Max Lucado Daily: CHRIST COVERS US - April 24, 2026
We are poor. Spiritually for sure; monetarily, perhaps. We’ve buried our dreams, desires, and aspirations. Like the mother with Lupus or the businessman in the unemployment line, we’re out of options. Yet Christ approached us while we were yet sinners. “Will you cover us?” we asked him, and grace smiled. He gave us grace.
Not just mercy, mind you, but grace. Grace goes beyond mercy. Mercy gave the prodigal son a second chance, but grace threw him a party. Mercy prompted the Samaritan to bandage the wounds of the victim, but grace prompted him to leave his credit card as payment for the victim’s care. Mercy forgave the thief on the cross; grace escorted him into paradise. Mercy pardons us; grace woos and weds us. Grace does this. God does this. Grace is God walking into your world with a sparkle in his eye and an offer that’s hard to resist.
Grace: More Than We Deserve, Greater Than We Imagine
1 Samuel 27
David thought to himself, “Sooner or later, Saul’s going to get me. The best thing I can do is escape to Philistine country. Saul will count me a lost cause and quit hunting me down in every nook and cranny of Israel. I’ll be out of his reach for good.”
2–4 So David left; he and his six hundred men went to Achish son of Maoch, king of Gath. They moved in and settled down in Gath, with Achish. Each man brought his household; David brought his two wives, Ahinoam of Jezreel and Abigail, widow of Nabal of Carmel. When Saul was told that David had escaped to Gath, he called off the hunt.
5 Then David said to Achish, “If it’s agreeable to you, assign me a place in one of the rural villages. It doesn’t seem right that I, your mere servant, should be taking up space in the royal city.”
6–7 So Achish assigned him Ziklag. (This is how Ziklag got to be what it is now, a city of the kings of Judah.) David lived in Philistine country a year and four months.
8–9 From time to time David and his men raided the Geshurites, the Girzites, and the Amalekites—these people were longtime inhabitants of the land stretching toward Shur and on to Egypt. When David raided an area he left no one alive, neither man nor woman, but took everything else: sheep, cattle, donkeys, camels, clothing—the works. Then he’d return to Achish.
10–11 Achish would ask, “And whom did you raid today?”
David would tell him, “Oh, the Negev of Judah,” or “The Negev of Jerahmeel,” or “The Negev of the Kenites.” He never left a single person alive lest one show up in Gath and report what David had really been doing. This is the way David operated all the time he lived in Philistine country.
12 Achish came to trust David completely. He thought, “He’s made himself so repugnant to his people that he’ll be in my camp forever.”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Friday, April 24, 2026
by Tim Gustafson
TODAY'S SCRIPTURE
Joshua 3:9-11, 13-17
Then Joshua addressed the People of Israel: “Attention! Listen to what God, your God, has to say. This is how you’ll know that God is alive among you—he will completely dispossess before you the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites, and Jebusites. Look at what’s before you: the Chest of the Covenant. Think of it—the Master of the entire earth is crossing the Jordan as you watch.
When the soles of the feet of the priests carrying the Chest of God, Master of all the earth, touch the Jordan’s water, the flow of water will be stopped—the water coming from upstream will pile up in a heap.”
14–16 And that’s what happened. The people left their tents to cross the Jordan, led by the priests carrying the Chest of the Covenant. When the priests got to the Jordan and their feet touched the water at the edge (the Jordan overflows its banks throughout the harvest), the flow of water stopped. It piled up in a heap—a long way off—at Adam, which is near Zarethan. The river went dry all the way down to the Arabah Sea (the Salt Sea). And the people crossed, facing Jericho.
17 And there they stood; those priests carrying the Chest of the Covenant stood firmly planted on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan while all Israel crossed on dry ground. Finally the whole nation was across the Jordan, and not one wet foot.
Today's Insights
God personally led Israel out of Egypt, through the sea, across the wilderness, and through the Jordan River (Joshua 3:13-17) into the promised land. These miracles are explainable only by God’s presence among them. At Mount Sinai, Moses had confessed, “If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here. How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?” (Exodus 33:15-16). God’s presence is vital for us today too and the primary source of our witness to an onlooking world. No matter what situations we face, He’ll go with us and make a way for us.
Rivers to Cross
I am with you as I was with Moses. Joshua 3:7
When Chris McCandless wandered off the grid and into the Alaskan wilderness, he expected to return. But he crossed the Teklanika in April, well before summer ice-melt would swell that river into an impassable torrent. Months later, out of food, McCandless couldn’t get back. His tragic death is memorialized in book and film.
The people of ancient Israel faced a crucial river crossing in order to enter the promised land. However, “the Jordan [was] at flood stage” (Joshua 3:15), a challenge that would grow their faith. God told Joshua, “Today I will begin to exalt you in the eyes of all Israel, so they may know that I am with you as I was with Moses” (v. 7).
Joshua told the people, “The ark of the covenant of the Lord of all the earth will go into the Jordan ahead of you” (v. 11). Taking the ark, the priests stepped into the Jordan, and “the water from upstream stopped flowing” (vv. 15-16). The entire nation stepped across on a dry riverbed (v. 17).
From time to time we’ll face “river crossings”—impossible situations that can grow our faith if we’ll turn to the one who makes the way across. The greatest of these crossings is from this life into the next. No matter what it is, the God who was with Moses, Joshua, and the Israelites also makes a way for us.
Reflect & Pray
What “river crossing” do you face today? How have you seen God show His power on your behalf in the past?
Thank You, dear Jesus, that You make the way across any river I face, including the final one.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Friday, April 24, 2026
Do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven. — Luke 10:20
As Christian disciples, worldliness isn’t our snare; sin isn’t our snare. Our snare—the thing that threatens to entrap us—is a lack of spiritual discipline. If we are spiritually undisciplined, we shamelessly strive to fit in with the religious age we live in, drawn by the lure of spiritual “success.”
Never court anything besides the approval of God. Take yourself “outside the camp, bearing the disgrace he bore” (Hebrews 13:13). Jesus told the disciples not to rejoice in successful service, and yet this seems to be the one thing in which most of us do rejoice. We have a commercial viewpoint, tallying up how many souls have been saved and sanctified on our watch. We forget that our work begins where God’s grace has laid the foundation. Salvation and sanctification are the work of God’s sovereign grace. Our work is to disciple lives until they are entirely given over to God. One life wholly devoted to God is more valuable to him than a hundred lives reawakened by his Spirit. God brings his disciples to a standard of life by his grace, and we are responsible for reproducing that standard in others.
Unless we are living a life hidden with Christ in God, we are likely to become irritating dictators instead of indwelling disciples. Many of us are dictators. We dictate when we pray and when we preach, telling God what he must do, telling others how they must be. Jesus never dictated. When Jesus talked about discipleship, he prefaced it with an “if,” not with a “must” (Matthew 16:24 kjv). Discipleship carries an option with it.
2 Samuel 19-20; Luke 18:1-23
WISDOM FROM OSWALD
For the past three hundred years men have been pointing out how similar Jesus Christ’s teachings are to other good teachings. We have to remember that Christianity, if it is not a supernatural miracle, is a sham.
The Highest Good, 548 L
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Friday, April 24, 2026
MANY FLAVORS AT GOD'S PLACE - #10250
Now, I'm not in the business of advertising any particular ice cream spot, but let's face it, it's kind of fun to go to Baskin Robbins. You know, they have all those flavors they advertise. Now, you can write to me and tell me that maybe you like another place better, but listen, I know you like to go where there's a lot of flavors. And you know what? It seems like it takes me an hour to decide which one I want. Well, not really, but seems like an hour to the person who's waiting on me. But the variety is a lot of fun. Now, can you imagine an ice cream store that offered only vanilla? Yeah, boring! After a while you get tired of the same old flavor. Can you imagine a person who said, "I only eat vanilla. I never tried anything else." I'd say to them, "Man, look at the list! You're missing so many flavors. You can have ice cream so many different ways." How boring to think that all ice cream has to be the one flavor you like.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Many Flavors At God's Place."
Our word for today from the Word of God is found in 1 Corinthians 12. And we go, in a sense, to God's ice cream parlor if you want to put it that way. And it's called the church - the body of Christ. Listen to all the flavors. "There are different kinds of gifts, but the same spirit. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all men." Verse 12 of 1 Corinthians 12: "The body is a unit, though, that is made up of many parts, and though all of its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ."
Okay, now, if there's one message we could get from these wonderful verses it would be this. Variety is God's plan for His body. He's not interested in cookie cutter Christians. He wants many styles, many flavors of Christians. God likes variety. Guess what we like? Uniformity. We want everybody to be like us - like our group. So as a consequence, generally speaking, Baptist Christians only know Baptist Christians, and Assembly of God Christians only know Assembly of God Christians, and Methodist Christians only know Methodist Christians, and Presbyterian, Presbyterians, etc. The list is infinite.
But, you see, none of us has all of Him. But all of us together have all of Him. Don't cut yourself off from all the other flavors; don't just be a vanilla Christian. See, we disagree only about, say, 10% of it. Ninety percent is about Christ, and sin, and salvation, and Christ's return, and the Bible: we tend to agree on those. We need each other. Those different styles and different emphases in the body of Christ are not only God's will, but they make you rich.
One group of Christians may teach you how to pray and get a hold of God. Another group may really have a vision for missions, and they'll help you care about a lost world. Others will really get you into personal evangelism. There's another group of Christians who might really help you learn about God's sovereign control over things. And then there's a group over there that may be strong in loving and caring and accepting. And this group over here, they'll teach you a lot about worship. And this one, oh you'll learn a lot about careful Bible study. Hey, listen. We will be together forever. All the labels we have here on earth won't make it past the gate of heaven. Why don't we get together now?
You're on God's side when you're against whatever divides His body. It's not all vanilla. It's lots of flavors. It's all ice cream; but it's lots of flavors, and that's what counts. We're all the church.
So, celebrate the variety in God's family. And enjoy all those flavors.
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