March 15 Daily Devotional

Bible Verse

"Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths" (Proverbs 3:5–6).

Devotional

The regular exercise of prayer makes every burden light. It smoothes every rugged step of a child of God. It is this that keeps down his trials. Not that he is ever exempt from them—no, it is "through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God" (Acts 14:22). You are a disciple of the cross. Your religion is that of the cross. You are a follower of him who died upon the cross. And so you must never expect entire exemption from the cross until you pass to the possession of the crown.

But you may pray down your crosses. Prayer will lessen their number and tone down their severity.

If a person is a true child of the covenant (one of the Lord's family), but his walk is far from God (his condition is cold, worldly, and careless), then he may expect crosses and trials to increase with each step that he advances towards the kingdom. Oh, little do many of the tried, afflicted, and constantly disappointed believers consider how closely related these very trials, and afflictions, and disappointments are to their restraining of prayer before God. Every step seems to be attended with some new cross. Every scheme is blasted by some adverse wind. Every effort is foiled. Disappointment follows disappointment, wave follows wave. Nothing they attempt prospers. Everything they try fails. And everything seems to be against them.

Oh, if we could see behind the scenes, what would we discover? A deserted throne of grace! If we were to reveal the secret and frame it as a charge against the believer, what would it be? "You have restrained prayer before God!" (Job 15:4 NKJV). You worked out your plans without prayer. You entered into your enterprise without prayer. You made your efforts without prayer. God has blown upon it, and it all has come to nothing. No wonder! You did not consult God. You did not acknowledge the Lord. You did not ask his permission. You did not seek his wisdom. You did not crave his blessing. And so he blew upon it all!

God's precious injunction is, "In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths." Where this is honored, there is God's blessing. Where it is slighted, there is God's curse.

We have not known thee as we ought,
nor learned thy wisdom, grace and pow'r;
the things of earth have filled our thought,
and trifles of the passing hour.
Lord, give us light thy truth to see,
and make us wise in knowing thee.

We have not feared thee as we ought,
nor bowed beneath thine awful eye,
nor guarded deed, and word, and thought,
remembering that God was nigh.
Lord, give us faith to know thee near,
and grant the grace of holy fear.

We have not loved thee as we ought,
nor cared that we are loved by thee;
thy presence we have coldly sought,
and feebly longed thy face to see.
Lord, give a pure and loving heart
to feel and know the love thou art.

We have not served thee as we ought;
alas! the duties left undone,
the work with little fervor wrought,
the battles lost or scarcely won!
Lord, give the zeal, and give the might,
for thee to toil, for thee to fight.

When shall we know thee as we ought,
and fear and love and serve aright?
When shall we, out of trial brought,
be perfect in the land of light?
Lord, may we day by day prepare
to see thy face and serve thee there.

(Thomas Benson Pollock, 1889)

Be sure to read the Preface by Octavius Winslow and A Note from the Editor by Larry E. Wilson.

Larry Wilson is an ordained minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. In addition to having served as the General Secretary of the Committee on Christian Education of the OPC (2000–2004) and having written a number of articles and booklets (such as God's Words for Worship and Why Does the OPC Baptize Infants) for New Horizons and elsewhere, he has pastored OPC churches in Minnesota, Indiana, and Ohio. We are grateful to him for his editing of Morning Thoughts, the OPC Daily Devotional for 2025.