September 5, 2025
“In my opinion whatever we may have to go through now is less than nothing compared with the future God has planned for us. The whole creation is on tiptoe to see the wonderful sight of the children of God coming into their own.” (Romans 8:18-19)
The view from the finish line has me fixating on the Providence of God, which like a Hebrew word can easily be read backwards. It is now easy for me to see what I considered random chaos in my life was really the loving hand of God leading me by making me offers I could not refuse. When events roll out over which you have no control, you will see how the hand of God is showing you what to do.
A friend put this new needlepoint on his wall: “Never do what somebody else can do when you could be doing what only you can do.” All our lives God has been shaping us in miraculous ways to make a unique contribution to God’s work.
As you pray about next steps, reflect on this thought: “We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works which God before ordained that we should do for Him.” (Ephesians 2:10) This means we are all works in progress.
Over our lives you can write: “Caution, God at work!” God wants to point to you and say, “She is my workmanship!” There is verse in Romans 8 which tells us that all nature is on tiptoe in awe of the children of God coming into their full potential.
The issue now is: what is God doing in your present circumstances to point you to what God wants to do next in your life?
Dick Woodward, (email, 2005)
Leave a Comment » | 
faith | Tagged: Bible Study, devotions, faith, Hope, inspiration, Jesus, lifestyle, love, prayer, Spiritual Discernment, spiritual guidance | 
Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
August 19, 2025
“Give us this day our daily bread.” (Matthew 6:11)
When Jesus taught His disciples how to pray, He gave us a principle that has many applications. At the end of Matthew 6, which records the central part of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus states that we should not worry about tomorrow. Many have made that obvious application to this prayer petition.
People with tragic challenges like addictions and overwhelming suffering are only able to get their heads and hearts around the concept of a solution one day at a time.
Another legitimate application of this principle for living is to apply this concept to divine guidance. In Philippians 3, the Apostle Paul states that one way to discern the will of God for our life is to live up to the light we now have. He promises that as we do, God will give us more light.
To illustrate that concept someone said, “If you want to see further ahead into the will of God for your life move ahead into the will of God just as far as you can see.”
When I was a college student I drove across the United States several times. I drove at night because there was less traffic. My headlights illuminated about 100 yards at a time. I discovered that if I kept driving into the light the headlights gave me, I eventually traveled from Pittsburgh to Los Angeles.
It is easier for God to steer a moving vehicle than one that is stationary. As we respond to the light God is giving us God adds more light to our path. The application of that principle leads us into God’s will one day at a time.
Dick Woodward, 17 August 2010
Leave a Comment » | faith | Tagged: Bible Study, devotions, faith, Hope, inspiration, Jesus, lifestyle, prayer, spiritual guidance | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
June 13, 2025
“We don’t know what to do but our eyes are on You.” (2 Chronicles 20:12)
No matter how gifted we may be, sooner or later we will hit a wall of crisis where we do not know what to do. The Scripture from Chronicles is taken from a time when the people of God were overwhelmingly outnumbered, and they simply did not know what to do. James later wrote that when we do not know what to do, we should ask God for the wisdom we confess we do not have. (James 1:5) He promises us that God will not hold back but will provide a truckload of wisdom for us.
Years ago I received a telephone call from my youngest daughter when she was a first year student at the University of Virginia. With many tears she informed me she had fallen down a flight of stairs and was sure she had broken her back. At the hospital they discovered mononucleosis and seriously infected tonsils that needed to be removed. She concluded her litany: “Finals begin tomorrow, and I just don’t know what to do, Daddy!”
Frankly, I was touched that my intelligent young daughter believed if she could just share her litany of woes and tap into the vast resources of my wisdom, I could tell her what to do when she did not know what to do.
According to James that is the way we make our Heavenly Father feel when we come to Him overwhelmed with problems and tell Him we don’t know what to do. A good way to begin some days is: “Lord, I don’t know what to do, but my eyes are on YOU!”
Dick Woodward, blog 2013
Editor’s Note: Blessings to all the fathers out there as we celebrate Father’s Day this weekend! For those of us who have fathers in Heaven – like my Papa – it’s comforting that our Heavenly Father is always here when we don’t know what to do.
Leave a Comment » | faith | Tagged: Bible Study, devotions, faith, Father's Day, Hope, inspiration, Jesus, lifestyle, prayer, spiritual guidance | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
March 4, 2025
“For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” (Ephesians 2:10)
The founding elder of the first church for which I was the pastor was a home builder. He did beautiful work. When a couple wanted him to build their home, he would take them to a beautiful home he had built and say to them, “By the grace of God this is by workmanship.” The verse above is saying to all of us who are followers of Christ that our risen living Christ would like to point to each of us and say, “This is My workmanship!”
We are all a work of Christ in progress. In addition to that thought this verse is stating that when we came to faith and were saved by grace through the faith our Lord gave us, He created us for good works. In fact we’re told that before He saved us he already planned that we would do those works for Him.
I don’t know about you, but that truth excites and inspires me greatly! We’re so self-centered that when we come to faith our focus is often on what trusting Christ to be our Savior is going to mean to us. Many followers of Christ have the attitude, “What have you done for me lately?” The Apostle Paul had the right vision when he met the risen Christ on the road to Damascus and asked the question, “Lord, what do you want me to do for You?”
As a follower of Christ have you been asking and seeking to know what those works are your Lord and Savior planned for you when He saved you by grace?
Dick Woodward, 08 March 2010
1 Comment | faith | Tagged: Bible Study, devotions, faith, Faith in action, Hope, inspiration, Jesus, lifestyle, prayer, spiritual guidance | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
January 28, 2025
“…what my God had put in my heart to do at Jerusalem…” (Nehemiah 2:12)
When Nehemiah learned of the dreadful condition of the wall around Jerusalem he wept, fasted and prayed. He then became a supreme example of what it means to have a vision. His definition of vision is what God put in his heart to do. I have heard missionaries describe how they were reading the Gospels and when they got to the Great Commission they knew what God put in their hearts to do.
When I was a new believer studying for the ministry, I heard a great Bible professor survey the entire Bible. He made it so clear and relevant. I felt he was introducing us to sixty-six of his holy little friends and I wanted to spend the rest of my life getting to know them better. I also knew in my heart that God wanted me to put together a devotional, practical survey of the Bible for lay people and make it even more simple than the one I was taught. That vision eventually became a reality.
As you grow in faith and your relationship with God, have you been close enough for God to put in your heart what He wants you to do? The Bible and church history affirm the reality that God loves to work that way.
The Apostle Paul stood in chains before a king and said some beautiful words. He said he was not disobedient to the heavenly vision God gave him. (Acts 26: 19) Has God put in your heart what He wants you to do? Will you make the commitment that you will not be disobedient to that vision?
Dick Woodward, 28 January 2010
Leave a Comment » | faith | Tagged: Bible Study, devotions, faith, heavenly vision, Hope, inspiration, Jesus, lifestyle, prayer, spiritual guidance, vision | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
January 7, 2025
“Only let us live up to the truth we now have.” (Philippians 3:16)
The Apostle Paul had a life changing experience on the road to Damascus. He shared the details of that experience in the third chapter of his letter to the Church at Philippi. It was as if his accounting books were turned upside down – what had been in the gain column was now in the loss column and vice versa.
After his books had been turned upside down (or we might say right side up) Paul’s ambitions totally changed in the gain column. He wanted to tackle the purposes for which the risen Christ had tackled him. Now he only wanted to know Jesus Christ and the high calling of God to which Christ was leading him.
Paul claims that he has not attained these things in his new gain column, but he has learned a principle about knowing the will of God: if we want to know the will of God we must live up to the Light and truth God has given us at any given time on our faith journey.
From Paul’s experience we can take away a prescription for guidance. If we want to see further ahead into the will of God for our lives, then we should move ahead into the will of God just as far as we can see.
Like driving across country at night when we move ahead into the 100 yards of light our headlights give us – that light can lead us clear across the country.
When we live up to the Light we have, God gives us more Light.
Dick Woodward, 08 January 2011
Leave a Comment » | faith | Tagged: Bible Study, devotions, faith, Hope, inspiration, Jesus, lifestyle, Light, prayer, spiritual guidance, St. Paul | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
July 23, 2024
“I have brought you out that I might lead you in…” (Deuteronomy 6:23)
There are times when God wants to do a new thing in our lives. To do this new thing God faces three challenges. First God must get us out of the old place. That is not easy because we often love the security of where we are. God therefore has to blast us out of the old. That can happen in many ways. We could be fired, or we may just know in our knower that it is time to make a change. The call of God is often made up of a pull from the front and a boot from the rear.
The second challenge is that God has to keep us going to pull us through the transition time between the old place and the new place to which God is leading us. Transition times can be difficult!
The verse above describes the way God brought the children of Israel out of Egypt to bring them into the Promised Land. Their transition time involved crossing a desert, which should have taken eleven days. They went around in circles for forty years. They circled that desert because they did not have the faith to invade the land of Canaan. When God wants to do a new thing in our lives, do we go around in circles because we do not have enough faith to enter into the new place God is leading us?
The third challenge is that God has to make us right to settle us into the new place God has for us. One translation of 2 Corinthians 6:1 reads that we are “co-operators” with God. When we realize what God is trying to do in our lives, are we ready to give God a little more cooperation?
Dick Woodward, 24 July 2009
Leave a Comment » | faith | Tagged: Bible Study, devotions, faith, Hope, inspiration, Jesus, lifestyle, managing change, opportunity, prayer, spiritual guidance | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
July 16, 2024
“You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly…” (James 4:3)
At the heart of a counseling session, a woman once said, “Don’t confuse me with Scriptures, Pastor. My mind is made up!” Seeking God’s will for our lives is often out of reach because we have our agendas in place when we come before God. If our minds are set like concrete before we converse with God, we are then actually asking God to bless our will, our agenda and the way we have decided to go.
James tells us that when we pray, we ask and do not receive because our asking is flawed by our self-willed agendas. To seek and know the will of God we must be completely open to whatever the will of God may be. Our prayer and commitment must be in the spirit of the familiar metaphor, “You are the Sculptor, I am the clay. Mold me and make me according to Your will. I am ready to accept Your will as passively as clay in the hands of a Sculptor.”
There are two reasons to be open and unbiased as you seek to know God’s will. The first we learn from Isaiah 55: the ways and thoughts of God are as different from our ways and thoughts as the heavens are high above the earth. Another is that we become a totally new creation when we are born again.
It is tragically possible to miss the will of God for your life because you do not have the faith to believe that God can make you a new creation in Christ: a new creation with extraordinary potential.
Dick Woodward, from A Prescription for Guidance
Leave a Comment » | faith | Tagged: belief, Bible Study, devotions, faith, Hope, inspiration, Jesus, lifestyle, love, prayer, spiritual guidance | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
January 23, 2024
“All our steps are ordered by the Lord; how then can we understand our own ways?” (Proverbs 20:24)
Solomon poses a wise question in Proverbs 20:24: “If we are going the way God wants us to go, how can we expect to always understand the way we are going?” I believe it is obvious that God is making you an original in an original way. There isn’t anybody like you and there isn’t supposed to be.
My thoughts turn to six powerful Bible verses: the last four verses of Romans 11 and the first two verses of Romans 12. They tie in with Isaiah 55 and the reality we often do not know what God is doing. The profound truth focused is that God is the source of, the power behind, and His glory is the purpose for everything He is doing.
The application in Romans 12 is that you should worship by surrendering your body as a living sacrifice (not a dead one.) Ask God to transform your mind so you think as He does. Then, having met these prerequisites, prove one day at a time that His will for you is good and moves toward spiritual maturity. (This passage is especially good in the Phillips.*)
God is shaping you to be a champion for Christ in dimensions that are far beyond anything you could imagine or even think to imagine! Whatever spiritual help it takes you must master this problem or it will master you. Every time God wants to do a great work like what He is doing in your life, the evil one is there trying to defeat it.
Put on the whole armor of God to defeat what the evil one is trying to do.
Dick Woodward (email, 20 January 2007)
(*J.B. Phillips translation of The New Testament in Modern English)
Leave a Comment » | faith | Tagged: Bible Study, devotions, faith, Hope, inspiration, Jesus, lifestyle, prayer, spiritual guidance | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
December 27, 2023
“Then He brought us out that He might bring us in…” (Deuteronomy 6:23)
Are you ready for a new thing? God often wants to do a new thing in our lives but He has three challenges.
Often when God wants to bring us out of the old and into a new place He cannot get us out of the old because we are insecure and want to hold on to the old place. God then has to blast us out of the old. That’s why a call of God is often made up of a pull from the front and a boot from the rear.
God’s second challenge is that He has to pull us through the transition between the old place and the new. Transitions can last for years and they can be very painful, but God promises He can pull us through the worst of them.
God’s third challenge is to get us right so He can settle us into the new place. We should no more resist that work of God than a baby should resist being born and coming out into life.
Don’t give God a hard time when God wants to do a new thing in your life. If we trust God’s character we should cooperate with God when God wants to make changes and do new things in us and for us. A rut is a grave with both ends knocked out. Our loving Heavenly Father does not want to see His children in the living death of a rut.
Instead of giving God a hard time, make it easy for Him as He brings you out of the old place and leads you into the new places He has for you in the New Year.
Dick Woodward, 28 December 2012
Leave a Comment » | faith | Tagged: bible, Bible Study, blog, devotions, faith, god, Hope, inspiration, Jesus, lifestyle, New Year's, peace, prayer, spiritual guidance | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
4SpiritualSecrets 