Focus

Pay attention to the tension in your body. Let go of it and any expectations to do anything other than God’s will today. Prepare yourself to hear God’s word.

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Read

1 John 5:1-5 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the parent loves the child. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments. For the love of God is this, that we obey his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome, for whatever is born of God conquers the world. And this is the victory that conquers the world, our faith. Who is it that conquers the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

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Reflect

John Henry Yates, an American songwriter born in 1837, experienced many trials and tribulations. As a young boy he fractured his skull, broke his leg, and pierced his lung with a knife. He also witnessed the horrors of the Civil War. His first wife and two sons died of diphtheria when he was in his early forties. He eventually remarried and continued to remain faithful to God. All these life experiences led him to write the familiar old hymn “Faith Is the Victory.”

In the lyrics to this song, Yates references the words of 1 John 5:4. In the first verse, he parallels the life of a Christian to the life of a soldier:

Encamped along the hills of light,
Ye Christian soldiers, rise.
And press the battle ere the night
Shall veil the glowing skies.
Against the foe in vales below
Let all our strength be hurled.
Faith is the victory, we know,
That overcomes the world.

Yates instructs us to be urgent and rise up before the night has a chance to veil the light. As Christians, we must obey God and keep his commandments.

We all face foes within the low points of our lives; however, we know if we keep the faith, we can overcome the world with God’s help.

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Pray

Dear Lord, help me to love you and obey your commandments. Give me the faith to rise daily, put on your armor, and fight the good fight so that I can claim victory in your name. Amen.

Go with God!