JULY 22, 2026

  “For those who feel their lives are a grave disappointment to God, it requires enormous trust and reckless, raging confidence to accept that the love of Jesus Christ knows no shadow of alteration or change. When Jesus said, "Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy burdened," He assumed we would grow weary, discouraged, and disheartened along the way. These words are a touching testimony to the genuine humanness of Jesus. He had no romantic notion of the cost of discipleship. He knew that following Him was as unsentimental as duty, as demanding as love.” 

― Brennan Manning, The Ragamuffin Gospel: Good News for the Bedraggled, Beat-Up, and Burnt Out

PSALM 36-37

 39The salvation of the righteous comes from the Lord; he is their stronghold in time of trouble.

ACTS 23:1-11

6Then Paul, knowing that some of them were Sadducees and the others Pharisees, called out in the Sanhedrin, “My brothers, I am a Pharisee, descended from Pharisees. I stand on trial because of the hope of the resurrection of the dead.” 7When he said this, a dispute broke out between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the assembly was divided. 8(The Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, and that there are neither angels nor spirits, but the Pharisees believe all these things.)9There was a great uproar, and some of the teachers of the law who were Pharisees stood up and argued vigorously. “We find nothing wrong with this man,” they said. “What if a spirit or an angel has spoken to him?” 10The dispute became so violent that the commander was afraid Paul would be torn to pieces by them. He ordered the troops to go down and take him away from them by force and bring him into the barracks.11The following night the Lord stood near Paul and said, “Take courage! As you have testified about me in Jerusalem, so you must also testify in Rome.”

JOURNAL 

Paul's life continues to challenge me because it is such a remarkable picture of what happens when a person surrenders himself to a single purpose. As I read Acts, I don't find a man haunted by what following Christ has cost him. He doesn't dwell on the reputation he lost, the comforts he surrendered, or the life he could have lived. Instead, he simply presses on. He knows his days are numbered, but that knowledge doesn't fill him with despair. It fills him with resolve. Every day is another opportunity to be faithful to the mission God has given him.

I want to learn to see my own life the same way. So often I am tempted to measure today against the future I imagined or against outcomes I hope to achieve. Yet Paul reminds me that the adventure is not found in controlling tomorrow but in faithfully walking with God today. Every morning I can lay my hopes, expectations, and plans into God's hands. In surrendering them, I don't lose hope. I actually find it. My heart is no longer divided between following Christ and protecting my own agenda. I become free to obey wherever God leads, trusting that His Spirit will provide everything I need for this day.

That is the life I want to keep learning. Not looking backward with regret or forward with anxious striving, but walking into each day with open hands, believing that every ordinary moment has been authored by God. Like Paul, I want my confidence to rest not in knowing how the story ends, but in knowing the One who writes it. If my life is surrendered to Him, then no day is wasted, no act of obedience is insignificant, and every moment becomes part of the great adventure of His Kingdom. My calling is simply to trust, to follow, and to allow His Spirit to lead me one day at a time.

37They were put to death by stoning;^e they were sawed in two; they were killed by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated— 38the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, living in caves and in holes in the ground.

39These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised, 40since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.

 HEBREWS 11:37-40

JULY 21, 2026

 “The story goes that a public sinner was excommunicated and forbidden entry to the church. He took his woes to God. 'They won't let me in, Lord, because I am a sinner.'

'What are you complaining about?' said God. 'They won't let Me in either.” 
― Brennan Manning, The Ragamuffin Gospel: Good News for the Bedraggled, Beat-Up, and Burnt Out

PSALM 34-35

 18The Lord is close to the brokenhearted

and saves those who are crushed in spirit. (34:18)

ACTS 22

22The crowd listened to Paul until he said this. Then they raised their voices and shouted, “Rid the earth of him! He’s not fit to live!”23As they were shouting and throwing off their cloaks and flinging dust into the air, 24the commander ordered that Paul be taken into the barracks. He directed that he be flogged and interrogated in order to find out why the people were shouting at him like this. 25As they stretched him out to flog him, Paul said to the centurion standing there, “Is it legal for you to flog a Roman citizen who hasn’t even been found guilty?”

JOURNAL 

One of the things God has been slowly opening my eyes to is why surrendering outcomes changes so much. For years I thought the greatest benefit was freedom from anxiety. While that is certainly true, I am beginning to see something even deeper.

For much of my life, I avoided work that required me to be alone. Homework. Sales calls. Quiet projects. Anything that depended solely on me seemed incredibly difficult to begin. Yet put me on a team, in a classroom, on a football field, or alongside other people, and I came alive. I thrived in shared purpose but often shrank from isolation.

Looking back, I realize that when I was alone, I believed I really was alone. Every task depended on my ability, my motivation, my wisdom, and ultimately my success. The burden rested entirely on me. No wonder I avoided so many of those moments. They weren't just difficult tasks. They felt like isolated battles where I had to prove myself. But surrendering outcomes has begun to expose that lie.

When I lay down my agenda each morning and welcome God's Spirit to lead me, I am no longer approaching the day by myself. The Spirit of God actually dwells within me. The same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead is present in the ordinary moments of my life. A phone call is no longer just my phone call. Writing a lesson plan is no longer just my creativity. Preparing for practice, answering an email, studying Scripture, or tackling a difficult project are no longer isolated efforts. They become moments of partnership with God Himself.

I wish I could say I live this way consistently, but I don't. My old patterns have a way of quietly sneaking back in. I catch myself picking outcomes back up, relying on my own strength, and feeling the familiar weight of isolation again. But every time I surrender those outcomes once more and consciously welcome God's Spirit into the work before me, something changes. The burden becomes lighter. The work becomes less about proving myself and more about participating with Him.

Perhaps this is what Paul understood so deeply. Whether he was preaching before crowds, making tents, or standing alone in chains, he was never actually alone. His confidence wasn't found in favorable circumstances or successful outcomes but in the presence of Christ within him.

That may be the greatest freedom obedience offers. It isn't simply that I stop chasing outcomes. It is that I stop living as though everything depends on me. I am no longer working in isolation. I am walking with the God who promised never to leave me, whose Spirit lives within me, transforming even the quietest and most ordinary tasks into opportunities for fellowship.

That is what makes surrender so beautiful. It doesn't merely change what I am doing. It changes who I believe is doing it with me.

4But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship.^b 6Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba,^c Father.” 7So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir.

 GALATIANS 4:4-7

JULY 20, 2026

   "If you want to figure out the players that will go on to bigger and better things, look at how they fail, in a game of failure. It’s easy to stand tall in baseball when things are going well. But those who stand tall while getting shelled – which happens in baseball often – and shake it off prior to the next outing or at bat, those are likely the players to look for in the multi-tiered stadiums at a later time."

- The Mental Game of Baseball 

PSALM 31-33

16No king is saved by the size of his army;

no warrior escapes by his great strength.

17A horse is a vain hope for deliverance;

despite all its great strength it cannot save.

18But the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear him,

on those whose hope is in his unfailing love,(33:16-18)

ACTS 21:15-40

27When the seven days were nearly over, some Jews from the province of Asia saw Paul at the temple. They stirred up the whole crowd and seized him, 28shouting, “Fellow Israelites, help us! This is the man who teaches everyone everywhere against our people and our law and this place. And besides, he has brought Greeks into the temple and defiled this holy place.” 29(They had previously seen Trophimus the Ephesian in the city with Paul and assumed that Paul had brought him into the temple.)

30The whole city was aroused, and the people came running from all directions. Seizing Paul, they dragged him from the temple, and immediately the gates were shut. 31While they were trying to kill him, news reached the commander of the Roman troops that the whole city of Jerusalem was in an uproar. 32He at once took some officers and soldiers and ran down to the crowd. When the rioters saw the commander and his soldiers, they stopped beating Paul.

33The commander came up and arrested him and ordered him to be bound with two chains. Then he asked who he was and what he had done. 34Some in the crowd shouted one thing and some another, and since the commander could not get at the truth because of the uproar, he ordered that Paul be taken into the barracks. 35When Paul reached the steps, the violence of the mob was so great he had to be carried by the soldiers. 36The crowd that followed kept shouting, “Get rid of him!”

JOURNAL 

The more I read Paul's journey to Jerusalem, the more I realize that his peace did not come because his circumstances were favorable. He walked into a city knowing that arrest, violence, and suffering awaited him. Yet nowhere do I see him wishing he were somewhere else or longing for an easier assignment. He was fully present in the day God had given him. His heart had already surrendered tomorrow, so he was free to live today. His peace was not found in the hope that things would work out but in the confidence that he was exactly where God had led him. Obedience, not outcomes, had become his security.

So much of my life has been spent measuring a day by how closely it matched my expectations. If things were difficult, interrupted, or painful, I quietly wished I could get to a different day, a different season, or a different set of circumstances. But Paul reminds me that today's assignment is not a detour from God's will. It is God's will. There is no better place for me to be than faithfully living the day He has placed before me.

The quote from The Mental Game of Baseball captures this beautifully. Great players are not defined by the days everything goes right but by how they respond when everything seems to go wrong. They remain composed because their identity is no longer tied to the result. In the same way, a follower of Christ is revealed not when life is easy, but when obedience remains steady in the face of disappointment, criticism, uncertainty, or failure.

Today is a gift, not because it promises comfort or success, but because it is another opportunity to walk with God. I am breathing, thinking, choosing, loving, serving, and working. Those are extraordinary gifts. To spend today wishing it were different is to overlook the very gift God has placed in my hands. My calling is not to chase a better day but to be fully obedient in this one.

Unlike Paul, I am not facing an angry mob or the threat of death. But I am simply being invited to live faithfully in the ordinary moments before me. To teach well. To coach with passion. To encourage someone who needs hope. To love my family. To work with excellence. To surrender tomorrow and embrace today. That is enough. In fact, that is everything. For if I can learn to find peace in obedience instead of outcomes, then every day, regardless of its circumstances, becomes a glorious day.

2Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters,^a whenever you face trials of many kinds,

JAMES 1:2

JULY 19, 2026

   “As an act of goodwill you must sacrifice all the futures you might have for the one that he designs for you.” 

― Dexter Palmer, The Dream of Perpetual Motion

PSALM 28-30

 11You turned my wailing into dancing;

you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy,

12that my heart may sing your praises and not be silent. Lord my God, I will praise you forever.(30:11-12)

ACTS 21:1-14

10After we had been there a number of days, a prophet named Agabus came down from Judea. 11Coming over to us, he took Paul’s belt, tied his own hands and feet with it and said, “The Holy Spirit says, ‘In this way the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem will bind the owner of this belt and will hand him over to the Gentiles.’ ”

12When we heard this, we and the people there pleaded with Paul not to go up to Jerusalem. 13Then Paul answered, “Why are you weeping and breaking my heart? I am ready not only to be bound, but also to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.” 14When he would not be dissuaded, we gave up and said, “The Lord’s will be done.”

JOURNAL 

For much of my life, my hopes and dreams for tomorrow have given me a sense of security. As long as I could picture the future I wanted and believe I was moving toward it, I felt grounded. But I am beginning to realize that hopes and dreams, when too narrowly defined, can become anchors. Instead of helping me follow God wherever He leads, they quietly tether me to a destination of my own making. Without realizing it, I begin evaluating every opportunity, disappointment, and act of obedience by whether it moves me closer to the future I have imagined.

The question I keep coming back to is, where did that picture come from? Was it born from God's Spirit, or from my own desires, fears, and imagination? If it is from me, why should I trust it so completely? If it is from God, then I don't need to cling to it. The only way to experience God's future is to surrender it back to Him and seek His will today.

The more I practice this, the more I notice two seemingly opposite things happening at the same time. At first, there is a real sense of disorientation. It feels like I have lost my bearings because the things that once gave me direction are no longer in control. But that feeling slowly gives way to freedom. I begin to realize I am not losing myself. I am simply letting go of anchors that kept me from being fully present with God today. Instead of chasing tomorrow, I become more attentive to today's opportunities for obedience.

Paul lived this way. Even after hearing that chains awaited him in Jerusalem, he continued because his security was no longer found in a preferred outcome but in the will of God. David could say, "You turned my wailing into dancing," not because life became easy, but because his confidence rested in God rather than circumstances. James could tell us to "consider it pure joy" because joy is not rooted in getting the future we hoped for but in trusting the God who already holds it.

Perhaps that is what I am finally beginning to learn. The greatest security is not found in the future I can imagine but in surrendering both today and tomorrow into God's hands. That surrender feels unfamiliar at first, but on the other side of it is a freedom and joy I am only beginning to discover.

2Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters,^a whenever you face trials of many kinds,

JAMES 1:2

JULY 18, 2026

 “The difference between an admirer and a follower still remains, no matter where you are. The admirer never makes any true sacrifices. He always plays it safe. Though in words, phrases, songs, he is inexhaustible about how highly he prizes Christ, he renounces nothing, gives up nothing, will not reconstruct his life, will not be what he admires, and will not let his life express what it is he supposedly admires.” 

― Søren Kierkegaard, Provocations: Spiritual Writings of Kierkegaard

PSALM 25-27

13I remain confident of this:

I will see the goodness of the Lord

in the land of the living.

14Wait for the Lord;

be strong and take heart

and wait for the Lord.(27:13-14)

ACTS 20:17-38

32“Now I commit you to God and to the word of his grace, which can build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified. 33I have not coveted anyone’s silver or gold or clothing. 34You yourselves know that these hands of mine have supplied my own needs and the needs of my companions. 35In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ”

JOURNAL 

For much of my life I have approached obedience to God with hidden expectations. I wanted to obey, but I also wanted obedience to produce the life I imagined. My hopes, dreams, goals, and plans quietly became the lens through which I interpreted God's will. If circumstances moved me toward those outcomes, I felt confident. If they moved me away, I questioned God or myself. What I am beginning to see is that true surrender starts long before the decisions of the day. It begins the moment I wake up.

Every morning I have a choice. I can begin the day carrying my own agenda, or I can place it on the altar before God. That means honestly acknowledging my desires, ambitions, fears, disappointments, and expectations without pretending they are not there. Then comes the difficult part. I must surrender them. I must release every outcome I have already written in my mind and become willing for God either to affirm those desires or completely redirect them. Only then am I truly available to hear His voice instead of merely asking Him to bless mine.

To many people, and honestly to much of my own heart, this sounds extreme. Modern life teaches us that our hopes and dreams should become our marching orders. We are told to chase them relentlessly and build our lives around them. The thought of laying those dreams on the altar every single morning almost seems irresponsible. Yet I am becoming convinced this is exactly what Jesus calls His followers to do. It is not because dreams are bad, but because anything that cannot be surrendered has quietly become our master.

In many ways, this daily surrender clears the clutter from my heart. It makes room for God's Spirit. Before I think about work, coaching, finances, success, or even ministry, I must first remember that life itself is already a gift. Breath, strength, a sound mind, another day with my family, and another opportunity to love and serve are gifts I did not earn. Gratitude loosens my grip on outcomes because it reminds me that I have already received far more than I deserve.

Only after that posture is established am I ready to open God's Word and ask for my marching orders. Then my family, my friends, my students, my players, and my community are no longer simply part of my plans. They become the people God has entrusted to me today. My objectives are no longer driven by what I hope to accomplish but by what He places before me in obedience.

Paul lived this way. He was compelled by the Spirit, not by guarantees. He walked toward Jerusalem fully aware that hardship awaited him because faithfulness mattered more than comfort or success. His confidence rested not in achieving a preferred outcome but in finishing the task God had given him. That kind of freedom is difficult for me because my flesh still longs for comfort, recognition, and certainty. Yet those things are not evil until they become the reason I live.

Kierkegaard's words expose the difference between admiration and discipleship. An admirer celebrates Christ without changing his life. A follower continually places his life on the altar. I want to become that kind of follower. Every morning I want to surrender my dreams, ambitions, and expectations, trusting that whatever God returns to me can be pursued with confidence, and whatever He removes was never meant to be my master. Ironically, by surrendering outcomes, I do not lose my life. I finally become free to live it, confident that I "will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living," not because life unfolds according to my plans, but because His presence is enough wherever obedience leads.

22“And now, compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there. 23I only know that in every city the Holy Spirit warns me that prison and hardships are facing me. 24However, I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace.

ACTS 20:22-24