Daily Devotions for Busy Lives

Bart Leger
  • 5.0 (11)
  • Christianity
  • Updated Daily

You meant to spend time with God this morning. Then the day started without you. This daily devotional podcast gets you back to Him in 7 to 9 minutes. Each weekday, pastor and author Dr. Bart Leger opens Scripture with a true story from everyday life and one practical way to apply God's truth. Listeners call it quick and to the point, a bit of calm at the start of the day. Press play and start your day anchored in God's Word.

  1. 13h ago

    What to Do When You Feel Like a Stranger in Your Own Home

    Some of the loneliest people are living in a house full of people. Your spouse is buried in work. The kids are behind a bedroom door with their phones. You get through a whole evening under one roof and exchange maybe forty words, most of them about the schedule. Then you look around at the family you helped build and feel like a guest in it. It's a strange kind of lonely, because you can't point to the thing that went wrong. Nobody fought. Nobody walked out. It came apart slowly over a few years while everybody was busy being responsible. This episode opens with a national AARP survey on loneliness. Researchers asked married people over the age of 45 a simple set of questions, and close to a third of them gave the same answer. They were lonely. These were couples sharing a house and a bed with someone, and feeling alone anyway. Relationship expert Pepper Schwartz described the ache as having a body right next to you while your deepest needs go unseen by the one person who should know you best. Psalm 68:5-6 speaks into that house: "Father to the fatherless, defender of widows, this is God, whose dwelling is holy. God places the lonely in families." Read that line with your own household in mind. God is the one who does the placing, which means He put you there on purpose, and He didn't move out when the warmth did. Look at who He is in those verses. Father to the fatherless. Defender of widows. He goes straight to the people who have nobody, which means the loneliest person at your dinner table already has His full attention. The survey covers marriages, and the ache runs wider than marriage. Plenty of parents feel it with a teenager who used to talk to them. So ask God to change what you have no power to change on your own. You can't reach inside your spouse and make them want you again, and you can't schedule the moment a sixteen-year-old opens up. Then start small. One meal with the television off. One conversation where nobody is holding a phone. Bart shares his own version of this, the years in ministry when he was out of the house most nights, coming home late to a family that had already gone on with the evening without him. He was pastoring other people's families while his own learned to run without him in it, and he calls that a sobering thing to figure out about yourself. BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU'LL DISCOVER: What an AARP survey found about loneliness inside marriage The promise in Psalm 68 that is easy to read past Two small changes that give a distant household somewhere to start A home like this can be rebuilt, one small turn toward each other at a time. God placed you in that house, and He is still in it. Be the one who moves first tonight. Share This Episode: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/323 Need Prayer? Leave me a voicemail: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/voicemail Want to keep these devotions coming? Please consider supporting this podcast. https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/support/ Rate and Review https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/reviews/new/ Connect with Bart Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/dailydevotionsforbusylives Website: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com Feeling spiritually drained? Start here. Download your free copy of my eBook Making Time for Jesus here: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/subscribe.

    What to Do When You Feel Like a Stranger in Your Own Home

  2. 1d ago

    What to Do When Someone Rejects Your Apology

    You went to the person. You told them you were sorry. And they didn't accept it. Maybe they told you it was too late. Maybe they got up and left the conversation without saying anything at all. Most of us grew up with a simple picture of how this is supposed to work. You apologize and they forgive you. Things go back to normal. When the second half never comes, you're left holding something you already paid for with nowhere to put it. So you start second-guessing the apology itself. Maybe you said it wrong. Maybe you waited too long. You think about going back and saying it again, better this time, and somewhere in there you know that a second run at it would be more about your relief than about them. This episode opens with David, who had spent years running from King Saul. Saul had turned on him out of jealousy and hunted him through the wilderness with an army, though David had served him faithfully and even married into his family. Then Saul walked alone into the cave where David and his men were hiding, defenseless, with his back turned. David's men were certain God had handed the king over. David rose and crept toward him with a blade. Psalm 34:14 speaks directly to that moment: "Turn away from evil and do good. Search for peace, and work to maintain it." Search for peace. Work to maintain it. Both of those are things you do with your own hands, and neither one arrives on command. Look at what the verse assigns you: the searching and the work. The other person's answer was never on your list. Paul says the same thing in Romans 12. As much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men. That phrase is a limit, and the limit is a mercy. So a finished apology looks like this. You named the thing you did without softening it, and you didn't attach conditions. Then you stopped. If that's what happened, the apology is complete whether or not they received it. God measures your repentance by what you brought Him. Bart shares his own version of this, an apology he made as a youth pastor that a father would not take, and a man who left the church over it. David learned the same lesson the long way. He cut a corner from Saul's robe and let the king walk out alive. Saul wept and confessed, and before long the chase started up again anyway. BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU'LL DISCOVER: What makes an apology complete even when the other person refuses itHow Psalm 34:14 marks the boundary between your part and theirsWhat David did when the man he had spared came after him again You can search for peace and work to maintain it. You cannot hand it to someone who won't take it. Do your part and keep your hands clean. Leave the rest with God. Share This Episode: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/322 Need Prayer? Leave me a voicemail: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/voicemail Want to keep these devotions coming? Please consider supporting this podcast. https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/support/ Rate and Review https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/reviews/new/ Connect with Bart Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/dailydevotionsforbusylives Website: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com Feeling spiritually drained? Start here. Download your free copy of my eBook Making Time for Jesus here: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/subscribe.

    What to Do When Someone Rejects Your Apology

  3. 2d ago

    When Your Kids Don't Know Their Grandparents Well

    A lot of families are spread out now. Grandparents live in one state, parents in another. The grandkids grow up on a handful of visits a year. Jobs move people. Housing prices move people. Nobody sat down and planned it this way, and here we are anyway. Some things get lost in the spread. The stories your parents could tell your children about where the family came from and what God did for them back when things were tight. The habits and small kindnesses grandkids pick up just from being around older people who love the Lord. Those don't transfer over a two-day Christmas visit with everybody rushing. This episode opens with Dale Russell, whose granddaughter was two years old and lived five hours away. He did the thing everybody recommends and hopped on a video call, and she lost interest almost immediately. A toddler has no use for making conversation with a face on a screen. She would wander off after a minute, leaving him holding a phone and watching the top of her head. Five hours was too far for a quick visit, and Dale could see where it was headed. At that rate he would be a nice man who showed up a couple times a year. Psalm 145:4 puts a name on what that distance costs: "Let each generation tell its children of your mighty acts; let them proclaim your power." Look at the verb. Tell. One generation tells the next, spoken out loud, from somebody who was there to somebody who wasn't. That kind of telling takes a person in the room and enough time for the story to come up on its own. The best of it happens sideways, in the car or standing at the sink drying dishes. So if distance is what you have, use what you have. Video calls do more than they seem to do in the moment, and a visit twice a year that everybody plans around will accomplish more than four visits nobody prepared for. What you say matters more than how long you talk. A five-minute call where you tell your grandchild one thing God did in your life will outlast a thirty-minute call about the weather. Bart shares his own version of this, the calls with his grandkids that get one-word answers and a shrug. Dale found his way through by changing what the two of them did together on the call. He read her picture books over live video, and the ones he reached for most were Bible stories. BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU'LL DISCOVER: What gets lost between generations when families live far apartWhy Psalm 145:4 describes faith being handed down out loud, in personOne change that turns a video call into something a young child will stay for Christian grandparents have one thing above all to hand down, and that is their faith. The miles change how it happens. They don't have to stop it. Share This Episode: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/321 Need Prayer? Leave me a voicemail: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/voicemail Want to keep these devotions coming? Please consider supporting this podcast. https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/support/ Rate and Review https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/reviews/new/ Connect with Bart Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/dailydevotionsforbusylives Website: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com Feeling spiritually drained? Start here. Download your free copy of my eBook Making Time for Jesus here: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/subscribe.

    When Your Kids Don't Know Their Grandparents Well

  4. 3d ago

    How to Pray When You're Too Tired to Pray

    Some nights the day ends and you have nothing left, and the prayer you meant to pray never comes. Learn why a short, plain prayer counts with God, and what Jesus said about willing spirits in worn-out bodies. There are stretches when the day finally winds down and you know you should pray, and you have no energy left for it. The words won't come. The moment you close your eyes, your mind wanders off to the grocery list or something your boss said that afternoon. You start to wonder if there's something wrong with your faith. Usually the answer is simpler. You're worn out. This episode opens with Charlotte Elliott, who had been sick so long she'd almost forgotten what a strong day felt like. Her brother, a minister, was raising money for a school, and the whole family went to help. Charlotte was too weak to go. Lying alone at home, an old accusation came back: she was useless and a burden, and if she couldn't even help with a fundraiser, God probably had no use for her either. Scripture speaks to that exhaustion with more tenderness than most of us expect. On the night before the cross, Jesus asked His closest friends to stay awake and pray with Him in Gethsemane, and He came back to find them asleep. Matthew 26:41 records what He said: "Keep watch and pray, so that you will not give in to temptation. For the spirit is willing, but the body is weak." He looked at grown men who couldn't keep their eyes open on the worst night of His life, and He put His finger on the right cause. Their spirit was willing. Their flesh had run out. There's no contempt anywhere in the diagnosis. Jesus knew what tired felt like, and He was hours from the cross when He said it. So prayer when you're wiped out can be short and plain, and God still hears every word of it. It can be one line. God, I'm here. Or, God, help me. That is a prayer, and He receives it the same way He receives the polished ones. Some of the best praying you'll ever do will be short and direct. Peter, sinking into the water, managed three words. Bart shares his own version of this, the nights he starts praying in bed and never finishes the sentence, and the years he spent waking up feeling like he'd stood God up. Charlotte's answer came the same way. With no strength and nothing to bring, she reached for pen and paper and wrote one line of a prayer that became the hymn "Just As I Am." BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU'LL DISCOVER: Why exhaustion at prayer time usually says nothing about the state of your faithWhat Jesus said in Gethsemane about willing spirits in worn-out bodiesA one-line prayer you can pray tonight when you have nothing else left God has a long habit of using people who come to Him with nothing left but themselves. Say your one line tonight, and let Him handle the rest of it while you sleep. Share This Episode: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/320 Need Prayer? Leave me a voicemail: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/voicemail Want to keep these devotions coming? Please consider supporting this podcast. https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/support/ Rate and Review https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/reviews/new/ Connect with Bart Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/dailydevotionsforbusylives Website: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com Feeling spiritually drained? Start here. Download your free copy of my eBook Making Time for Jesus here: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/subscribe.

    How to Pray When You're Too Tired to Pray

  5. 6d ago

    What to Do When You Feel Distant from God

    Almost every Christian goes through this at some point. You pray, and it seems like the words don't get past the ceiling. You open your Bible, and the verses that used to move you read flat. Nothing scandalous has happened. You didn't walk away. God just feels far off, like He stepped back and didn't say why. It's disorienting, and it can last a lot longer than you expected, weeks or even months of reaching for a presence that feels absent. This episode opens with Sara Hagerty, who wanted to be a mother while the answer stayed no year after year. She was a believer who had known God as close and warm, but somewhere in the long wait He seemed to step back. She prayed about the emptiness and felt like she was talking to a shut door, and the strange part was that she hadn't done anything to cause it. Scripture answers that ache with an invitation. Isaiah 55:6 says, "Seek the LORD while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near." Notice the tone. God is inviting you to come, and He attaches a promise to it: He can be found, and He is near. When God feels far, the feeling is telling you one thing and God is telling you another. He says He is near, even on the mornings your heart can't detect Him. So the way back is simpler than you'd guess. First, keep coming. Don't wait until you feel something to pray or open the Word; come while it's dry and keep the habits you had when He felt close. Second, tell Him the truth about where you are, without dressing it up. A prayer as plain as "God, I can't feel You right now, and I'm still here" honors Him more than a polished one, because it's true. Bart shares his own version of this, the Sundays he preached about God's nearness while feeling a thousand miles away, and how doing the next faithful thing brought the nearness back. Sara found the same path. She kept coming, told God the truth about her grief, and in time the nearness returned, even in a life that still held loss. BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU'LL DISCOVER: Why feeling distant from God is common and usually says nothing about your standing with HimWhat Isaiah 55:6 offers as an invitation when God feels far awayTwo simple steps for coming back when His presence feels absent God does not always hand you the felt sense of His nearness on demand, and He is always closer than you think. Keep coming, tell Him the truth, and trust the promise that He is near. Share This Episode: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/319 Need Prayer? Leave me a voicemail: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/voicemail Want to keep these devotions coming? Please consider supporting this podcast. https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/support/ Rate and Review https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/reviews/new/ Connect with Bart Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/dailydevotionsforbusylives Website: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com Feeling spiritually drained? Start here. Download your free copy of my eBook Making Time for Jesus here: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/subscribe.

    What to Do When You Feel Distant from God

  6. Sep 3

    The Comfort of an Old Hymn

    Familiar Christian music can hold you when nothing else quite does. Discover why the songs you've sung for years reach places words can't, and how God meets you in a melody when your faith feels dry. There's a comfort that comes the moment you hear the first few notes of a song you've known forever. Maybe it's a hymn you sang as a kid, standing next to your mother in the pew. Maybe it's the one they play at every funeral you've been to. Before you've thought about a single word, something in you settles. The music has been holding a memory for you, keeping it safe and connected to a time and a person you loved. When life gets to be too much, that melody can reach a place plain words can't. This episode opens with Gerald Wolfe, a gospel musician at his dying father's bedside. His dad had slipped somewhere conversation couldn't reach, and most days there was little left to say. One afternoon Gerald started an old hymn his father had sung for years, just to fill the room with something familiar. What happened next changed the rest of Gerald's life. Scripture shows why music does this. Paul wrote in Colossians 3:16, "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly... in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord." Paul wanted God's truth to take up residence in us, deep down and settled in, and he named singing as one of the ways it happens. A truth you only hear, you might forget by Friday. A truth you've sung a hundred times gets down inside you and stays. That's why the words come back when almost everything else is gone. So if your soul feels dry, put on a hymn you loved as a kid, or a worship song that has meant something to you. Don't analyze it. Let it play and let the words return on their own. The song can pray for you when you can't, working truth back into you that you couldn't reason your way to. Bart shares his own take, that modern worship tends to move him most, though the lyrics of the old hymns still stop him cold. Gerald's father proved the point. When Gerald sang, his dad began to sing too, verse after verse, the words returning the second the melody did. It was the last song they shared, and it sent Gerald mailing hymn recordings to nursing homes, where people who can't hold a conversation still open their mouths and sing every word. BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU'LL DISCOVER: Why a familiar hymn can reach you when plain words no longer doWhat Colossians 3:16 says about singing as a way God's word settles in youA simple step for letting a song revive a faith that feels dry When words fail and your soul feels dry, God can meet you in a melody you forgot you knew. Put on the old song and let it lead you back. Share This Episode: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/318 Need Prayer? Leave me a voicemail: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/voicemail Want to keep these devotions coming? Please consider supporting this podcast. https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/support/ Rate and Review https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/reviews/new/ Connect with Bart Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/dailydevotionsforbusylives Website: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com Feeling spiritually drained? Start here. Download your free copy of my eBook Making Time for Jesus here: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/subscribe.

    The Comfort of an Old Hymn

  7. Sep 2

    When You Realize You've Been Neglecting a Friendship

    Most of us have a friend we've slowly let drift, and the longer we wait, the more awkward it feels to reach out. Discover why the fix is simpler than you think, and how to make the first move. A lot of us have a friend we used to be close to, and we can't quite remember when we stopped calling. Life sped up. New responsibilities came in. Somewhere in there the calls got rarer, then stopped, and neither of you meant for it to happen. Then one day their name crosses your mind, you realize how long it's been, and a wave of embarrassment hits. Right behind the thought of reaching out comes the excuse: it's been too long, they've probably forgotten all about it, they might not even want to hear from me. This episode opens with Pak Yan and Joe Chan, boyhood friends in Hong Kong who lost touch after Joe's family moved to America in 1962. Thirty-eight years passed. Pak never let go of the friendship, so he searched Joe's name, found one hundred and eight strangers, and started dialing down the list, leaving one voicemail after another. Scripture speaks straight to the drift. Solomon wrote in Proverbs 27:10, "Do not forsake your own friend or your father's friend... Better is a neighbor nearby than a brother far away." Solomon is talking about more than betrayal. He means the slow forsaking that happens by neglect, when a good friendship dies because nobody tended it. Friendships need active tending, or they fade, and nobody sends you a reminder that it's been eight months since you talked. So drop the story you've been telling yourself about how your friend must feel. You can't know for sure. They may be waiting for your call, or feeling the same guilt you are, each of you waiting for the other to go first. Go first anyway. The way through the awkwardness is a text that says, "I've been thinking about you, and I'm sorry it's been so long." Most of the time, that one message reopens the door. Bart shares his own version of this, a friend he keeps meaning to call while the awkwardness keeps building. Pak's story ended well: on his 104th call, Joe called back, and it felt like they picked up right where they left off. Now they meet every week, two old friends who almost lost each other to nothing more than time. BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU'LL DISCOVER: Why good friendships fade through simple neglect, with no one meaning for it to happenWhat Proverbs 27:10 says about tending your friendships instead of forsaking themThe one simple text that gets you past the awkwardness and reopens the door You are not too late. Send the text, own the silence, and let God warm up a friendship that only drifted because life got busy. Share This Episode: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/317 Need Prayer? Leave me a voicemail: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/voicemail Want to keep these devotions coming? Please consider supporting this podcast. https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/support/ Rate and Review https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/reviews/new/ Connect with Bart Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/dailydevotionsforbusylives Website: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com Feeling spiritually drained? Start here. Download your free copy of my eBook Making Time for Jesus here: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/subscribe.

    When You Realize You've Been Neglecting a Friendship

  8. Sep 1

    What to Do When Your Church Is Losing People

    Watching your congregation shrink is a grief few people talk about. Discover why declining numbers don't get the final word, and how Jesus keeps building His church even when yours feels small. If you love a local church, a shrinking congregation can be depressing. You stand at the back and count, and there are fewer heads than a year ago, far fewer than five years back. You know the empty seats by name: the family that moved for a job, the couple that slowly stopped coming. Every absence is a person you prayed for and did life with, and it can start to feel like a verdict, as if the decline is God's grade on your church, or on you. This episode opens with a sobering headline. In 2024, more Protestant churches in America closed their doors than opened them, around four thousand in a single year. The churches most likely to be shrinking are the older, smaller ones, and the pastors least sure they'll last another decade are the ones leading small congregations. That number can tell you the loss you feel is common. It cannot tell you what God is doing in the people who remain. Scripture holds a promise no attendance chart can touch. In Matthew 16:18, Jesus told Peter, "On this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it." Hear who does the building. Jesus does. He was speaking about the whole body of Christ across the world and the centuries, and that church has never once stopped growing somewhere on earth. Your job is to be faithful right where He has placed you, and to leave the numbers with Him. Every local congregation has its own story under God's care, and He counts what you can't count. Sometimes the very decline that grieves you is what He uses to call a church back to its knees and into new life. Bart shares his own passion for church revitalization and his work as a Certified Church Consultant with Church Answers, and he invites pastors and members longing to see their church grow again to reach him at mykingdomimpact.com. The prayers going up in a half-full room still reach God. Jesus is still building, and no closure notice gets to overrule His promise. BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU'LL DISCOVER: Why a shrinking church is a common grief that no number fully explainsWhat Matthew 16:18 promises about who is responsible for building the churchA simple step for encouraging the people who are still in the room Jesus is the one building His church, and your job is to stay faithful where He planted you. Trust Him with the growth, and watch for the new life He can bring. Links Mentioned in this Episode https://mykingdomimpact.com/ Share This Episode: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/316 Need Prayer? Leave me a voicemail: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/voicemail Want to keep these devotions coming? Please consider supporting this podcast. https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/support/ Rate and Review https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/reviews/new/ Connect with Bart Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/dailydevotionsforbusylives Website: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com Feeling spiritually drained? Start here. Download your free copy of my eBook Making Time for Jesus here: https://www.dailydevotionsforbusylives.com/subscribe.

    What to Do When Your Church Is Losing People
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About

You meant to spend time with God this morning. Then the day started without you. This daily devotional podcast gets you back to Him in 7 to 9 minutes. Each weekday, pastor and author Dr. Bart Leger opens Scripture with a true story from everyday life and one practical way to apply God's truth. Listeners call it quick and to the point, a bit of calm at the start of the day. Press play and start your day anchored in God's Word.

Information

  • Creator
    Bart Leger
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    300
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2025 Daily Devotions for Busy Lives
  • Show Website
    Daily Devotions for Busy Lives

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