Max Lucado Daily: RESIST TEMPTATION - November 12, 2026
Satan and the Son of God stood on the southeastern wall of the temple, more than a hundred feet above the Kidron Valley, and Satan told Jesus to jump into the arms of God. Jesus refused. Not because God wouldn’t catch him. He refused because he didn’t have anything to prove to anyone, much less the devil.
Neither do you. In church of all places, Satan will do with you what he did with Jesus. He will urge you to do tricks, to impress others with your service, to make a show of your faith, to call attention to your good deeds. Satan loves to turn church assemblies into Las Vegas presentations where people show off their abilities rather than boast in God’s.
Don’t be suckered. You don’t have anything to prove.
God Is with You Every Day
Ecclesiastes 4
Slow Suicide
1–34Next I turned my attention to all the outrageous violence that takes place on this planet—the tears of the victims, no one to comfort them; the iron grip of oppressors, no one to rescue the victims from them. So I congratulated the dead who are already dead instead of the living who are still alive. But luckier than the dead or the living is the person who has never even been, who has never seen the bad business that takes place on this earth.
4Then I observed all the work and ambition motivated by envy. What a waste! Smoke. And spitting into the wind.
5The fool sits back and takes it easy,
His sloth is slow suicide.
6One handful of peaceful repose
Is better than two fistfuls of worried work—
More spitting into the wind.
Why Am I Working Like a Dog?
7–8I turned my head and saw yet another wisp of smoke on its way to nothingness: a solitary person, completely alone—no children, no family, no friends—yet working obsessively late into the night, compulsively greedy for more and more, never bothering to ask, “Why am I working like a dog, never having any fun? And who cares?” More smoke. A bad business.
9–10It’s better to have a partner than go it alone.
Share the work, share the wealth.
And if one falls down, the other helps,
But if there’s no one to help, tough!
11Two in a bed warm each other.
Alone, you shiver all night.
12By yourself you’re unprotected.
With a friend you can face the worst.
Can you round up a third?
A three-stranded rope isn’t easily snapped.
13–16A poor youngster with some wisdom is better off than an old but foolish king who doesn’t know which end is up. I saw a youth just like this start with nothing and go from rags to riches, and I saw everyone rally to the rule of this young successor to the king. Even so, the excitement died quickly, the throngs of people soon lost interest. Can’t you see it’s only smoke? And spitting into the wind?
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Thursday, November 12, 2026
by Nancy Gavilanes
TODAY'S SCRIPTURE
2 Kings 6:1-7
One day the guild of prophets came to Elisha and said, “You can see that this place where we’re living under your leadership is getting cramped—we have no elbow room. Give us permission to go down to the Jordan where each of us will get a log. We’ll build a roomier place.”
Elisha said, “Go ahead.”
3One of them then said, “Please! Come along with us!”
He said, “Certainly.”
4–5He went with them. They came to the Jordan and started chopping down trees. As one of them was felling a timber, his axhead flew off and sank in the river.
“Oh no, master!” he cried out. “And it was borrowed!”
6The Holy Man said, “Where did it sink?”
The man showed him the place.
He cut off a branch and tossed it at the spot. The axhead floated up.
7“Grab it,” he said. The man reached out and took it.
Today's Insights
Of the many miracles the prophet Elisha performed, many involved everyday things and ordinary people, demonstrating God’s protection and provision. The miracle of the “iron axhead” (2 Kings 6:5) is one example. The iron ax was an expensive tool. Such a loss would’ve been costly for the prophet, and its restoration saved him from a huge financial debt. We see other examples of God’s care in the miracle of the abundant olive oil, which redeemed a widow’s debts (4:1-7); a young son restored to life (vv. 8-37); the provision of edible stew for hungry prophets (v. 38); and twenty loaves of bread feeding one hundred men (vv. 42-44). God cares about the everyday issues that trouble us. Jesus tells us to “look at the birds of the air . . . [and how your] heavenly Father feeds them” (Matthew 6:26). We can turn our everyday concerns to God knowing that He cares for us (1 Peter 5:7).
For additional reflection, read: How Not to Pray.
God’s Unexpected Ways
“Oh no, my lord!” he cried out. “It was borrowed!” 2 Kings 6:5
When the Bible that Matt Williams kept in the back of his car was stolen, he feared he’d never see it again, and the precious photos he kept tucked in its case would be lost. So he offered a short prayer: “Lord, it breaks my heart. I got a lot of stuff in there that means a lot to me, and I’d like to get it back. But not my will but yours, like you always say.” Just days later, Williams was stunned to learn that his Bible was found in a stolen car. It had been placed next to a Bible the original car owner kept on her passenger seat. Being reunited with his prized possession seemed impossible, but God answered Williams’ prayer.
In 2 Kings 6:1-7, we read about the prophet Elisha facing a seemingly impossible situation. He and a group of prophets were by the Jordan River getting wood to build a larger meeting place. As one of the prophets cut down a tree, “the iron axhead fell into the water. ‘Oh no, my lord!’ he cried out. ‘It was borrowed!’” (v. 5). The distressed prophet showed the prophet Elisha where it fell. “Elisha cut a stick and threw it there, and made the iron float” (v. 6). The prophet was miraculously reunited with the valuable lost item.
No care or concern is too small to bring before God in prayer. We can pray and ask God for help in any circumstance, and He can answer our prayers in unexpected ways.
Reflect & Pray
When has God answered your prayer in unexpected ways? What can you pray about today?
Dear God, thank You that I can pray about anything.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Thursday, November 12, 2026
The Transfigured Life
If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. — 2 Corinthians 5:17
What is your idea of salvation? The experience of salvation means that in your life things have actually been changed. When you are saved, you no longer look at things as you used to. Your desires are new. The things which used to rule you have lost their power.
A key question in this experience is, Has God changed the things that matter? If you still long for old things, it’s absurd to talk about being born from above. When you are born again, the Spirit of God manifests a change in your mind and life. Afterward, when a crisis arises, you are the most amazed person on earth at the wonderful difference in you. There is no possibility of imagining that you caused this difference; you know beyond a doubt that it was the Spirit of God. This complete and amazing change is the evidence that you are a saved soul.
“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud” (1 Corinthians 13:4). What difference has salvation and sanctification made in me? Can I walk tall in the light of 1 Corinthians 13, or do I have to shuffle? The salvation that is worked out in me by the Holy Spirit emancipates me entirely. As long as I walk in the light as God is in the light, he sees nothing to censure, because his life is working through every aspect of my own—not only those aspects I am conscious of but also those that lie deeper than my consciousness.
Jeremiah 51-52; Hebrews 9
WISDOM FROM OSWALD
It is an easy thing to argue from precedent because it makes everything simple, but it is a risky thing to do. Give God “elbow room”; let Him come into His universe as He pleases. If we confine God in His working to religious people or to certain ways, we place ourselves on an equality with God.
Baffled to Fight Better, 51 L
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Thursday, November 12, 2026
Fatal Distraction - #10394
Scripture: Luke 17:26-30
For many years Americans were not very quick to catch on to soccer. It’s been the world’s game; not so much America’s game. We did have the World Cup finals here, then again recently. And for many Americans they began to understand most of what the world already knew. It’s the greatest sports obsession in the world. Obsession may seem a little strong, but, well consider what happened in Thailand a few years ago. One night during the World Cup games the streets were empty in this particular city. “Hey, the World Cup is on. Why would I be out on the street?” In fact, even the security guard at the bank left to watch the game. And while the guard and the city lost themselves in a soccer game, yep, you wanna guess? Some thief cleaned out the bank. Now, I don’t know who won the match, but I know who lost their money.
I’m Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about “Fatal Distraction.”
Our word for today from the Word of God comes from Luke 17. I’ll be reading verses 26-30. It’s an unsettling example that Jesus uses to describe how people will be living just before Jesus Christ comes back. Here’s what it says, “Just as it was in the days of Noah, so also will it be in the days of the Son of Man. People were eating, drinking, marrying, being given in marriage up till the day Noah entered the ark. Then the flood came and destroyed them all. It was the same in the days of Lot. People were eating and drinking, buying, selling, planting, building. But the day Lot left Sodom, fire and sulfur rained down from heaven and destroyed them all. It will be just like this on the day the Son of Man is revealed.”
What were these people doing? Does it say they were doing real sinful stuff? Well, they were, but that’s not what it says here. They were doing everyday stuff. Planting, building, marrying, eating, drinking; that’s not real terrible stuff. They were just so busy with little stuff that they missed some of the biggest stuff in history. Sounds like our Thai soccer fans. It’s sort of a fatal distraction; all hypnotized by a comparatively trivial thing while they’re losing what’s really valuable. Maybe like some of us.
There are some little things in terms of eternity that have become big things, and it ends up causing us to treat the really big things far too lightly. Take sports for example. Now, I’m not some pharisaical prude who doesn’t care about sports. I’ve got my teams I like and root for. Ask my sons; I yell as loud as anybody for our home team. But for some of us we spend entirely too much time talking about, thinking about, watching our teams. We even get angry, depressed, and delirious over it.
But if we take a step back, how much does it really matter who got a ball through a hoop more times? Or who got a ball into a net, or who can get the pointed ball from one end of the field to the other the most times?
We can become addicted to fitness, or our favorite TV shows, or our favorite music. We can get addicted to cars, antiques, and recreation. Actually for most of us, there is some fatal distraction that tends to take us over and push everything else aside and then take a disproportionate chunk of our time, money or energy. Now, I’m not suggesting we eliminate all the diversions from our lives. I’m suggesting we ask ourselves, “Is there something that has more of me than it should?”
See, Jesus suggested that the trivial can become consuming and cause us to miss what He’s doing or what He wants to do in our lives. Obsessions that may cost us our relationship with God.
God wants us to think of ourselves as soldiers. A real soldier is focused on his mission; his commander, and not on a trivial pursuit (2 Timothy 2:4). We’re living in incredible times, maybe end times. It’s time to take inventory and make sure the best of our energy and our resources is going to the things that are going to matter 100 million years from now.
Those Asian soccer fans might make this recommendation: let’s not get hypnotized by things that ultimately don’t matter while we’re losing what’s really valuable. Or in the words of Jesus, “Seek first the Kingdom of God.”
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