I greet you in Jesus' precious name! It is Thursday morning, the 23rd of November, 2023, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.

We start in the Book of Nehemiah 8:10: 

"…for the joy of the Lord is your strength." 

Then we go to the New Testament, to the First Book of Timothy 6:6: 

"Now godliness with contentment is great gain."

I have just been to a men's prayer meeting. We meet at 5 a.m. at the little chapel on the farm, Shalom, and while we were praying, one of our men prayed a very touching prayer. He said, "Lord, two teams came back from the World Cup. One team have become the world champions, and the other just missed the world championship by two matches; one point separated success from apparent failure, one point. You and I cannot live like that. We cannot put all our hope, all our trust in one single game—the only difference between joy and sorrow, success and supposed failure - one point. 

You may be sitting and waiting for your university results to come in, and maybe you are going to make it by one point, or you are going to miss it by one point. You cannot put your whole life's expectancy on one point. Maybe you are a young farmer and you are trusting God for a good crop. You have put all your effort into that crop, just like you do every other year. The only difference between a good crop and a bad crop is whether it rains or whether it doesn't rain.  

Maybe you have beautiful animals for sale - beef cattle, sheep, lambs - but because of the economy, there is one point between failure and success. We can't live like that. The Lord tells us that the joy of the Lord is our strength. That's not a funny ha-ha joy. That is a deep knowing that if you love Jesus Christ, your name is written in the Lamb's Book of Life, and when you leave this world, you are going straight home to Heaven to be with the Lord forever and ever. It brings a measure of contentment that this world cannot give. We must keep focused on the Lord Jesus Christ and His promises over our lives, which will bring us peace, joy and purpose for living.

Today, go out and look forward to an incredible life because when you are a believer, it is a win-win situation. If we die, we go straight home to Heaven, and if we live, we live for Christ.

God bless you and goodbye.