270 people in our community are currently praying with you.

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.

Prayer to Follow God

Dear Lord, I seek Your guidance and wisdom as I navigate the challenges of life. Help me to discern Your will and to follow Your path. Fill me with the Holy Spirit, that I may be empowered to live a life that is pleasing to You. Give me the courage to trust in Your goodness and to surrender to Your will. In Jesus’ name, I pray.

Mason Barge 10/2025 finds.life.church

Prayer for Holiness

Holy God, no one can put together what has crumbled into dust, but you can restore a conscience turned to ashes. You can restore to its former beauty a soul lost and without hope. With you, there is nothing that cannot be redeemed. You are love; You are Creator and Redeemer. I praise you with my every ounce.

I fear the lesson, my God, of the fall of Lucifer, full of pride. I pray you will keep me from such a terrible fate; keep me safe with the power of your Grace; save me from falling away from you. Save me from doubt. Incline my heart to hear your mysterious voice every moment of my life and thus be led to call upon you, for you are present in every thing and every moment.

Meditation

“A great many people mistake opinions for thoughts.”

~ Herbert V. Prochnow

Benediction — One Voice

May the God of endurance and encouragement grant us to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together we may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Mason Barge 2/2024

~ Romans 15:5–6

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.

Two Apostles, by Tintoretto (Jacopo Comin), ca. 1570.

Food for Thought

Galatians 1:9-10 (DP Bible)

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 [literally anathema].

Perhaps they tell you what you want to hear. But I live to please God, not men. Pleasing an audience is not my goal. I will not compromise the truth, for if I did, I could not call myself a servant of Christ.

DP Parallel Bible (3-Column) - Galatians 1

Notes on the Scripture

Pleasing God, not Men (Galatians #5)

Paul’s statement here is brief, but it is bursting with power. He lives to please God, not people. Of course, he is trying to bring the message of Christ to those he addresses and hopes that they will receive it. But what does he do if someone says or thinks, “I like most of what you say, but I cannot accept _____________.” Does he say, “Well, better that you believe 98% of it”? Does he say, “I’m a grown-up. I think we can compromise on that one small issue”? No. He says “I will not compromise the Gospel of Christ. I seek to please God, not my human listeners.”

There is no compromise in the Bible. God is an absolute; He is not going to change depending upon the thoughts of human beings.

Paul

Working backwards from Paul’s statements, we might infer that this is a problem in Galatia: preachers of the Gospel, in order to attract more followers, are telling them what they want to hear instead of the Word of God. They are making compromises in order to enlarge their groups of followers.

Everyone has parts of the Gospel that they do not want to hear, that they would like to change. But if we look just one verse back, what is the status of these preachers in the eyes of God? Both they and the compromised Gospel they preach are accursed. “Anathema.”(Anathema, oddly, is a perfect transliteration of the Greek word used here and in v. 10. It means to be the object of God’s disfavor. Paul comes as close as possible to saying “damned” without foregoing the possibility of repentance.)

Reading this, we can make a distinction between Paul, the apostle of Christ, and the false apostles who have infiltrated the Galatian churches. Paul certainly wants to grow the church of Christ, but his first principle is that the church must be pure and in complete acceptance of the Word of God. He will not compromise the Gospel, no matter how few the people who believe. The false apostles’ first principle, on the other hand, is apparently acceptance. If they can say something that will increase the size of the church, they will modify their message.

Paul emphasizes his own integrity, saying “I could not call myself a servant of Christ” if he compromised God’s truth in order to please his listeners.

The modern world is no different. A servant of Christ will accept His Word, whether they like it or not. A minister — priest, bishop, pastor, deacon, or whatever title by which they are called — who preaches variance from the Bible is not a servant of Christ, and by telling people what they want to hear instead of the truth, he is not doing his congregation a favor. Pandering to the secular opinions of church members has, unfortunately, become the rule rather than the exception in many (if not most) churches.

So we must examine our own beliefs, testing them against the Gospel (1 Thess. 5:21); and if our beliefs and the Gospel differ, it is our beliefs that we must understand to be in error.

Daily Inspiration

“It's Too Late!”

Current Memory Verse     Remember the Bible

Print Today’s Devotion