Category: Devotions

Late…and on time…have different meanings to different people. I’m one of those annoying people who feels like fifteen minutes early is actually being on time. To get somewhere at the exact time you are told an event is starting…is late.

This comes from the fact that I don’t like to be or feel rushed. Getting to where I need to be a few minutes before it starts lets me compose myself (Lord, don’t I need that) and feel prepared. My internal clock is pretty good. I always have a good idea of what time it is…but there is no rush hour in my makeup. There isn’t a speed cycle in me.

They are making new cars that have eight, nine, or even ten gears. I’m an old standard-shift three-speed. But a three-speed still gets you there on time.

Now, this may not be the wisest thing to do, but I live in a house of ladies who define time differently than I do.

When I say we need to leave in twenty minutes…that means in twenty minutes the car should be leaving the driveway. Tires should be rolling. That does not mean that you are wrapping up the getting-ready-to-leave process.

Getting ready for me can happen literally in ten minutes. My hair is already done. After some basic hygiene issues and picking out a pair of pants and a shirt that is comfortable…I’m good to go.

It seems to take ten minutes for curling irons to get warm and ready to go battle in my home.

There are stages, I’ve noticed. There is a hair stage. A makeup stage. A sit-around-and-aggravate-Dad-because-the-clock-is-ticking stage. There is a stage of dressing and picking out shoes…followed by a reassessment of clothing selection and footwear.

There are also certain smells that develop during the female preparation stages.

Curling irons and burning hair with 1,800 watts of electricity produce a certain smell. Sprays and lotions have their own smells. The final step of covering all that involves a tiny, expensive bottle of perfume that finishes off the concoction of smells.

A friend of mine, who is blessed with girls also, says that teenage girls and brownies are the same…when you start to smell them, you know they’re almost done.

As you can see, we are dealing with two different ideas about time and preparation.

At some point, out of frustration, I’ll just tell everyone, “I’ll be waiting in the car.”

This doesn’t change the time we will actually leave. It just gets me out of the way.

Waiting drives me crazy when I know there is a simple solution.

Solution: Just get ready like I do…think like I do…and let’s get going.

It’s that simple.

And actually, it’s silly when I think about it.

If we are not careful, we can have this same kind of attitude when it comes to the workings of God.

We have a simple idea of what needs to happen.

“God, do this, at this time, and it will work out.”

Amazing that we have been promoted to God’s advisory committee.

But God does not always operate on our schedule.

Take, for instance, the death of Lazarus in John 11. Jesus received word that Lazarus’s physical condition was serious. And…then He waited two days before going to Lazarus’s house.

He waited two days.

When He did arrive, Lazarus was no longer sick…he was dead.

Jesus waited two days.

However, this waiting allowed for a greater miracle to happen. Rather than healing a sick man, Jesus raised a dead man. God received glory. People wondered if this might be the Messiah. Word about Lazarus spread throughout the region.

The story has been retold and preached for thousands of years…because Jesus waited two days.

God does not operate based on a clock. He isn’t confined to time. The Bible speaks of God working in “due season.”

When we finally realize that “due season” is better for us, we will look at things differently.

That prayer that you have been praying, and you are on the verge of dropping from your prayer life…keep praying until it’s “due season.”

That lost soul that you have shared with and thrown a bushel of seed on…don’t give up. It’s not “due season” yet.

God is never late…never early…He is always perfect in His timing.

Excuse me while I go sit in the car.

Until the next line…

Scott Sullivan

The Notebook

Luke 5:4–6 — “Put out into deep water and let down your nets for a catch.” Simon replied, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night long and caught nothing. But if you say so, I’ll let down the nets.” When they did this, they caught a great number of fish, and their nets began to tear.

I’ve always been intrigued by this fishing story. Jesus chose several fishermen to be His disciples. Why fishermen? Perhaps because they understood something about failure. They knew what it was like to work all night and catch nothing, yet they also knew you don’t quit fishing because yesterday was unsuccessful. You go back out and try again.

Simon was a professional fisherman. He knew his trade. He knew the water, the weather, and the fish. He had worked hard all night and had nothing to show for it. Then Jesus told him to go back out and let down the nets.

Simon could have argued. He could have explained why it wouldn’t work. Instead, he simply said, “But if you say so.”

That is obedience.

Simon didn’t know what was going to happen. He simply trusted the One who told him to go.

And look what happened. His obedience led to a catch so great that the nets began to tear.

There is another part of this story that encourages me even more. Jesus didn’t quit working on Simon. He was preparing him for something far greater than catching fish. Aren’t you glad Jesus hasn’t quit working on you and me?

There will be days when you are tired. There will be times when you have worked hard and have little to show for it. You may even wonder if it is worth trying one more time.

When those moments come, remember Simon’s words: “But if you say so.”

Obedience doesn’t always guarantee immediate results, but quitting guarantees that we will never see what God intended to do through our obedience.

Think back today to a time when you wanted to quit but remained faithful. Remember what God did through that obedience.

Never quit. Never quit.

Quitting never honors God.

In 1964, Bob Dylan struck a nerve with his song, “The Times They Are a-Changin’.” There was upheaval and unrest in our nation. People were anxious and worried about the future. Many were concerned that the past, and the things they loved, were gone forever. Indeed, the times were a-changin’. 

In our home, we could have this song playing in every room. The times are changing in our family. As I write this, my daughter will sleep in her room one more night before going off to college. There is concern about the future, and there is sadness because we recognize that the old way of life has changed forever. 

Perhaps I’m a little different…no, I’m different. But while there is a tinge of sadness, excitement outweighs the feeling of loss. Her mother and I have been preparing her for this since the day our delivery doctor looked me in the eye and said, “You got your girl.” I think he muttered under his breath, “May God have mercy on your soul,” also. 

As parents, we must understand that our children aren’t really ours. God has entrusted them to us. They are gifts that we are to care for and nurture. 

Having said this, I don’t know many people who like change. I’m a routine person. I don’t like to have my routine altered, and when it happens, I tend to get a little grumpy. Shocking. 

But change can be good. To want my daughter to always live at home would not be fair to her. It would keep her from becoming all that God planned for her to be. 

During this season, I’ve been holding on to a promise that God made to Israel in Isaiah 43:19: 

“Look, I am about to do something new; even now it is coming. Do you not see it?” 

Yes, Lord, I can’t help but see it. 

As one season comes to an end, another season begins. We struggle with new seasons because we can’t see what the future holds. It can be unsettling. We like to know what will happen…and when it will happen. We like to see the outcome from the beginning. 

But that’s not the way God operates. 

God tells us to trust Him with each step. He doesn’t give us a GPS readout of what the road looks like ahead and where each turn will take us. What is beautiful about this is that while we can’t see the road ahead of us, He can. He knows every danger and pitfall that lies ahead. He goes before us and walks with us. 

The danger isn’t in the road ahead. The danger is when we fail to walk with Him as we travel the road. 

Perhaps today, you are entering a new season. Today, you could write across the pages of your future the word change. 

Pray. Hold tight to the One who goes ahead of you, loves you, and wants what is best for you. Keep your heart open to what God is doing as your life changes. 

God is already in the season you are now entering. 

Until the next page… 

Scott Sullivan  

The Notebook 

August in Mississippi. Just saying that makes me sweat. You know that kind of heat that makes the road look wet in the distance. There is nothing like stepping out the door in the morning and having summer give you a big, wet hug.

The thought of yard work in August makes my head itch. I know I’m getting older…look at me, and you know I’m getting older. But I used to be able to do my yard from start to finish. Now I cut a little…stop and drink some water. Weed eat a little…stop and drink some water. Walk to the front yard…stop and drink some water. My increased water intake stems from a phrase I’m using more and more: “I used to be able to…”

I don’t wear summer well. To a stranger, my body looks more like it’s leaking than sweating. And when I’m that hot, I don’t want a Coke. I don’t want a sports drink. I want water. Just cold water.

As a sign of my transition into the life of a curmudgeon, I’ve started taking old milk jugs and a plastic pitcher with me whenever I head north toward Lucedale. Why, you may ask? In the little community of Basin, there’s an artesian well. In the late 1930s, a drilling crew came through looking for oil. Instead of striking oil…they hit some of the best water that has ever crossed your lips. It tastes different from what comes out of my faucet, and unlike bottled water, it actually has a taste. I choose to believe it’s the minerals. God made minerals, by the way.

Why do our bodies crave water? Because we are mostly water. Our blood contains a great deal of it. But so do our brains, hearts, lungs, kidneys, muscles, and eyes. Most of them are made up of more than 70% water. No wonder I slosh sometimes.

God designed our bodies to crave water. Likewise, He created within each of us a craving for Him. We have a spiritual thirst. It cannot be satisfied with religious activity or good works. It can’t be satisfied with money, pleasure, relationships, or success. That thirst can only be satisfied by Jesus Christ.

In John 4, Jesus stops to speak with a woman at a well. She had tried to satisfy the cravings within her through relationships. She had been married five times and was living with a sixth man. She was empty. She was rejected. Jesus offered her the only thing that could truly satisfy…Himself…the Living Water.

Are you trying to satisfy your thirst for Jesus with other things today? Spit that buttermilk out and drink deep from the Living Water.

Until the next page…

Scott Sullivan

The Notebook

In the South, we have some customs that I hope never pass away. A lot of us send food rather than flowers when someone dies. Men walking with their wife or daughter still walk closest to the traffic. When addressing someone older than we are, we call them “Mr.” or “Mrs.” even when we’re all adults. 

I’m not sure how it is in other parts of the country, and I really don’t want to find out, but in church there’s an unwritten seating chart. If a visitor sits in someone’s “seat,” the offended party would never say anything (I hope), but someone else might quietly whisper to the newcomer, “Come sit with me.” 

Another Southern habit is waving for the other driver to go first at a four-way stop. The problem comes when they’re waving you on, too. Eventually, somebody has to be rude and just go. 

But one of my favorite customs is pulling over to the side of the road as a funeral procession passes. It’s a quiet way of showing respect for the dead and compassion for those who grieve. Not only do you pull over, but you don’t dare pass the procession. Not only will you get some ugly looks from the grieving family, but there is a good chance you will make a new friend who happens to be wearing a badge.  

This past Saturday, I found myself riding in a funeral procession. Most of the people traveling that highway pulled over. A few paid no attention to the procession or to the line of cars gathered along the shoulder. Their mothers must not have let them lick the spoon growing up. 

The truth is, they didn’t pull over because they didn’t know my friend, Gary Holland. Had they known Gary, they would have pulled over and gotten in line with the rest of us. 

Gary took a chance on me and hired me to work at Fred’s Dollar Store while I was still in junior high. My dad had to sign a waiver because I wasn’t old enough to work. For the next nine years, from junior high through college, I was a Fred’s employee. Though I was a year short, when I left Fred’s Gary gave me a ten-year service pin. 

Think about that. There are people who spend their entire careers moving from job to job and never stay anywhere more than a couple of years. At twenty-two years old, I had a ten-year pin. 

Working for Gary was an education. 

I learned a lot of Jimmy Buffett songs. I was introduced to Rush Limbaugh. I learned a little about restoring old cars. I learned what moonwalking almost looked like. The keyword is almost. I learned how to treat employees. Believe it or not, I even learned a little chemistry. 

One night Gary and I decided that instead of hiring the usual crew to strip and wax the floors, we’d do it ourselves. We rented a buffer and looked around the store, convinced we already had all the cleaning supplies we needed. 

What we didn’t know was that some chemicals should never be mixed. 

Clorox bleach and ammonia may seem like they would make a great floor cleaner, but together they produce toxic gas. Johnson & Johnson wouldn’t have approved, but the Kaiser might have. 

I also learned the danger of using the almost right word. 

My primary job at Fred’s was unloading trucks and stocking shelves. One day we received a call from the home office explaining that the truck would be delayed. Gary happened to be in the restroom, so one of my fellow truck unloaders answered the phone. 

When the caller asked to speak with Gary, my coworker confidently replied, “He’s decomposed.” 

I quickly explained that the word he was looking for was indisposed. 

Close…but no cigar. 

There were also lessons in pest control that you won’t find in a Terminix brochure…but that’s a story for another day. 

Over the years, my relationship with Gary changed from boss and employee to lifelong friends. If Gary Holland was your friend, he was your friend for life. 

In the thirty-six years since I left Fred’s, almost every month Gary either called me or stopped by my office. We’d laugh. Catch up on life. Talk about his battle with Parkinson’s. Solve most of the world’s problems. 

When our visit ended, Gary always said, “I love you.” 

And I believe he meant it. 

Following Gary’s funeral procession, all those memories came flooding back. Yet my thoughts weren’t centered on what he taught me at Fred’s or even on the conversations we’d shared over the years. I found myself thinking about the way he lived. 

Gary battled Parkinson’s for years, yet he never stopped making much of Jesus. 

Sometimes God moves mountains and changes our circumstances. 

Sometimes He doesn’t. 

Gary taught me that faith isn’t measured by whether the storm goes away. It’s measured by whether we continue trusting the One who walks with us through it. God didn’t remove every hardship from Gary’s life, but He never left his side. 

Gary wore many titles: husband, father, grandfather, son, brother. 

But to me, he was my Jesus-loving friend. 

Had the people driving down that highway known him like I did… 

they would have pulled over. 

Until the next page…

Scott Sullivan

The Notebook

As someone who loves to write, it always excites me when someone picks up one of my books. But what means even more is when they come back later and say, “I’ve enjoyed reading your book. It has meant a lot to me.”

There is no greater compliment an author can receive than knowing someone has actually read what they wrote and that it made a difference.

That thought came to me recently while reading the book of Acts. In Acts 3:15, Peter boldly tells the crowd, “You killed the source of life, whom God raised from the dead; we are witnesses of this” (CSB). Other translations describe Jesus as the Author of life.

Peter was speaking to the very people who had rejected Christ.

They killed the Author.

Almost every time I write a devotion or work on a book, there is a rewrite process. What I intended to say doesn’t always make it onto the page the first time. Sometimes a sentence needs to be clearer. Sometimes one word carries far more weight than another. Mark Twain famously said that the difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and the lightning bug. Every good writer knows that editing is where much of the real work happens.

Now imagine an author who dies before finishing his work. There are no more stories to tell. No more chapters to write. No more words of wisdom, instruction, or encouragement.

They killed the Author.

For three days, it appeared the story was over.

But Acts 3:15 doesn’t end with death. Peter immediately declares that God raised Him from the dead.

The Author lives.

Jesus Christ, the Author of life, is still writing. He is still creating. He is still transforming lives. He can rewrite the broken chapters of your past. He can begin a new work in your heart. He can change the ending of your story. He still speaks words of truth, hope, encouragement, and grace to all who will listen.

They killed the Author…

…but God raised Him from the dead.

And because the Author lives, your story is not finished.

Until the next page…

Scott Sullivan

The Notebook

Luke 15:10 — 10 I tell you, in the same way, there is joy in the presence of God’s angels over one sinner who repents.”

            Luke chapter 15 is often called the chapter of lost things. Jesus tells three parables: a lost sheep, a lost coin, and a lost son. Amazingly, the One who created all things is deeply concerned about what is lost. The psalmist reminds us, “For every animal of the forest is Mine, the cattle on a thousand hills” (Psalm 50:10). Since God owns everything, it would seem that when something is lost, He could simply replace it. He certainly could. But He doesn’t.

            Have you ever stopped to consider that when a person wanders from God or rejects Him, God doesn’t simply write them off? He does just the opposite. God sent His Son to seek and save what was lost…you and me.

He didn’t do this because He was competing with Satan or trying to improve His numbers. In fact, Jesus said the road that leads to life is narrow, and few find it. God didn’t send His Son to win a competition. He sent His Son because He loves us.

When I think about that exchange…God giving His Son for sinful humanity…my mind goes to the hymn, How Deep the Father’s Love for Us:

“How deep the Father’s love for us,

How vast beyond all measure,

That He should give His only Son,

To make a wretch His treasure.“

            Question:  If God cared enough to send His Son to die for the lost…do we care enough to even share the Gospel with those we encounter?  In the words of the late Pastor Voddie Baucham, “If you can’t say amen, say ouch.”

Until the next page…

Scott Sullivan

The Notebook

Joshua 11:6 — 6 The Lord said to Joshua, “Do not be afraid of them, for at this time tomorrow I will cause all of them to be killed before Israel. You are to hamstring their horses and burn their chariots.”

In Joshua chapter 11, Israel faced one of its greatest military challenges. The enemy was overwhelming. Kings from Hazor, Madon, Shimron, Achshaph, the hill country, and the lowlands joined forces against God’s people. The Canaanites, Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Jebusites, and Hivites all gathered for battle. As if that weren’t enough, they possessed countless horses and chariots, giving them a military advantage Israel simply didn’t have. Humanly speaking, Israel had every reason to be afraid.

God’s words reveal what Joshua was likely feeling. The Lord said to Joshua, “Don’t be afraid.” You don’t tell someone not to be afraid unless fear is knocking at the door. From a human perspective, Joshua had every reason to be intimidated. His enemies were numerous, well-equipped, and prepared for battle. Most of us would have felt exactly the same way.

Today, our enemies may look different, but they are no less real. We face frightening diagnoses, uncertain futures, financial pressures, broken relationships, and countless other fears. They may seem distant when they belong to someone else, but they become very personal when they arrive at our own doorstep.

The God who strengthened Joshua has not changed. He still knows our fears before we speak them. He still walks with His people. He still keeps His promises. Whatever fear has found its way to your doorstep today, take it to the Lord. You may not know what tomorrow holds, but you can trust the One who does.

Until the next page…

Scott Sullivan

The Notebook

Editor’s Note: This devotion is adapted from my book Reflecting on the Word, a collection of 52 weekly devotions centered on Scripture and practical application. If it encouraged you, you’ll find many more like it in the book.