JANUARY 9, 2026

 “The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.” 

1. ― Ralph Waldo Emerson

GENESIS 23-24

11Abraham was now very old, and the Lord had blessed him in every way. 2He said to the senior servant in his household, the one in charge of all that he had, “Put your hand under my thigh. 3I want you to swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and the God of earth, that you will not get a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I am living, 4but will go to my country and my own relatives and get a wife for my son Isaac.”

5The servant asked him, “What if the woman is unwilling to come back with me to this land? Shall I then take your son back to the country you came from?”

6“Make sure that you do not take my son back there,” Abraham said. 7“The Lord, the God of heaven, who brought me out of my father’s household and my native land and who spoke to me and promised me on oath, saying, ‘To your offspring^a I will give this land’—he will send his angel before you so that you can get a wife for my son from there. 8If the woman is unwilling to come back with you, then you will be released from this oath of mine. Only do not take my son back there.” 9So the servant put his hand under the thigh of his master Abraham and swore an oath to him concerning this matter.(24:1-9)

MATTHEW 8

5When Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, asking for help. 6“Lord,” he said, “my servant lies at home paralyzed, suffering terribly.”

7Jesus said to him, “Shall I come and heal him?”

8The centurion replied, “Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But just say the word, and my servant will be healed. 9For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and that one, ‘Come,’ and he comes. I say to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”

10When Jesus heard this, he was amazed and said to those following him, “Truly I tell you, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith. 11I say to you that many will come from the east and the west, and will take their places at the feast with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. 12But the subjects of the kingdom will be thrown outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

13Then Jesus said to the centurion, “Go! Let it be done just as you believed it would.” And his servant was healed at that moment.

JOURNAL 

In the end, what matters most is how we love. Our love is never self-generated; it is always a reflection of the love of God that we choose to receive and embrace. When we open ourselves to His love, it becomes the source of our strength. It gives us the power to love not only when it is easy, but in every circumstance, even when love costs us something.

That kind of love does not remain passive. It compels us to go to war with whatever diminishes our capacity to love well. Fear, selfishness, bitterness, pride, and hatred are not harmless traits; they are thieves that quietly rob us of who we were created to be. To love as God loves means confronting and surrendering the things that choke compassion and distort truth.

We will surrender to something...the question is what are we surrendering to. What we surrender to will always be revealed in how we love. When we surrender to God, our lives become beacons of joy, power, hope, and light, not because we are perfect, but because His love is alive in us. When we surrender instead to fear or self-preservation, we become hollow, carrying darkness rather than life, withholding from the world the gift God placed within us.

Love is the measure. Love is the evidence. And love, grounded in God, is the force that transforms both us and the world around us.

7“Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the law my servant Moses gave you; do not turn from it to the right or to the left, that you may be successful wherever you go. 8Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful. 9Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.”

JOSHUA 1:7-9