Today's daily devotion

Encouragement from the Scriptures

For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through the endurance taught in the Scriptures and the encouragement they provide we might have hope.—ROMANS 15:4 NIV

You know those days when nothing goes right? Sometimes those days stretch into weeks and months. You don’t get the promotion. Your car breaks down. Someone you love gets sick. Disappointment settles in and brings its brother, Discouragement. Things are not going according to your plan, and you may wonder if God even hears your prayers.

Look at the heroes of the Old Testament: God’s plan for those people wasn’t smooth sailing, either. Joseph was sold
into slavery, falsely accused by Potiphar’s wife, and unjustly imprisoned. Moses tended flocks in the wilderness for forty years after murdering a man and before leading God’s people out of slavery. David was anointed king but had to run for his life and wait fifteen years before actually sitting on the throne.

Those stories give us hope and encouragement. Our plans are quite different from God’s plans, and His ways of doing things are quite different from what we would often choose. We see how things worked out for the people of the Old Testament. We can take encouragement from the fact that the same God is at work in our lives.