Insight for Today
A Daily Devotional by Pastor Chuck Swindoll

Our world has become a large, impersonal, busy institution. We are alienated from each other. Although crowded, we are lonely. Pushed together but uninvolved. No longer do most neighbors visit across the backyard fence.

Close, open relationships are vital. A glib "Hi, how are ya" must be replaced with genuine concern. The key term is assimilation. When I use the word here, I'm referring to people reaching out to one another.

How wonderful that God personally cares about those things that worry us and prey upon our thoughts. He cares about them more than we care about them. Not a single nagging, aching, worrisome, stomach-tensing, blood-pressure-raising thought escapes His notice.

God has given mankind the ability to see beyond the present. And He has not given that ability to any other creation. He has given us eternity in our hearts, without which "man will not find out the work which God has done from the beginning even to the end."

Foolish indeed is the person who considers himself safe and sound because he has money. . . . And another reason it's foolish to trust in riches for security is that money, in the final analysis, brings no lasting satisfaction.

The good life—the one that truly satisfies—exists only when we stop wanting a better one. It is the condition of savoring what is rather than longing for what might be.

While thinking back on his days with Jesus, John (one of The Twelve) remembers there was something about Him that was like no one else, during which time His disciples "beheld His glory." His uniqueness was that incredible "glory."

Have you ever been in an area of the country where there was a lot of fruit ripening in the sun? Maybe on some cool September morning you've taken a walk through the apple orchards of the Hood River valley or along the Columbia River in Oregon.

We cannot change the past . . . and that includes the way we reared our children. All of us—yes, every parent I have ever met—would love to step into the time tunnel and return to the Island of Second Chance. We would give anything to relive those years.

You and I could name things, specific things that we've gone through in the last several years that make no logical sense whatsoever . . . but that's okay. We can't figure them out.

A young fellow rushed into a gas station to use the pay phone. The manager overheard his telephone conversation as he asked: "Sir, could you use a hardworking, honest young man to work for you?"

Providence. We toss the word around. But have you ever analyzed it? It comes from the Latin, providentia. Pro means "before" or "ahead of time"; videntia is from videre, meaning "to see." . . . Put them together and you have "seeing ahead of time."

Disillusionment is a dangerous, slippery slope. First we become disillusioned about our fellow man. Then we move on to cynicism. Before long, we trust no one, not even God. We've been burned. We've been taken advantage of; we've been mistreated.

Like Jell-O, concepts assume the mold of the words into which they are poured. Who has not been stabbed awake by the use of a particular word . . . or combinations of words? Who has not found relief from a well-timed word?

What is God looking for? He is looking for men and women whose hearts are completely His—completely . . . . God is not looking for magnificent specimens of humanity. He's looking for deeply spiritual, genuinely humble, honest-to-the-core servants.

Independence is our watchword and "Think for Yourself" is our motto. Declaring a need is a sign of weakness, an open admission of failure and lack of character. Furthermore, we are on the move so much, who has time to share and to care?

Some of the most profound ministries of the Spirit of God are not public or loud or large. Sometimes His most meaningful touch on our lives comes when we are all alone. I urge you to include in your schedule time to be alone with God.

If some corporate position is the god of your life, then something terrible occurs within when it is no longer a future possibility. If your career, however, is simply a part of God's plan and you keep it in proper perspective, you can handle a demotion.

Perhaps you never knew what it was to nestle securely in a parent's love. Your home life may have been strained or even fractured from your earliest memory. From a human point of view, your birth might have come at a difficult or awkward time in your parents' lives.

Solitude doesn't refer to mere personal privacy for a twelve-second pit stop where we get a quick fix to reenter the race. It's more than that.