“Doris, these repairs are not mine!” Sherry worked in a garment factory and the swelling pile of jeans behind her would clog her line. She checked and the hem’s flawed stitching was done in green; Sherry’s thread was blue.

“Only one life, ’twill soon be past;

Only what’s done for Christ will last.”

We live differently when we remember that the eternal is what is important. We order our lives around what is truly real rather than what will someday appear as it actually is—as unreal as shadows.

Has Satan ever told you, “You’ve failed, so God isn’t interested in helping you”? In the story of the Gibeonite deception in Joshua 9:3-15, Joshua failed to seek God’s guidance, and he and his men impulsively signed the treaty with the Gibeonites. Still, Joshua did not despair.

Has Satan ever told you, “You’ve failed, so God isn’t interested in helping you”? In the story of the Gibeonite deception in Joshua 9:3-15, Joshua failed to seek God’s guidance, and he and his men impulsively signed the treaty with the Gibeonites. Still, Joshua did not despair.

An evangelist came to Dr. Alexander Whyte’s hometown and in his preaching criticized the other ministers there. The next day, a man who had heard the evangelist visited Dr. Whyte.

Job was a good, righteous, and holy man who lost it all. If one-tenth of Job’s troubles happened to us, what would be our response? Would we do what Job did upon hearing of his losses? Before he said a thing, “he fell to the ground in worship” (Job 1:20). Job saw God as the blessed controller of all things, so he worshipped.

Dutch Sheets told in his book Intercessory Prayer of a period when he was spending hours a day counseling several who were in difficult situations. Three of them were extremely suicidal and at times would call him saying they were going to take their lives right then.

Some years ago, I had an experience which gave me a deep respect for spiritual realities. In closing my prayer times, I began telling Jesus I wanted my spirit to commune with His Spirit. Often I experienced a profound sense of being strengthened in my spirit.