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  Listen to today’s devotional Tell Me Something Good November 10, 2026 1 Thessalonians 3:6-13 Our youth group was hosting a free car wash when two people approached us without a car to wash. They wanted to know what we were doing and why. They attended a nearby church, and when they learned I was a pastor, one said, “Pastor, tell me something good.” No Bible study or sermon. Just a good word. I should’ve told them to sign up for my daily devotional or text messages. Instead, I told them what God was doing through our youth group. I shared the growth I was seeing in our young people. I got to brag on God. And these visitors got to hear how God’s Spirit was moving among their neighbors. That’s the blessing of a testimony. We get to share the joy of what God is doing. In 1 Thessalonians 3, Timothy returns with good news about the Thessalonians’ faith and love. Paul receives that news in the middle of distress and affliction. And their faithfulness encourages him so deeply that he wri...

  Listen to today’s devotional 1 Corinthians 14:20-25 Imagine leaving worship having heard everything you wanted and missing someone who needed to hear from God. That's a part of what Paul addresses in 1 Corinthians 14. In this chapter, he discusses prophecy and speaking in tongues and then tells the church to grow up. “Be infants in evil,” he says, “but in thinking be adults.” It almost sounds like he interrupted himself. But he is actually getting to what matters most. The Corinthians had spiritual gifts. What they didn't have was the maturity to consider whom those gifts were helping. Paul asks them to imagine someone walking into their gathering. What would that person encounter? Confusion? A roomful of people speaking past one another? Or something that reaches their heart and helps them realize that God is here? The whole talk about prophecy and speaking in tongues might confuse a lot of us. But it's a conversation that helps us consider whose experience we take into ...

  Listen to today’s devotional Amos 3:1-8 I don't remember what it's like to drive a car without a check engine light on. But when it's on for so long, there shouldn't be too much of a surprise when the car finally stops. There's no sense wondering, "Why is this happening to me?" when there's probably an answer under the hood that I’ve tried to ignore. To be sure, there are things we cannot explain about our life and the world around us. Grief and hardships, for example, should not always be so easily interpreted. But sometimes, when we say, “I don’t understand," we really mean something like, “I don’t want to admit it.” Amos 3 starts asking questions. Does a lion roar without a reason? Does a bird fall into a trap when there isn’t one? His questions build toward something his people probably don't want to hear. That what’s happening has something to do with how they’ve been living. Israel has mistaken being chosen for being excused. But God r...

  Listen to today’s devotional Amos 1:1 You know how you can be halfway through a really good meal, and then somebody says something that makes you put your fork down? Amos would’ve been that guy. Amos 1:1 introduces him as one of the shepherds of Tekoa. I like that we learn what he did for a living before we hear what he had to say. Later, when a priest tells him to go preach somewhere else, Amos tells him where God found him in the first place. He was out with the flock. I imagine there is a lot to learn out there. Lessons about which sheep need your attention the most. Noticing the needs of an entire flock. A few chapters later, Amos talks about people stretched out on couches, eating lamb and drinking wine. And I keep thinking about the lamb. Somebody raised it. Somebody like Amos got up and went out to check on it even at the most inconvenient times. That's what shepherds do. I wonder how much of that kind of work ever crossed anybody’s mind over dinner. What gets Amos going i...

  Listen to today’s devotional Psalm 5:1-7 God and evil are not traveling companions. Speaking of God, Psalm 5 says, “evil will not sojourn with you.” The Message Bible translates that to say that God doesn't socialize with Wicked or invite Evil as a houseguest. They aren’t cozy. God doesn’t pull up a chair for evil. I wish I could say the same about us. We know evil is wrong. But spend enough time around it, and you notice something. We trade contempt with contempt. We let resentment sound like righteousness. And we can become so determined to oppose evil that we stop noticing what it’s doing in us. Paul’s later warning makes sense then. “Do not be overcome by evil” (Romans 12:21). Evil can overcome us even while we’re arguing against it. So, what do we do with the pressure building in our souls? The psalmist says, “Through the abundance of your steadfast love, I will enter your house, I will bow down toward your holy temple in awe of you.” With God’s steadfast love as his startin...

  Listen to today’s devotional Psalm 128 Chances are that you've heard Pharrell Williams' song "Happy." It was named the best-selling song of 2014---worldwide. It has over a billion online streams. It went triple-platinum in the UK and was recognized as the most-played song of the 2010s. It's a fun song, of course. But sometimes when I hear it, I wonder: Why is he so happy? Whatever is fueling that happiness, wouldn't you like a bit of it? If the writer of Psalm 128 had written the song, we’d know where to start: “Happy is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in his ways.” Fear might sound like a strange starting point for happiness. Here, though, it describes reverence for God that shapes how we live. God matters enough that we pay attention and adjust our steps to God's way. Then the psalm's happiness gets practical. There’s work that puts food on the table. There are people gathered around it. The vine and olive shoots picture a household flourish...