Our Daily Bread Podcast | Our Daily Bread Our Daily Bread Ministries

As teens, my sister and I didn’t understand my mom’s decision to receive Jesus as her Savior, but we couldn’t deny the changes we saw in her. She had more peace and joy and began faithfully serving at church. She had such a hunger for studying the Bible that she attended and graduated from seminary. A few years after my mom’s decision, my sister accepted Christ and started serving Him. And a few years after that, I also placed my trust in Jesus and started serving Him. Many years later, my late father joined us in believing in Him as well. My mom’s decision for Christ created a ripple effect among our immediate and extended family.

Moms and grandmoms, your decisions can affect generations.

When the apostle Paul wrote his final letter to Timothy and encouraged him to persevere in his faith in Jesus, he noted Timothy’s spiritual heritage. “I am reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and, I am persuaded, now lives in you also” (2 Timothy 1:5).

How beautiful that Timothy’s mom and grandmom helped nurture his faith so he could become the man God was calling him to be. 

On this Mother’s Day and beyond, let’s honor mothers who’ve made a decision to follow Jesus.

Let’s also leave a spiritual legacy for our loved ones.

As Gandalf the Grey confronted Saruman the White, it became clear that the latter had turned from what he was supposed to do—help protect Middle-earth from the power of the evil Sauron. What’s more, Saruman had allied with Sauron! In this scene from the film The Fellowship of the Ring, based on J. R. R. Tolkien’s classic work, the two former friends then engage in an epic good-versus-evil battle. If only Saruman had stayed the course and done what he knew was right!

King Saul also had trouble staying the course. In one account, he rightly “expelled the mediums and spiritists from [Israel]” (1 Samuel 28:3). Good move, for God had declared that dabbling in the occult was “detestable” (Deuteronomy 18:9-12). But when God didn’t answer the king’s plea—due to his prior failures—for how to deal with a massive Philistine army, Saul caved: “Find me a woman who is a medium, so I may . . . inquire of her” (1 Samuel 28:7). Talk about a complete reversal! Saul failed once more as he went against his own decree—what he knew was right.

A millennium later, Jesus said to His disciples, “All you need to say is simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything beyond this comes from the evil one” (Matthew 5:37). In other words, if we’ve committed to obey Christ, it’s vital that we keep our oaths and be truthful. Let’s stay the course in doing those things as God helps us.

Many years ago, New York City launched a Stay Safe Stay Put ad campaign to educate people on how to stay calm and be safe when trapped in an elevator. Experts reported that some trapped passengers had died when they tried to pry open the elevator doors or attempted exiting by some other means. The best plan of action is to simply use the alarm button to call for help and wait for emergency responders to arrive.

The apostle Paul spelled out a very different type of rescue plan—one to help those trapped in the downward pull of sin. He reminded the Ephesians of their utter spiritual helplessness, truly “dead in [their] sins” (Ephesians 2:1). They were trapped, obeying the devil (v. 2), and refusing to submit to God. This resulted in them being the subject of God’s wrath. But He didn’t leave them trapped in spiritual darkness. And those who believe in Jesus, the apostle wrote, “by grace . . . have been saved” (vv. 5, 8). A response to God’s rescue initiative results in faith. And faith means we will give up on being able to save ourselves and call on God to rescue us—receiving the rescue Jesus offers.  

By God’s grace, being rescued from sin’s trap doesn’t originate with us. It’s “the gift of God” through Jesus alone (v. 8).

A century ago, lush forest covered roughly 40 percent of Ethiopia, but today it’s around 4 percent. Clearing acreage for crops while failing to protect the trees has led to an ecological crisis. The vast majority of the remaining small patches of green are protected by churches. For centuries, local Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahido churches have nurtured these oases in the midst of the barren desert. If you look at aerial images, you see verdant islands surrounded by brown sand. Church leaders insist that watching over the trees is part of their obedience to God as stewards of His creation.

The prophet Isaiah wrote to Israel, a people who lived in an arid land where bare desert and brutal droughts threatened. And Isaiah described the future God intended, where “the desert and the parched land will be glad; the wilderness will rejoice and blossom” (Isaiah 35:1). God intends to heal His people, but He intends to heal the earth too. He’ll “create new heavens and a new earth” (65:17). In God’s renewed world, “The desert will bloom with flowers” (35:2 nirv).

God’s care for creation—including people—motivates us to care for it too. We can live in sync with His ultimate plan for a healed and whole world—being caretakers of what He’s made. We can join God in making all kinds of deserts bloom with life and beauty.

Joy was concerned for her relative Sandy who for years had struggled with alcoholism and mental-health issues. So Joy went to Sandy’s apartment, but with doors locked it appeared vacant. As she and others planned their search for Sandy, Joy offered up a simple prayer: “God, help me to see what I’m not seeing.” As they were leaving, Joy looked back at Sandy’s apartment and saw the tiniest movement of a curtain. In that moment, she knew that Sandy was alive. Although it took emergency assistance to reach Sandy, Joy rejoiced in this answered prayer.

The prophet Elisha knew the power of asking God to reveal to him His reality. When the Syrian army surrounded their city, Elisha’s servant shivered in fear. Not the man of God, however, for with God’s help he glimpsed the unseen. Elisha prayed that the servant too would see, and “the Lord opened the servant’s eyes” to see “the hills full of horses and chariots of fire” (2 Kings 6:17).

God lifted the veil between the spiritual and physical worlds for Elisha and his servant. Joy believes God helped her see the tiny flicker of the curtain, giving her hope. We too can ask Him to open our eyes to His reality, that we’d be given the spiritual vision to understand what’s happening around us, whether with our loved ones or in our communities. And we too can be agents of His love, truth, and compassion.

Decades ago, I went to a college retreat where everyone was talking about a personality test. “I’m an ISTJ!” one said. “I’m an ENFP,” another chirped. I was mystified. “I’m an ABCXYZ,” I joked.  

Since then, I’ve learned a lot about that test (the Myers-Briggs) and others such as the DiSC. I find them fascinating, because they can help us understand ourselves and others in helpful, revealing ways—shedding light on our preferences, strengths, and weaknesses. Provided we don’t overuse them, they can be a useful tool God uses to help us grow.

Scripture doesn’t offer us personality tests. But it does affirm each person’s uniqueness in God’s eyes (see Psalm 139:14-16; Jeremiah 1:5), and it shows us how God equips all of us with a unique personality and unique gifts to serve others in His kingdom. In Romans 12:6, Paul unpacks this idea, writing, “We have different gifts, according to the grace given each of us.”

Those gifts, Paul explains, are not for us alone, but for the purpose of serving God’s people, Christ’s body (v. 5). They’re an expression of His grace and goodness, working in and through all of us. They invite each of us to be a unique vessel in God’s service.