Insight for Today
A Daily Devotional by Pastor Chuck Swindoll

Looking for a role model on how to handle criticism? It would be worth your while to check out the book of Nehemiah. On several occasions this great-hearted statesman was openly criticized, falsely accused, and grossly misunderstood.

Tough days. We all have them. And most of us, if we're honest, must admit we don't handle them well. Others who love us try to help, but they tend to complicate matters. Take the four guys who decided to go mountain climbing one weekend.

You've heard them. Those all-too-familiar cries of exasperation. Maybe a couple have crossed your mind today sometime between the too-early clang of the alarm and the too-late racket of the neighbors next door.

We've been talking about what I'm calling "witch hunting," the phenomenon affecting our world in which people are eager to find the Devil in every nook and cranny and to blame him for just about everything.

Flip Wilson's line, "The Devil made me do it," was designed to be funny, not phony. Whether the comedian believed in an actual Satan is, for the moment, immaterial. All he was interested in was getting a laugh.

Years ago a certain issue of Sports Illustrated featured a lengthy article on Tom Landry, former coach of the Dallas Cowboys. Those who know me won't be surprised to hear that I read every word of it. I was living in Dallas when the Cowboys were formed into a team.

Like an anger-blind, half-starved rat prowling in the foul-smelling sewers below street level, so is the person caged within the suffocating radius of selfish jealousy. Trapped by resentment and diseased by rage, he feeds on the filth of his own imagination.

I really feel sorry for Eutychus. It was bad enough for the fella to fall asleep in church while Paul was preaching . . . he even fell out the window to his death three stories below! But then, of all things, Dr. Luke included the incident for all the world to read.

Strange creatures roam the land these days. Being efficient, diligent, and productive, they are remarkably impressive . . . but beneath the surface they are suffering from a miserable malady.

As we have been discussing, homes and churches across the country today are haunted by ghosts of the Ephraimites, men who were skilled and fully equipped for battle but who turned and fled when the going got tough (see Psalm 78:9).

Psalm 78 is a hymn of history. Being a Maskil psalm, it is designed to instruct those who ponder its message. The opening words command us to listen . . . to incline our ears to what the composer, Asaph, has to say.

God makes some people large, others moderate in stature. Still others are small in size. We frequently make the mistake of calling small folks "little," but that is an unfortunate and unfair tag. I'm not picking at terms . . . there is a great deal of difference between being small and being little.

Some collegians think manual labor is the president of Mexico . . . until they graduate. Suddenly, the light dawns. Reality frowns. And that sheltered, brainy, fair-skinned, squint-eyed scholar who has majored in medieval literature and minored in Latin comes of age.

Chances are running high that you're in a hurry today. Am I right? Your "To Do" list stretches on and on. If you're reading this in the morning, you're wondering how in the world you'll get it all done.

Making one's own decisions develops healthy mental muscles. But there will always be a few who crave to be told what to do. A major reason some prefer to be indecisive is laziness. Decision making is hard work.

I like Joshua's style in Joshua 24:14–15. Like a good leader, he laid out the facts. He exhorted those about him to get off the fence and get their spiritual act together. He encouraged personal authenticity and strong commitment.

We've been talking about how easy it is to take one thing and transform it into another as it leaves our lips. Exaggerate this detail or rearrange that fact and you've got a recipe that'll make more mouths water than hot fudge on a rainy night.

"Don't garble the message!" If I heard that once during Marine boot camp, I must've heard it four dozen times. Again and again, our outfit was warned against hearing one thing, then passing on a slightly different version.

On October 12, 1972, a Fairchild F-227 of the Uruguayan Air Force was chartered by an amateur rugby team. The plan? To fly from Montevideo to Santiago, Chile . . . a flight pattern which required flying over the rugged Andes.

Extreme dilemmas are usually solved by radical adjustments. It used to be called "fighting fire with fire." Minor alterations won't do. If the situation is getting completely out of hand, a slight modification won't cut it. It's get-with-it time.