Daily Devotion for November 1, 2025
Prayers
Scripture
Lord’s Prayer
Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever.
Our “Saturday Oldie” this week takes a Country turn, as Alan Jackson and friends perform a medley of old favorite gospel songs in Carnegie Hall.
I was standing by my window,
On one cold and cloudy day,
When I saw that hearse come rolling,
For to carry my mother away.
Refrain:
Will the circle be unbroken,
By and by, lord, by and by?
There's a better home a-waiting
In the sky, lord, in the sky.
I said to that undertaker,
Undertaker please drive slow;
For this lady you are carrying
Lord, I hate to see here go.
Oh, I followed close behind her,
Tried to hold up and be brave;
But I could not hide my sorrow
When they laid her in the grave.
I went back home, my home was lonesome,
Missed my mother, she was gone;
All of my brothers, sisters crying,
What a home so sad and lone.
We sang the songs of childhood,
Hymns of faith that made us strong;
Ones that mother Maybelle taught us--
Hear the angels sing along.
Music by Charles H. Gabriel
Lyrics by A. P. Carter
Prayer for God’s Protection
Heavenly Father, I live in your shelter. You are my refuge and my fortress. You are my God, in whom I trust. Deliver me and all those who love You from the dangers of the world, both the physical dangers that can crush our bodies and the deadly pestilence that can lay waste to our souls. Cover us with your mighty wings and protect us with your steadfast shield, and we will not fear the terror of the night or the perils of the day.
The world in its darkness curses you, the only truth, the only love, the only salvation; it seeks to destroy us by force, by sarcasm, by seduction, by compromise. But if a thousand fall to the lies of the world, if ten thousand should fall away, it will not affect me. For I have made you my dwelling place, O God. You have sent your angels to guard the faithful. On their hands, they bear us up, that no stone shall strike our foot, and no viper strike our heel.
Deliver me, O Lord, for I hold fast to you even in my fear. No temptation or power of earth can separate me from your love. You answer me when I call to you; you protect me because I call on your name. You have satisfied me with long life and salvation. All praise to the God of Jacob, all praise to Jesus Christ.
For the Aged
Look with mercy, O God our Father, on all whose increasing years bring them weakness, distress, mental confusion, or isolation. Provide for them homes of dignity and peace; give them understanding helpers, and the willingness to accept help; and, as their strength diminishes, solidify their faith and their assurance of your love, so that they may come to you in confident hope, and without fear. In the name of Christ we pray for them,
Benediction
Finally, may I go forth filled with the joy and confidence of your Spirit; and may everything I do this day, in word or deed, be done in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father.
Think of the day ahead in terms of God with you, and visualize health, strength, guidance, purity, calm confidence, and victory as the gifts of His presence.
Today’s “Remember the Bible” Question
Where in Matthew do we find “The Great Commission”?
Proverbs 23:23 (The Message)
Buy truth—don’t sell it for love or money;
Buy wisdom, buy education, buy insight.
Galatians 1:6-9 (DP Bible)
One Gospel (Galatians #2)
am astonished to hear that you have deserted the true Gospel of Christ and have begun to follow perverted “gospels” taught to you by fakes and con men. I call these “gospels”, but it is a misnomer. There is one and only one Gospel: the one I have taught you.
If I myself should come and preach something different to you – if an angel should descend from the heavens and tell you something different – turn your back and walk away. These teachings, and those who promote them, are accursed!
I have said it before and I will say it again, in writing: those who teach a different Gospel from that which they have received are accursed.
DP Parallel Bible (3-Column) - Galatians 1
Notes on the Scripture
Paul wastes no time. His first words are a scorching rebuke to the churches of Galatia. How much more different could it be from the beginning of the first epistle we studied? “We always remember you in our prayers, giving thanks to God for . . . the steadfastness of your hope and your love in Jesus Christ . . . . ” (1 Thess. 1:2-3)
In fact, if we jump ahead a bit and view Galatians in light of Paul’s typical epistle, there is a striking omission. At the beginning of Romans, 1 Corinthians, Philemon, Colossians, both Thessalonian epistles, all of the pastoral epistles, and Ephesians (at the end), in addition to a blessing, Paul gives a thanksgiving for the recipients’ faith. There is no thanksgiving here! Instead, there is a curse.
Paul says that he is astonished. Although he is given to rhetorical effect, we must never doubt his sincerity. He is not using such strong language simply for its effect; he was undoubtably in a state of high emotion: confusion and shock. We must remember what it cost him to bring the Gospel to Galatia. Years of his life spent in constant discomfort, far away from the support of his church family, always in the midst of hostile people who would arrest him, imprison him, beat him and, once, stone him and leave him for dead.
Imagine suffering and toiling as he did, in order to save the souls of those few who would listen, and then learn later that they had given up their salvation for some nonsense preached to them by a theological huckster. If anyone doubts that Paul was empowered by a supernatural force, they do not grasp his life. As he himself previously hinted (1 Thess. 2:2), he could not have done what he did under human power. God’s Holy Spirit filled him with superhuman capacity of endurance.
C. S. Lewis said of Christ:
A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse.”
One might say something similar about Paul, for doubters always attack his apostleship. Paul is a lightning rod for people who want to rewrite the Bible. But how could he have done what he did and not be the agent of God? Well, we are jumping ahead a bit, because Paul himself will advance a similar argument in the second half of the chapter.
