Keys for Kids - daily devotions and Bible stories for kids and families

Read: Joshua 1:1-9

The sick feeling in Micah’s stomach got worse as the plane lifted off the ground and lurched into the air. Everything below him was the size of ants. Not only did he feel sick to his stomach, his chest felt tight too. Dad sat next to him and tried to smile encouragingly. It didn’t help.

Since his parents’ divorce he’d had to spend most of his time with Mom and went to visit Dad in the summer and over Christmas. Every time he left Mom, Micah felt scared. He wasn’t afraid of his dad—he loved him—just scared of change. Of traveling to new places. Airports. Big cities. The sadness he felt from his parent’s divorce was bad enough, but the fear that came with it made him feel like his life was out of control.

The plane leveled off, and Micah began to breathe a little easier. Dad reached over and gave him a hug. “Change is hard, isn’t it? New things and places can be uncomfortable. But I know something that might help you.” Dad pulled out his Bible. “This morning I read about Joshua leading the children of Israel into their new land. There were bad guys to fight, he’d never led anyone into battle before, and change was all around him. But God was with him and brought him through it all.”

Dad squeezed Micah’s arm. “I know your mom’s and my divorce has been very difficult for you and how many changes you’ve had to go through. But I also know that because you trust in Jesus, God is with you and will never leave you. Wherever you go, He goes. God was with Joshua just like He promised, and He promises to be with you too. You don’t have to be afraid.” After Micah listened to Dad read some verses from his Bible, he thought about it for a while. He liked the idea of never being alone. Someone would always be with him when new things happened or new people came into his life. And not just anyone, but someone who loved and cared about him. A trusted Friend— Jesus. Micah relaxed back into his seat and smiled. “You know, Dad, I think this is gonna be our best visit ever!”

–S.K. Fry

How about you?

Today's Key Verse:

Today's Key Thought:

Read: Psalm 51:6-10; Luke 11:37-41

"Mom, can we go home now? I’m sooo bored!” Stella slumped against the seat of the car.

“Stella, we’re almost done—kids, look! A whole block sale!” Mom pulled the car over to the side of the road.

Hayden excitedly pressed his nose against the window. “I love yard sailing!”

The family got out of the car. Hayden ran straight to a model airplane. Stella stuck close to her mom as they looked at different mugs. Mom picked up one with a lid just as Hayden came running back. He and Stella both saw it at the same time, and the siblings gasped in unison.

“That is the prettiest mug I’ve ever seen!” Stella exclaimed.

“Mom, you have to get it!” Hayden said.

“All right, fine.” Mom laughed and brought the mug to the cashier.

When the family arrived home, Stella asked, “Mom, can I please have the mug?”

Mom smiled. “No, but if you clean it, you can be the first to drink out of it!”

Stella’s eyes sparkled. “Deal!” She ran excitedly to the sink. She opened the lid of the mug and immediately shut it. “Eww, it’s all gross on the inside!”

Mom came over and peered at the mug. “Kids, this is a perfect example of what I read during my devotions today! In the book of Matthew, Jesus told the Pharisees to first clean the inside of the cup, and then the outside will also be clean. What do you think that verse actually means?”

Stella wrinkled her nose in thought. “Oh, I know! God wants what we look like on the inside to matter more to us than our outward appearance.”

Hayden’s eyes widened. “God wants us to clean our insides?”

Stella smirked. “No, silly. God sees our hearts, and that’s what matters to Him.”

“Oh, I get it now!” said Hayden. “We need to let Jesus make us clean.”

“You got it,” said Mom. “When we trust Jesus as our Savior, He cleans our sin away and pours His love into our hearts. Then our outward actions will make His love visible to others.” She smiled. “Now, who wants some hot chocolate to go in that mug?”

–Summer Coleman

How about you?

Today's Key Verse:

Today's Key Verse:

Read: Psalm 42:1-4

"It’s still raining,” said Hayley. “Isn’t the sun ever going to shine again?”

“We need rain to make the garden grow,” said Mom. She smiled at her daughter. “This might be a good time for you to pray and read your Bible. You haven’t done that yet today,

“No—but I have some other things I want to do first.” Hayley quickly headed for the stairs. “Seems like all we do in this family is go to church and read the Bible and pray,” she mumbled to herself. She blushed when she saw Mom glance her way. Oops! I hope Mom didn’t hear that, she thought.

“Come with me to the garden,” said Mom. “I want to show you something.”

Outside, Mom plunged a shovel into the dirt and turned it over. The ground was quite wet on top, but a little way down, the dirt was dry.

“I thought it’d be muddy a mile below the surface!” said Hayley. “I guess we do need more rain.”

Hayley sighed. “You heard what I said earlier, didn’t you?”

“Yes, I did,” said Mom. “And I know it can be hard to do those things sometimes, but the Bible compares our need for Jesus to thirst. Even after we’ve put our faith in Him, we still need to spend time with Him so He can remind us that He has saved us and help us feel His love and presence in our lives. If we don’t pray, read His Word, and worship Him with other Christians regularly, we can lose sight of how much we need Him and become spiritually dry—just like this ground without rain.”

Hayley was silent as they headed back to the house. “I think I’ll go have my quiet time now,” she said once they were inside. “I’m feeling thirsty for God’s Word.”

–Cindy Huff

How about you?

Today's Key Verse:

Today's Key Thought:

Read: Proverbs 4:20-27; Matthew 14:22-32

Mara climbed up onto the beam Dad had built for her. She was determined to make the school gymnastics team, but after taking a few steps, she wobbled and nearly slipped off. “Focus your eyes on that picture you put up,” Mom said.

While staring at the picture on the wall across the room, Mara slowly lifted her foot. But when she glanced back at her mother, she tilted to the left and then swayed to the right. She tried to regain her balance, but had to hop down to keep from toppling off the beam. She climbed back up. “I’m gonna get this,” she said. “I just have to focus.”

After dinner that evening, Dad opened his Bible and handed it to Mara. “Why don’t you read a few verses from Proverbs for us?”

“Okay.” Mara took the Bible and began to read. When she finished, she looked up. “Proverbs 4:25 sounds like good advice for gymnastics. I need to look straight ahead and keep my eyes from wandering. Every time I lose my focus, I lose my balance.”

Mom nodded. “I have trouble with that too.”

“You do?” Mara grinned. “Do you get up on the beam and practice when I’m not around?”

Mom laughed. “No, but I have trouble in another area. As Christians, we need to keep our focus on Jesus so we don’t get distracted by things in this world and lose our balance in life.”

“Good question,” said Dad. “The passage you just read listed some ways to do that. Do you remember what it said we should do?”

“I know!” said Mara’s little brother. “It said we should pay attention to what God says.”

“And keep it in our hearts and not let it out of our sight,” added Mara.

Dad nodded. “Right. That means putting our faith in Jesus and looking to His Word for guidance in our lives. It also means confessing our sins to Jesus and trusting Him for the power to obey Him and show His love to others. Focusing our lives on Him will keep us in perfect balance.”

–Nance E. Keyes

How about you?

Today's Key Verse:

Today's Key Thought:

Read: Psalm 104:16-24

Dad rowed the boat to the edge of some lily pads. It was the best place in the lake to catch fish. As Alex sat in the boat with his father, he watched his red and white bobber closely and waited for it to go down, signaling a fish had taken the bait. The calm water reflected the sky and trees along the shore. Birds were singing, and a frog hopped off a lily pad and splashed into the lake. The bobber wiggled as the ripples spread under it, but it didn’t go down.

“The fish don’t seem to be very hungry today,” Dad said a while later. “But it sure is nice out here with the blue sky and water and the green grass and trees. It’s all so peaceful.”

Alex turned to his dad. “We’ve been studying colors in school,” he said. “Some scientists say that blue slows down the rate of the heart and green helps prevent eyestrain. That makes them restful colors.”

“Do you suppose that’s why God made so much blue and green in nature?” Dad asked. “Just imagine what it would be like if the sky were bright red and all the leaves were black.”

Alex laughed. “We learned that red is supposed to make people more active. Some say it can even cause blood pressure to rise. I don’t think it would make people feel very good to have a red sky all the time.” He paused. “It sure looks pretty when the sun is setting though.”

“God is very wise,” said Dad. “We see a great deal of His wisdom in nature—even in the colors He chose. Restful greens and blues most of the time, but pretty reds and oranges and yellows in evening sunsets and fall leaves.”

“Right. And lots of colors in flowers and berries and stuff.” Alex looked at his fishing line. “You know what else scientists say? They say orange makes you hungry.” He grinned at his dad. “I wish God had made these bobbers. Instead of making them red and white, He probably would have made them orange to make the fish more hungry. Then maybe they’d take the bait!”

–Jane K. Chase

How about you?

Today's Key Verse:

Today's Key Thought:

Read: Genesis 3:8-23; Romans 6:23; 8:1

Lila normally loved her and Mom’s monthly post-church café tradition. They sat at their usual window seat, but today Lila nudged ice cubes around with her straw in silence. Unable to bear the silence anymore, Mom asked what was wrong.

Sighing, Lila responded, “Well, we learned about sin today at church, and I just don’t understand. Why does sin have to ruin everything, and why does it cause pain and death and heartbreak?”

“Now that’s a big question,” Mom said, “but a good one. Let me take a moment and try to think of a good way to answer.” She looked out the window until her eyes landed on something. “Do you see that wasp?”

Lila grimaced at the yellow-and-black-winged terror. “Yes.”

“Well, sin is kind of like your allergic reactions to wasp stings,” said Mom. “How did you feel when you got stung last week?”

Lila rubbed the spot on her arm where a wasp had stung her. It was still slightly red and raised up. “I was dizzy. My whole arm swelled up, and I even had trouble breathing.”

“Right. Even though the wasp only stung one tiny part of your body, you still felt its horrible effects everywhere. Like your bee sting, it only took one mistake for everything to become cursed with sin. When Adam and Eve, the first two people, chose their own way instead of God’s, their disobedience broke the perfect relationship they had with God and brought sin and its horrible effects into the world.”

“And that’s why Jesus had to come,” said Lila.

Mom nodded. “Jesus’s perfect life, death on the cross, and resurrection from the grave saves us from the punishment of sin and heals our relationship with God. But because sin still exists in the world, we see its effects in our lives—like when wasps sting us and cause us pain. Yet we can be excited about how God will make everything perfect again one day.”

Lila glanced at the wasp outside the window. “Yeah, thank You, Jesus, for saving us…and thank You for allergy medicine!”

“Praise Jesus, indeed,” Mom said with a smile.

Lila grinned as their server set a plate of waffles down in front of her. “Praise Jesus for waffles too.”

–Zoe Brickner

How about you?

Today's Key Verse:

Today's Key Thought:

Read: 1 Corinthians 11:23-26

"We’re here!” Joshua and Jonathan tumbled out of the car and ran ahead of their parents through a gate. Then they stopped and looked around, puzzled. “This is a cemetery!” Jonathan said. “I thought we were going to a battlefield!”

“Yeah,” said Joshua. “The only soldier around here is that statue in the middle of the graves. My teacher says statues like that are memorials—things to help us remember something.”

“That’s right,” Dad said as they moved toward the statue. “Actually, this whole battlefield—which, by the way, extends beyond the cemetery—is a memorial.”

Mom nodded. “A memorial can have different forms,” she said. “It can be a statue like the one we’re looking at. Or it can be a holiday—like Memorial Day. Or even a service designed to remind us of someone or something.”

“Like how on Memorial Day we remember people who have died,” Jonathan said.

“Yes,” said Mom. “On that day, we especially remember those who died while serving their country—men and women like the soldiers buried in this cemetery.”

The boys began roaming around, reading the tombstones. “Hey, look!” Jonathan called. “This guy had the same name as me. ‘Jonathan Wright. Born 1760. Died 1778.’ That means he was only…uh…” Jonathan thought for a moment. “Eighteen years old when he died. He wasn’t very old!”

“Do you boys know how old Jesus was when He died?” asked Dad.

“Thirty-three,” said Joshua. He rolled a pebble on the gravel path under his shoe. “Why don’t we have a memorial day for Jesus?” he asked.

“Oh, we do!” said Dad. “We remember His death on Good Friday, but we also have a day when we remember His resurrection. We call it…”

“Easter!” the boys said in unison.

“Yes,” said Mom, “and we not only have special days to remember and celebrate what Jesus did for us. We also have a memorial service. Every time we have the Lord’s Supper at church—or Communion as it’s also called—we’re reminding ourselves of Jesus’s death and the sacrifice He made to free us from sin.”

–Barbara J. Westberg

How about you?

Today's Key Verse:

Today's Key Thought:

Read: Matthew 6:25-30

"Mom, I’m home!” Alyssa called as she came in after school.

“Hi, honey!” said Mom. “How was your day? Did you learn anything interesting?”

“We sure did!” said Alyssa. “Mr. Eddleman, our science teacher, poured some really hot water into two glasses. One glass had a spoon in it, and the other one didn’t. The one without the spoon cracked when the hot water was poured in, but the other glass was fine. Mr. Eddleman said the metal spoon helped absorb some of the heat and kept the glass from breaking.”

“Well, I hope he had the glass in the sink when it broke!” said Mom.

Alyssa laughed. “He did.” Then the smile faded from her face. “Everly wasn’t in school today—her family is having all kinds of problems. Her brother was in a car accident last night and had to be rushed to the hospital.”

“Oh no, that’s terrible!” said Mom.

“Yeah,” said Alyssa. “And her dad still hasn’t found a job, and her grandma is really sick—she might be dying. I don’t see how they can deal with it all.”

“Well, they know Jesus,” said Mom. “And that makes a big difference.”

Alyssa shrugged. “I feel like I would crack, like that glass in science class today.”

“That science experiment is a pretty good example of how knowing Jesus helps people,” said Mom.

“It is?” asked Alyssa in surprise.

Mom nodded. “Just like the hot water was poured into the glasses, we all have problems come into our lives. Sometimes it can be so overwhelming that we feel like we might crack under the pressure. But Jesus is like that spoon—He helps absorb the heat of our trials. His constant love and care keep our spirits from breaking. I really don’t know how anyone can get through tough times without Him.” She smiled at Alyssa. “Let’s ask God to comfort and encourage Everly and her family and help them trust Him to bring them through it all.”

Alyssa nodded. “Okay,” she said. “But can’t we do something else too? Like take them a meal or something?”

“We sure can,” said Mom. “Let’s start fixing one right now.”

–Linda E. Knight

How about you?

Today's Key Verse:

Today's Key Thought:

Read: Ephesians 3:14-21

As she sat working on her homework alone, Star didn’t feel very loved. It was a holiday weekend, and all her friends had plans. Megan’s parents were taking her to a waterpark. Emma was practicing tennis all weekend with her dad. Mila and her siblings were having fun playing on their new trampoline.

Star’s mom was working in her home office. She didn’t have a dad around or any siblings to spend time with. All she had was homework she had saved for the weekend, just to give herself something to do.

Star frowned at the paper in front her. Why had her teacher assigned her the word love to write about? She didn’t know anything about love.

She picked up her phone and called Mila. She had to convince her friend to take a break from the trampoline so they could talk. “How am I supposed to write about love?” she asked. “No one loves me.”

Mila snorted. “No one? What about me? And Emma and Megan?”

“That’s…different.” Star hadn’t thought of her friends as she was considering the topic.

“What about your mom?” Mila asked. “She loves you.”

Star glanced toward her mom’s office. “She doesn’t spend time with me.”

“Because she’s busy,” Mila said. “She’s busy because she loves you and needs to work to take care of you.” She sighed. “What about God, Star? Aren’t you forgetting that He loves you?”

Star twisted her hair around her finger. Maybe she had forgotten God. “Sometimes it doesn’t feel like it.”

“Maybe not,” Mila said. “But He really does, Star. Like we learned at church, His love is bigger than any human love. Jesus died on the cross so you could live with Him forever. What love is bigger than that?”

Star nodded slowly. “You’re right.”

“You don’t need to go on a trip or get amazing gifts in order to be loved,” Mila said. “But, Star? I really am loving the new trampoline and I would like to get back to it. Since your mom is working, want me to ask my mom to give you a ride over so you can try it out?”

Star’s eyes widened. “Really?”

“Really,” Mila said. “Because I love you.” She laughed. “Don’t forget how much God loves you too, Star.”

–Emily Acker

How about you?

Today's Key Verse:

Today's Key Thought:

Read: Exodus 20:12-15; Ephesians 4:25-32

Alastair walked into the kitchen where his sister Stasia was doing homework.

“Emerson got in trouble again,” said Alastair. “I can’t believe he’s going to flunk math over this!”

Stasia looked up in surprise. “Over what? What did he do?”

“Mr. Hoover caught him looking at somebody’s paper during a test,” Alastair replied. “Emerson said he was just checking one or two answers. That’s all. I think Mr. Hoover just hates Emerson, so he’s making a big deal out of nothing.”

“Well, if Emerson was caught cheating, what did he expect?” Stasia asked.

“It’s not like he was stealing somebody’s money during gym class,” said Alastair, trying to make his sister understand. “Other kids in school do a lot worse stuff than what Emerson did.”

“Sure,” said Mom, and she handed him a dirty glass.

Alastair grimaced. “Yuck! I can’t drink out of this. There’s still dried milk in the bottom of it.”

“But it’s cleaner than these others that need to be washed,” Mom said.

Alastair didn’t say anything right away. He was pretty sure this had something to do with what they were just talking about, and he was trying to figure out what it was.

“After all,” Mom continued, “if cheating is no big deal because it doesn’t seem as bad as what somebody else did, then a little dried milk in a glass shouldn’t be a big deal either, as long as it’s not as dirty as the other glasses.”

“Oh, well, I…um…” Alastair didn’t know what to say.

“It can be easy for us to excuse the wrongdoing of our friends—and especially our own wrongs—because someone else did something that seems worse,” Mom explained. “But it’s all sin in God’s eyes. After all, cheating is stealing too—it’s stealing the work someone else did and claiming it as your own, which is a sin, and it hurts them just as much as if you were stealing their money.”

Alastair nodded. “Sorry, Mom.” He looked at the glass in his hand. “I guess I’ll wait to have some juice, since all the glasses are dirty.”

–Mike A. Dize

How about you?

Today's Key Verse:

Today's Key Thought: