Daily Bible Reading
To prevent the frustration of falling behind, which most of us tend to do when following a Bible reading plan, each month of this plan gives you only twenty-five readings. Today we start a few “free days” . We encourage you to catch up on any readings you may have missed this month.
If you have finished the month’s readings, you can use these final days of the month to study the passages that challenged or intrigued you.
Daily Devotion
Remember the Steps to Victory in Forgiveness
“Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” Galatians 6:9 NIV
The other day, I went to a store when I was weary. During my visit, someone yelled and disrespected me. For me it seemed at just the wrong time. I became my “imperfect self” and behaved in a way that I should not have. I’m not a bad person; it’s just that my weariness caught up with me and prevented my turn of the ‘other cheek.’
Since that event the Holy Ghost won’t leave me alone, speaking to me that I needed to forgive the person. Internally I have resisted as I felt like the person was in the wrong. Instead of dealing with my hurt and seeking God’s help to forgive immediately, I walked away from the incident.
I got in my car and beat up myself as I should have forgiven the person immediately. Since then, the Holy Ghost has continued to speak to me about forgiveness through certain Scriptures in the Bible. I was pricked in my heart and regret that I handled forgiveness so poorly. As humans and even as Christians, we cannot always make wrong feelings go away immediately — any more than you can make right ones come upon demand. But God can and will redirect our thoughts. If we simply remember to do what the Scripture instructs us to do, we will be able to work through the process of forgiveness.
The first thing we must decide is to forgive those who have hurt us (Matthew 6:14-15). The second thing is to pray for them. Another thing God tells us to do is to bless our enemies (Matthew 5:44). To bless someone means to speak well of them and want good things for them. Refuse to talk unkindly about those who hurt us. Don’t keep talking about what the enemies “did,” because that only keeps the pain stirred up in us. The fourth thing you must do is wait. Don’t give up. Keep doing what is right and wait on God to change your feelings: He will! Forgiveness is a process. God gives us the strength to walk through the process. It is a process of love.
~Niezel Carganilla-Gaoaen