand the meaning of a love so deep when they read John 3:16? Hopefully, as they encounter this verse, they begin to understand God’s Word and how deeply he loves them.

God’s Son didn’t come to condemn us for wrongdoing, for it says, “Whoever believes in him [Jesus] is not condemned.” His passion for us is that we believe in the “name of God’s one and only Son” (v. 18).

Let the words of John 3:16 sink deep into your heart.

Lora Goff-Pitts has taught Bible classes for forty years at her local Wesleyan church. She is a mother, grandmother, author, and retired teacher. She and her husband, Rex, reside in Noblesville, IN.

© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.