A Glimmer on the Sea

Hey, I'm so glad that you've joined us for our daily devotional from Our Daily Bread. Our writer for today is Tim Gustafson, and the reading is titled, A Glimmer on the Sea. I lay on my bed full of stale liquor and despair, wrote journalist Malcolm Muggeridge of a particularly dismal evening during his work as a World War II spy, alone in the universe, in eternity, with no glimmer of light. In such a condition, he did the only thing he thought sensible. He tried to drown himself. Driving to the nearby Madagascar coast, he began the long swim into the ocean until he grew exhausted. Looking back, he glimpsed the distant coastal lights.

For no reason clear to him at the time, he started swimming back toward the lights. Despite his fatigue, he recalls an overwhelming joy. Muggeridge didn't know exactly how, but he knew God had reached him in that dark moment, infusing him with a hope that could only be supernatural. The Apostle Paul wrote often about such hope. In Ephesians, he noted that, before knowing Christ, each of us is dead in our transgressions and sins, without hope and without God in the world. But God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead. This world tries to drag us into the depths, but there's no reason to succumb to despair.

As Muggeridge said about his swim in the sea, It became clear to me that there was no darkness, only the possibility of losing sight of a light which shone eternally. Now let's get some fresh hope and encouragement from God's word. This is today's Our Daily Bread devotional scripture reading from Ephesians 2 verses 1-5 and 11-13. As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts.

Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions. It is by grace you have been saved.

Therefore remember that formerly you who are Gentiles by birth and called uncircumcised by those who call themselves the circumcision, which is done in the body by human hands, remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus, you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ. Now let's pray. Father, you are the source of all of our genuine hope. Fill us with your light and your joy today. Then spread that light and joy to the world around us that needs it so much. May the hope that we have in you become the hope of the entire world. Thank you, Lord. It's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen.