By Our Daily Bread Ministries
Daily Devotionals
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Trapped under two floors of collapsed rubble caused by an earthquake, 5-year-old Jinan, a Syrian girl, called out to rescuers as she shielded her little brother from the debris surrounding them. “Get me out of here; I’ll do anything for...
Near the dawn of the nineteenth century, Mary McDowell lived worlds apart from the brutal stockyards of Chicago. Although her home was just twenty miles away, she knew little about the horrific labor conditions that prompted workers in the stockyards...
I recently read a novel about a woman who refuses to acknowledge she has terminal cancer. When Nicola’s exasperated friends force her to face the truth, the reason for her avoidance emerges. “I’ve wasted my life,” she tells them. Though...
My three-year old son, Xavier, squeezed my hand as we entered the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California. Pointing to a life-size sculpture of a humpback whale suspended from the ceiling, he said, “Enormous.” His wide-eyed joy continued as we explored...
The first time we met our neighbor Henry, he pulled a well-worn Bible out of a bag he’d been carrying. Eyes sparkling, he asked if we’d like to discuss Scripture. We nodded and he flipped to some highlighted passages that...
The Brisbane City Hall in Australia was a dazzling 1920s project. White stairs boasted marble from the same quarry Michelangelo used for his David sculpture. The tower reflected Venice’s St. Mark’s Basilica, and the copper dome was the largest in...
The remarkable 2019 movie Little Women sent me back to my worn copy of the novel, especially the comforting words of Marmee, the wise and gentle mother. I’m drawn to the novel’s depiction of her steadfast faith, which underlies many...
Though he didn’t normally carry money with him, Patrick sensed God was leading him to tuck a five-dollar bill in his pocket before leaving home. During the lunch hour at the school where he worked, he understood how God may...
In March 1945, the “Ghost Army” helped US forces achieve the Rhine River crossing—giving the allies a vital base to operate from on World War II’s Western Front. The soldiers were most definitely human, not apparitions, all part of the...
As a blizzard bore down on my state in the western USA, my widowed mother agreed to stay with my family to “ride out” the storm. After the blizzard, however, she never returned to her house. She moved in, dwelling...
As long as you keep your mouth closed, I told myself, you won’t be doing anything wrong. I’d been outwardly holding back my anger toward a colleague after misinterpreting things she’d said. Since we had to see each other every...
One wouldn’t normally think of butterflies as being loud creatures: after all, the flapping of a single Monarch butterfly’s wings is practically inaudible. But in the Mexican rainforest, where many of them begin their short lives, their collective flapping is...
“Am I an owner or a steward?” The CEO of a multibillion-dollar company asked himself that question as he weighed what was best for his family. Concerned about the temptations that can come with vast wealth, he didn’t want to...
The topic was Leviticus, and I had a confession to make. “I skipped a lot of the reading,” I told my Bible study group. “I’m not reading about skin diseases again.” That’s when my friend Dave spoke up. “I know a...
“Where is my faith?—even deep down, right in, there is nothing but emptiness & darkness. . . . If there be God, please forgive me.” The author of those words might surprise you: Mother Teresa. Beloved and renowned as a tireless...
For days, the sickly cat cried, huddled in a box near my workplace. Abandoned on the street, the feline went unnoticed by many who passed it by—until Jun came along. The street sweeper carried the animal home, where he lived...
Bad memories and accusing messages flooded Sal’s mind. Sleep eluded him as fear filled his heart and sweat covered his skin. It was the night before his baptism, and he couldn’t stop the onslaught of dark thoughts. Sal had received...
Discover magazine suggests that there are around 700 quintillion (7 followed by 20 zeros) planets in the universe, but only one like Earth. Astrophysicist Erik Zackrisson said that one of the requirements for a planet to sustain life is to...
After another health setback, I feared the unknown and uncontrollable. One day, while reading a Forbes magazine article, I learned that scientists studied the rising of the “Earth’s rotation velocity” and declared that the Earth “wobbled” and is “spinning faster.”...
In Everything Sad Is Untrue, Daniel Nayeri describes his harrowing flight with his mother and sister from persecution through a refugee camp to safety in the United States. An elderly couple agreed to sponsor them, though they didn’t know them....
What would it be like to walk in the shoes of royalty? Angela Kelly, the daughter of a dockworker and nurse, knows. She was also the official dresser for the late Queen Elizabeth for the last two decades of the...
At my new school near a large city, the guidance counselor took one look at me and placed me in the lowest performing English composition class. I’d arrived from my inner-city school with outstanding test scores, excellent grades, and even...
The United Kingdom brims with history. Everywhere you go, you see plaques honoring historic figures or commemorating sites where important events occurred. But one such sign exemplifies the droll British sense of humor. On a weathered plaque outside a bed...
A co-worker once told me that her prayer life had improved because of our manager. I was impressed, thinking that our difficult leader had shared some spiritual nuggets with her and influenced her prayer life. I was wrong—sort of. My...
Soren Solkaer spent years photographing starlings and their breathtaking spectacle: murmurations, where hundreds of thousands of starlings move in fluid motion across the sky. Watching this marvel is like sitting underneath an orchestrated, swirling wave or a massive, dark brushstroke...
As a child, I viewed grown-ups as wise and incapable of failure. “They always know what to do,” I’d think. “One day, when I’m grown-up, I’ll always know what to do too.” Well, “one day” came many years ago, and...
He was loved by all—those were the words used to describe Don Guiseppe of Casnigo, Italy. Don was a beloved man who rode around town on an old motorbike and always led with the greeting: “peace and good.” He worked...
Like many teachers, Carrie devotes countless hours to her career, often grading papers and communicating with students and parents late into the evening. To sustain the effort, she relies on her community of colleagues for camaraderie and practical help; her...
Jim and Laneeda were college sweethearts. They got married and life was happy for many years. Then Laneeda began to act strangely, getting lost and forgetting appointments. She was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s at forty-seven. After a decade of serving...
The color red doesn’t always naturally occur in the things we make. How do you put the vibrant color of an apple into a T-shirt or lipstick? In early times, the red pigment was made from clay or red rocks....
With the American Civil War spawning many bitter feelings, Abraham Lincoln saw fit to speak a kind word about the South. A shocked bystander asked how he could do so. He replied, “Madam, do I not destroy my enemies when...
Although she finished first in her qualifying race, US speedskater Brittany Bowe gave up her chance to compete in the 500-meter event at the 2022 Winter Olympics to teammate Erin Jackson. Jackson had an unfortunate slip in the race that...
When Kristin wanted to buy a special book for Xio-Hu, her Chinese husband, the only one she could find in Chinese was a Bible. Although neither of them were believers in Christ, she hoped he would appreciate the gift anyway....
As a new believer in Jesus at the age of thirty, I had lots of questions after committing my life to Him. When I started reading the Scriptures, I had even more questions. I reached out to a friend. “How...
Pride precedes and often leads to humiliation—something a man in Norway found out. Not even dressed in running clothes, the individual arrogantly challenged Karsten Warholm—the world record holder in the 400-meter hurdles—to a race. Warholm, training in an indoor public...
When Wallace and Mary Brown moved to an impoverished part of Birmingham, England, to pastor a dying church, they didn’t know that a gang had made the grounds of their church and home its headquarters. The Browns had bricks thrown...
Born on a farm, Judson Van DeVenter learned to paint, studied art, and became an art teacher. God, however, had a different plan for him. Friends valued his work in church and urged him to go into evangelism. Judson felt...
Maggie’s guest showed up in church shockingly dressed. No one should have been surprised though; her young friend was a prostitute. Maggie’s visitor shifted uneasily in her seat, alternately tugging at her much-too-short skirt and folding her arms self-consciously around...
After being diagnosed with a brain tumor, Christina Costa noticed how much of the talk around facing cancer is dominated by the language of fighting. She found that this metaphor quickly started to feel exhausting. She “didn’t want to spend...
On her wedding day, Gwendolyn Stulgis wore the wedding dress of her dreams. Then she gave it away—to a stranger. Stulgis believed a dress deserved more than sitting in a closet collecting dust. Other brides agreed. Now scores of women...
There’s a monument in the chapel of Christ’s College, Cambridge, dedicated to two seventeenth-century physicians, John Finch and Thomas Baines. Known as the “inseparable friends,” Finch and Baines collaborated on medical research and traveled together on diplomatic trips. When Baines...
After a game, a college basketball star stayed behind to help workers throw out empty cups and food wrappers. When a fan posted a video of him in action, more than eighty thousand people viewed it. One person commented, “[The young...
In 1920, John Sung, the sixth child of a Chinese pastor, received a scholarship to study at a university in the United States. He graduated with the highest honors, completed a master’s program, and earned a PhD. But while pursuing...
While drilling for oil in one of the sunniest and driest countries in the world, teams were shocked to uncover a huge underground system of water. So, in 1983 the “great man-made river” project was begun, placing a system of...
The young pastor prayed every morning, asking God to use him that day to bless someone. Often, to his delight, such a situation arose. One day during a break at his second job, he sat in the sunshine with a...
As I was grading another stack of papers for a college writing class I teach, I was impressed with one particular paper. It was so well-written! Soon, though, I realized it was too well-written. Sure enough, a little research revealed...
Standing in the kitchen, my daughter exclaimed, “Mom, there’s a fly in the honey!” I quipped back with the familiar adage, “You will always catch more flies with honey than vinegar.” While this was the first time I’d (accidentally) caught...
Many years ago, Julie Landsman auditioned for principal French hornist for New York’s Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. The MET held their auditions behind a screen to avoid prejudice by the judges. Landsman did well in her audition and ended up winning...
God, why is this happening? Is this really your plan for us? As a husband and a dad of young children, those questions and more swirled in my mind as I wrestled with a serious cancer diagnosis. What’s more, our family...
I felt my heartrate increase as I opened my mouth to refute the charges a dear friend was leveling against me. What I had posted online had nothing to do with her as she implied. But before I replied, I...