The Lord knows those who seek refuge in Him

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional , Refuge

We are inclined to think of the wrath of God when the storms of life move in, and trouble brews. We look at leaders who are His adversaries, enemies, men filled with evil, or leading lives of sin, and fear that we will be consumed by the God’s indignation, and anger, as He deals with them, but although the rain falls on the just and the unjust alike, He knows all of us who have taken refuge in Him. Are we ready to trust in His goodness, and mercy as He deals with countries, and people who oppose Him?

We possess the Master Key, but do we unlock our prayers?

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional , Praying in Full

We ask very little of God, and yet He has so much more that He wants to give us. We ask in prayer, and yet we only ask for a sip from His cup, when He actually wants us to drink our fill, cup after cup of His boundless blessings, the blood of Christ, and from the endless flow of His living water. Do we think that if we ask too much it might be presumptuous, or that we might exceed His grace? Do we fear that we will strain His mercy, or ask for something that is beyond His ability to give? No my brothers and sisters, our God can satisfy our every need, and will keep asking us if we want more. The name of Jesus is like the master key that opens up every storehouses of our Lord’s provision, and treasure to us.

Renewing our Hope in the midst of Life’s Storms

Richard Forbes
Renewing Hope

Truly blessed is he who has never stood hopeless on one of life’s darkest nights, and searched for a tiny glimmer of hope. When we stand beneath a starless sky, or cower in hopelessness as storm clouds turn our day to night, where do we find the strength to believe, and the faith to hope again? Where do we turn to reclaim the lost joy that will bring light back into our lives? There is but one place for us to turn, and that is to the Lord. We cry out to Him with tears of desperation, and patiently wait upon Him with a strength that only His Holy Spirit can brings to us. We trust in our hope’s return, and have faith in Him, our strong tower, while we wait for the glow of the Lord’s righteous return.

Understanding the challenging mysteries of God

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional , Mysteries

As men and women of faith we often encounter hardships or other occurrences in life that we don’t understand. We see great catastrophes, and horrific wrongs being done in the world and ask “Why is God allowing this to occur?” We pray for intervention, or at least an answer, yet despite our pleading, and questioning, we can’t hear an answer, or understand God’s reasoning in allowing such a terrible occurrence. In truth, we are often shown the good as it rises from the terrible things we have faced, and in those times when we don’t get a glimpse of it, it is because we can’t understand or aren’t capable of seeing, what God’s hand is constructing.

Seeing Him who is Invisible

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional ,

Moses endured by seeing Him who is invisible, can we say the same thing regarding our faith? Is God so real and tangible to us that we can see Him all about us? When we open our eyes in the morning, and thank Him for the blessings to come, is He real to us? When we pray our morning prayers do we look into His eyes? And, even before our feet touch the floor, can our ears hear the voice of Jesus as He intercedes for us? Seeing is the process of our eyes gathering the reflection of light from the things about us, and our brain transforming them into an image. Do we see God in this way? Do our eyes gather Him in because He is light, and do we see Jesus because He is light too, or do they both remain invisible to us? Do our minds block what they should be seeing clearly? Is our faith correctly gathering the light of God, and of Jesus Christ and transforming it into their images for us to see?

Restoring the Fizz to a flat Faith, or Relationship

Richard Forbes
Complacent Faith

If we know and serve the Lord long enough there will be a time when we will experience His silence, and feel like He is far away. Maybe sin has separated us from Him, or we have become so used to His presence that we don’t feel His closeness like we once did. Whatever the reason, we know that we don’t believe any less, and yet for some mysterious reason there seems to be a distance between us. We are like a carbonated drink that has lost its fizz… we are flat. So what do we do when we find ourselves in this lonely place? I recommend that we read and pray the scriptures, and seek new ways to serve Him until we realize He is still close, and our hand is firmly in His once more.

Our Adoption as the Children of God

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional , Adoption

I once heard a man who had just lost both of his parents make this statement in the midst of his grief, “now I am an orphan”, and I thought to myself “for those who believe in God that will never be true.” Jesus Christ came to redeem us from sin, and to abide in us, but He came to do much more than simply introduce us to His Father, He came so that we would be adopted by Him… in Jesus we have become more than orphans that our Lord has charitably taken in… we have become His true sons and daughters; the sons and daughters of a loving God, and made His in every way.

Trials, Choices, and our Lessons of Faith

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional , Trials and Faith

When we face trials in our lives God will teach us lessons in faith through them, and the hardships we encounter will be of varying degrees, but every once in a while we will face one that is so overwhelming, and so devastating, that it shakes our faith to its very core, and those are the storms that break loose the loose debris of our self-imposed religion. These are the disasters that leave us with only the cornerstone of Jesus, and the solid foundational stones of God standing. It is in such times, when we think all is lost, that we will find our belief is still intact beneath the rubble, and that the things of God which are firm, and never changing have not only survived, but have become more deeply imbedded in us. Each of us will go through minor tremors, and fires of varying degrees, but when that magnitude 10 quake comes, or the fierce fires rage, what will we find standing when their dust has settled?

Who among us can fight for God?

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional , Fighting

It is a common misconception that we need to fight God’s battles for Him. Christian’s who think that they must aggressively defend God, or Jesus Christ, from the world are mistaken. As humans we carry a lot of defensive anger around in us, and it will bubble to the surface when we, or our families, are threatened in any way. If you aren’t inclined to believe this then try disparaging someone’s parents, correcting their child, or doing just about anything that makes them feel their loved ones are facing harm in some way. We allow this anger to bleed over into our faith too, and will turn neighbors into enemies over our desire to defend God, and even our liturgy. We will lash out at others who don’t believe as we do, and will even go to war over these differences. We act as though God needs for us to fight His battles, when all He really wants us to do is to show others who He is by standing firm in our spiritual lives, revealing the nature of His Son Jesus to the world, and then by trusting in Him as He wages spiritual war.

God’s Will; do we do more than obey it?

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional , Doing God’s Will

When the Lord our God gives us a bitter cup, and tells us to drink, what is our response? When we are told to face the death of a loved one, or perhaps our own death, do we walk dutifully into it, or do we resist it with all our might? What was Abraham’s response when he was asked to sacrifice his only son Isaac; did he hesitate to obey? In similar fashion, Jesus didn’t want to die, but more than that, He didn’t want to disobey the will of His Father. So He healed the ear that Peter had cut from the soldier’s head as he tried to rescue Jesus, and then our savior told him to put up his sword. Jesus didn’t just obey, but he helped to facilitate God’s will. Do we do this when we come to know God’s will for us? Is it in us to not only obey, but to contribute to God’s will for us?

Defeating our Thoughts of past Sin, to gain Eternity

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional , Tempting Thoughts


If we choose to follow the world over Yahweh the God of Abraham, then the fallen person within us, that we have chosen, will most certainly become who we are once again. Do we seek the false treasures, pleasures, and happiness that the world has to offer us over all that God desires to give us, and to do in our lives? Were we once focused on the Lord, only to have our hearts cool towards Him, and have we turned back towards the easy way, and those things that drove our lives before we first came to know Jesus? Are we no longer adhering to God’s commandments… only seeking what pleases the fallen man, or woman, within us rather than the suffering heart of Jesus that picking up our cross, and following Him requires? Well, God looks for those whose hearts are blameless, and only in Christ can we become pure.

Trusting completely in, and Leaning heavily on, our God

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional , Trust

When our enemies are marching against us, or problems appear ready to overcome us, we drop to our knees and pray, but quite often we hear only silence. However, God is not impressed with the strength of our adversaries like we are, nor does He fear the impending doom of problems that cause us to quake. He remains calm before calamity because it is He who has made the raging sea, and He who calms it. When facing the armies that assemble against us He remains still, even though our enemies might run at us like prides of lions. And, even if every pride in the land were gathered together as one, He is unimpressed, because they were made by His hand, and can be easily defeated with a single Word from His mouth. Do we doubt that God hears our prayers, or do we mistake His silence as a sign of fear or His inability to help us? Do we lean on Him as completely as we should… with all certainty?

Our Deliberate Travels of Faith

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional , Traveling

We travel the earth today in similar fashion to Jesus, and His disciples, but do we spread the gospel as we do so? A journey that took Jesus weeks and months to complete is now possible in minutes, and hours, but does that afford us the opportunity to interact with others as He was able to do? Is spreading the good news of Jesus Christ even something we consider a priority as we go, or is it something that maybe, just maybe, is an afterthought that we might stumble upon as we sit in an airplane high above the clouds? If we could travel by any means available to us, and it would not cost us a penny more, which method would we choose? In all honesty wouldn’t it be the fastest, and the one that provided us with the most comfort? Where is our Emmaus today? Where is the wind in our sails as we leave a crowd on one shore and teach a lesson of faith to our companions upon a stormy sea, as we sail to meet a waiting crowd on a distant shore?

Overcoming the World with Love

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional , Overcoming the World

Have we overcome the earth? There are men and women in this world that have so much wealth that they couldn’t possibly spend it in a dozen lifetimes, and yet they continue to be obsessed with it, protecting it, hoarding it, and focusing on making more. They feel like it gives them power, that they have overcome the world, and are its masters, but in truth their wealth has ensnared them, and owns them. Jesus came into this world born of meager parents, and walked across it with little more than the clothes on his back, yet He was free of poverty, because He had truly overcome the world. When we finally see as He saw, that what matters in this world is loving God, winning each soul’s deliverance from sin, and then returning it to our Heavenly Father, then we too will have overcome the world, and will have glorified God… Can we honestly say that we have overcome the world?

Worshipping God as we should

Richard Forbes
Christian , Daily Devotional , Worshipping

Do we worship, honor, and obey God above all else as we should? When the laws of men ask us to disobey His commands and commandments, are we courageous enough in our faith to say no? Would we be willing to abandon our home and become aliens in a foreign land if that is what it takes to remain righteous? God abhors sin, and just because we are told to honor our leaders, we are still subject to God. Sometimes the penalty for disregarding man’s law can be great, and when this is the case then we face a decision that tests our faith to its very core. This is when we must determine who we serve… will it be God, or man?

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