Thought For Today

I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Thursday morning, the 27th of November, 2025, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.

We start in the Book of Isaiah 55:11, and the Lord says;

”So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.”

Then we go to the New Testament, John 7:26:

”But look! He speaks boldly, and they say nothing to Him. Do the rulers know indeed that this is truly the Christ? “  

Now, remember what happened. Jesus told the disciples to go up to Jerusalem to the Feast of Tabernacles. He said, ”I will come later,” because they were seeking to kill Jesus. So eventually He came to Jerusalem on His own, and then He started to teach in the temple. His words were so bold that everyone listened without a word. The power of the spoken word of God. They recognised Jesus as the Christ, the Messiah, by the words which proceeded from His mouth.

I want to say to you today, my dear friend, and this applies to me, we are not using the word of God enough. That is where the power is! William Shakespeare was a great writer, but there’s no power when you quote Shakespeare. When you quote Sigmund Freud, there’s no power. When you even quote Albert Einstein, supposed to be the most brilliant mind, there’s no power, but when you quote the Word of God, there is power which accompanies the spoken Word of God.

I have had the privilege of speaking at the Feast of Tabernacles in Jerusalem a number of times, and I want to tell you when you say, ”thus says the Lord,” the power comes down folks, especially if you believe it. If you look at some of those old crusade tapes of Dr Billy Graham and he says, ”and the word of God says….” As soon as he quotes Scripture, you can feel the presence of the Holy Spirit in that stadium amongst those thousands and thousands of people. I’ve experienced it in my own life, standing up there, feeling totally inadequate, but as soon as I start quoting the word of God, a supernatural power comes down and energises me, and I can see a change in that vast crowd.

I want to speak to mothers today. You’ve got a sick child. Oh mom, go and lay your hands on your child and speak the Word of God over that child, speak healing over that little child. I want to say to dad, he doesn’t know what to do at work anymore, there are big problems there. Speak the Word of God. I really mean that, quote Scripture. You will be surprised by how the men will come into line.

Jesus bless you and have a wonderful day.
Goodbye.

I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Wednesday morning, the 26th of November, 2025, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.

We go to the Book of Exodus 40:37-38:

“But if the cloud was not taken up, then they did not journey till the day that it was taken up.  For the cloud of the Lord was above the tabernacle by day, and fire was over it by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel, throughout all their journeys.”

They did not move until the cloud moved. Then we go to the Book of Acts 1:4:

“…He commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the Promise of the Father,…”

The Lord wants to talk to you and me this morning about not becoming so impatient. Many of us think that the Israelites just wandered aimlessly through the wilderness for 40 years. No, they didn’t. Their Heavenly Father did not leave them as orphans. He put a cloud over the tabernacle and He said, “Don’t move until the cloud moves,” and then at night a pillar of fire, as a sign of protection over them. We must not move until the Lord tells us to move. 

We go to the Acts of the Apostles, after the Lord Jesus Christ had been resurrected, they were totally lost, the disciples were all huddled together in the Upper Room. I have been to that room, I have laid on the floor of the Upper Room. I was so blessed, Jill and I. There wasn’t a soul in that Upper Room when we were there that day, and we just lay on that floor and we just worshipped God. He said that we must wait for the promise of the Father. Now that is where a lot of us are making mistakes. We are running ahead of God, and that is why we are getting into trouble. 

As a young farmer, I remember us going through a drought period. I had planted my maize crop, but there was no rain. I wanted to disc it in and start again, but I didn’t have the money. I waited, and you know something? My neighbours put the plough in and started all over again. I waited and I waited and then the rain came! When the rain came, that maize came through. It was a beautiful crop. If I had not waited, I would have got myself into terrible financial trouble.

Today, wait for the promise of God. When the cloud moves, you move. When the cloud doesn’t move, you stay. If God doesn’t tell you to go, you better stay. If God tells you to go, pack your bags, then leave today. 

Jesus bless you and have a wonderful, peaceful day,
Goodbye.

I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Tuesday morning, the 25th of November, 2025, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.

We go straight to the Gospel of John 7:1:

”After these things Jesus walked in Galilee; for He did not want to walk in Judea, because the Jews sought to kill Him.”

Have you ever felt unwanted, my dear friend? Maybe this morning, you are feeling very alone because of your love and stand for Jesus Christ. Have you ever felt excluded? Now, this is an old term, “sent to Coventry”. What does it mean? I looked up the Oxford dictionary. It means being excluded from a group or social interaction and being given the silent treatment. Have you ever felt like that? Oh yes, and especially if you’re at school or university, you’re not one of the boys, you’re not one of the girls anymore. Why, what have you done wrong? No, you’ve done nothing wrong. What you have done is, you have identified yourself with Jesus Christ. That’s all you’ve done. You feel lonely? Well, I want to tell you, Jesus couldn’t even go up to Jerusalem because the Jews were waiting for Him, they wanted to kill Him. What had He done wrong? Nothing at all. He came to save the world!

Have you felt left out of the office party? It’s coming to the end of the year. Will you be welcome there? Yes, we can come but they don’t talk to us, especially when they start getting drunk and they start telling filthy stories. You feel totally isolated, don’t you? What about that sports team? You are one of the best players, you know that, but they keep preferring other people. Why? Because you are not popular because of your stand for Christ. Have you been overlooked at work maybe, for a promotion, because you will not back down and say that all roads lead to heaven, live and let live? No, because you love people, you’ve told them the truth but it’s made you very unpopular.

Well, I want to tell you today, shout for joy because you must be doing something right. If you look at Luke 10:20. The Lord says that your name, my name is written in the Book in Heaven, oh yes! When Jesus comes back, will He identify you as His friend or one of the gang? Well, stand tall, you won’t have to put your hand up He will find you, and He will take you home to be with Him, but in the meantime, the most important thing is that you do not compromise your stand for anybody.

Jesus bless you and have a wonderful day.
Goodbye.

I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Monday morning, the 24th of November, 2025, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.

We start in the Gospel of Mark 8:34. Jesus said:

“Whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.” 

Wow! Strong words! Remember, the cross represents death and self-denial. Then we go to John 6:66:

”From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more.”

That must be one of the saddest verses for me in the Bible. These men were His disciples. There were about 120 of them, then only 12. This Christian walk is not a bed of roses, don’t let anybody tell you that. In fact, if there are any preachers listening to this message, be careful how you talk. I’ve got to do the same. It’s not a case of come to Jesus and all your problems will be over, not at all. It’s come to Jesus, and He will walk with you through the fire. He didn’t say He’ll take you out, but He will never leave you nor forsake you!

Remember the rich young ruler? He said to Jesus, ”I have obeyed all the commandments.” And Jesus said, “But there’s one thing that you haven’t obeyed.” He didn't say that to him because He wanted money; He was testing him. He said, ”Give your riches to the poor, and come and follow me.” The Bible says that the rich young ruler walked away.

I remember a minister saying to me, ”Jesus must have been standing there with tears running down His face.” He didn’t run after him and say, ”Listen, let’s negotiate, just give half of your money away.” No, He stood there and He watched that man on his road to hell. Oh yes - we need to understand something, if we want to follow the Lord, we’ve got to put Him first in our lives.

That beautiful cross, young lady, beautiful silver or gold cross hanging around your neck, and by the way, I love to see people wearing the cross of Jesus, it doesn’t represent prosperity. It doesn’t represent anything to do with self, it is a sign that Jesus Christ died for you and He died for me, and we in turn must put the flesh down and start to live for Him. It is so beautiful to see people giving their lives to Christ, but then they need to follow through, but by the grace of God we will succeed.

Jesus bless you and have a wonderful day,
Goodbye.

I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Sunday morning, the 23rd of November, 2025, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.

We start in the Book of Exodus 39:43:

”Then Moses looked over all the work, and indeed they had done it; as the Lord had commanded, just so they had done it and Moses blessed them.” 

They had completed the task. They had done the work of the building of the tabernacle of God in the desert and Moses blessed them. 

Then we go to the gospel of Mark 14:16:

”So His disciples went out, and came into the city, and found it just as He had said to them; and they prepared the Passover.” 

We’re talking today about doing a good job for the Lord. We’ve got to give the Lord Jesus the best, not the second best, not the leftovers. The Lord sent Peter and John to prepare a place for the last meal that He would have on earth. The Lord Jesus told them where to go and what to do but they did it with excellence, just like they built the tabernacle with excellence. I want to say to you today that you and I must do things for God with an excellent spirit.

Now, I want to tell you a little story. Many years ago, when I was a fairly new preacher, I felt led to go to Cedarville in Kwazulu-Natal, to book the town hall and to have an outreach meeting. A very dear friend of mine said to me, ”There’s only one man who can do that for you. He’s an unbeliever, but he’s an exceptional organiser, and this man will do it, but I’m not sure whether he’ll accept the proposal because he’s not a Christian.” Anyway, miraculously, my friend approached him and he said, ”Yes, I’ll think about it. Where does this guy stay?” That’s me, and he told him the address and where the farm was. 

He arrived on the farm in a very big, fancy Mercedes-Benz. He got out of the car, I said, ”Would you like to come and have a cup of coffee? I’ve been expecting you.” He said, "No, thank you, I’m very busy.” He said, ”What’s your name?” I told him who I am, and he said, ”I will organise it for you.” I said, ”Is that all there is to it?” He said, ”I’ll do everything,” and out he drove, and he did an incredible job of preparation and by the way, he gave his life to Christ in the middle of that outreach, and he became a preacher himself, him and his dear wife. They had a little caravan and they drove all over the Eastern Cape, preaching the gospel and I asked him many many years later, ”Mike, why did you accept that invitation when you didn’t even know who I was?” He said, ”Because I drove onto your farm and I saw the fences were straight, the road was nicely prepared, the maise looked fantastic, the cattle were fat and I thought, I will do this job.” 

We need to do a good job because it makes a good impression. Don’t give God your second best, and do everything you do as unto Him. 

Jesus bless you and have a wonderful day,
Goodbye

I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Saturday morning, the 22nd of November, 2025, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.

We go straight to the Gospel of John 6:42:

”And they said, “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How is it then that He says, ‘I have come down from heaven’?”

What a beautiful statement! “I have come down from heaven”. Oh, my dear friend, I want to tell you something so special and precious this morning. I want to tell you about Jesus. Jesus is God, made flesh. If we look at Matthew 1:23. He is referred to as, “Immanuel”. What does that mean? It’s a Hebrew word which means, “God with us”, and if you look at John 14:9, Jesus Himself said, ”If you have seen Me, you have seen the Father.” So that is where all the problem came from in that little town of Nazareth, where Jesus said, ”I have come down from heaven.” They couldn’t understand that. They said, ”This is the son of Joseph and Mary, who live up the road.” What they did not realise was that God became flesh and dwelt among us! 

Many years ago, I heard a story about somebody who came up to an evangelist and said, ”You know, we all serve and we all believe in the same God.” And this man said, ”No, we don’t.” And he said, ”What do you mean?” And then the evangelist asked this man, ”Does your god have a son?” And the man said, ”No, He does not.” And he said, ”That’s why we don’t serve the same God. You see, the God I serve has a Son. His name is Jesus Christ.” 

I want to say to you today, at the end of the day, we can argue as much as we like, but the bottom line for me is this - relationship. I know a Man, a Man who can walk on water, I know a Man who can raise the dead, I know a Man who is coming back very soon! Yes, in my little quiet time room where I’m recording this message, I can tell you, I can feel His presence. Yes, I can feel Him, I can sense Him and I’m telling you that He is a friend who sticks closer than a brother and He wants to be your friend today.

Please speak with Him, He’s waiting to hear from you.
Jesus bless you and have a wonderful day.

Goodbye.

I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Friday morning, the 21st of November, 2025, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.

We go straight to 2 Corinthians 5:17:

”Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.”

No regrets about the past. If you’re a new person in Christ, you’ve got to look forward. Remember, I’m the farmer. You can’t plough a straight line if you keep looking behind you. We’ve got to move forward. There is no future in the past. I looked up the Oxford dictionary to find out the literal meaning of the word “regret”. Do you know what regret is, young person? “Aah, I shouldn’t have done that. I wish I hadn’t done that,” and the older people, ”Man, I should have thought more. I should have phoned my friend before he died, but he’s gone now and I won’t get a chance to speak to him again in this life.”

A regret, according to the Oxford dictionary, is “to feel sorry or to be disappointed about something that you have done or something that you should have done.” There’s no point in looking back, we’ve got to move forward. Now, C S Lewis, is one of my favourite authors, a very deep man in the Lord. A man who had a previous life, he was actually an atheist, he had no time at all, he didn’t believe in God, and then he had a beautiful encounter with the Lord Jesus Christ, and this is what he says. He says, ”You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.”

Isn’t that beautiful? I’ll say that once again. I think it’s very pertinent today to somebody who’s trying to come to grips with maybe something terrible that happened in the past. You wish you could rectify it, but you can’t. He says you can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start, that’s today, where you are, and change the ending! Let’s do it, you and I, let’s say: 

Lord, we are so sorry for the mess-ups we’ve made in the past, the people that we’ve hurt, the things we should have done and we didn’t do it, but Lord, I want to start today and I want to change the ending of my life.

In Jesus' name, amen.
God bless you and goodbye.

I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Thursday morning, the 20th of November, 2025, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.

We go straight to the Gospel of Matthew 6:33. Jesus says:

”But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.” 

What a beautiful scripture! Seek first the kingdom. First thing in the morning, that’s the time, seek the face of the Lord. Get your directions for the day, and then you will have a pleasant, successful and peaceful day.

John Bunyan was the man who wrote the fantastic book called “The Pilgrim’s Progress”. They say it’s maybe the most read book of all time, next to the Bible itself. A beautiful story. He spent most of his life in jail because of his stand for Jesus Christ. Now he says, and I quote, ”He who runs from God in the morning will scarcely find Him the rest of the day.” Basically, if you don’t have a quiet time in the morning, you will never catch up right through the day. Come on, let’s be honest. We need to change those principles now, and we need to put Jesus first every morning and then the rest of the day will go well. 

Seek ye first the kingdom of God, 
And His righteousness, 
And all these things shall be
Added unto you. Halleluh, Hallelujah. 

Halleluja, Halleluja,
Halleluja, Halleluh, Halleluja.

Jesus bless you and have a wonderful day,
Goodbye.

I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Wednesday morning, the 19th of November, 2025, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today. 

We start in the Gospel of John 6:35 (Amplified Bible):

“Jesus replied to them, “I am the Bread of Life. The one who comes to Me will never be hungry, and the one who believes in Me [as Saviour] will never be thirsty [for that one will be sustained spiritually].”

Jesus Christ is the bread of life. Have you ever been to a bakery very, very, early in the morning, where they make the bread at the back of the bakery and bring it out on trays? It is looking so beautiful, so brown and a delicious aroma. Aah, I love it so much, and then when you cut a slice of that bread, and you take some fresh farm butter and you spread it over liberally, and it starts to melt into that hot bread, I don’t think there’s too much that tastes better than that!

That’s why I get up in the morning at 4 o’clock, because I don’t like to eat stale bread. I don’t like to eat bread that is old. I don’t like to eat bread that is contaminated by the things of the world. We must get the Bread of Life, every single morning before anything else. Before we listen to the world news, before we start phoning other people and getting different opinions of different world events, we must go to the bakery, my dear friend. 

Radio Pulpit always says to me when we talk about evangelism, it is one hungry beggar showing another hungry beggar where to find bread. He says where to find the bakery, because that’s where the spiritual Bread of Life is. So, young person, today I want to tell you, get up in the morning and get into your quiet time room, wherever that might be. Open your Bible and read the Word of God, and that word will sustain you for the whole day, but if you don’t go to the bakery early in the morning, you’ll have to put up with stale bread, contaminated bread, which will confuse you.

Get to the Bread of Life. His name is Jesus!

God bless you and have a wonderful day.
Goodbye.

I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Tuesday morning, the 18th of November, 2025, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.

We go to the Gospel of John 6:27:

“Do not labour (do not work) for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life,…”  

This is Jesus speaking. Then we go back to the Old Testament, to the Book of Ecclesiastes 1:14. They say it was written by Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived. He says it is “grasping for the wind” 

Are you grasping for the wind today? Are you on the wrong track? Are you spending all your time, all your effort,  in building up things which will perish, maybe even before you die, and have no everlasting benefit to anyone or anything? We need to be like Jesus and get our priorities in order. Mark 8:36, the word of God says:

“For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?”  

I want to say to you today, be careful that you’re not putting all your effort into something that has no eternal value. Yes, we have to put food on the table for our families, we have to be responsible citizens, but we have to seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and then all these other things will be added to us.

Today please, listen to what the Lord is saying to us. Stop chasing after the wind and start seeking Jesus Christ, and He will undertake for you in every area of your lives. 

Jesus bless you and goodbye.