Now why do you cry aloud? Is there no king in you? Has your counselor perished, that pangs have seized you like a woman in labour? Writhe and groan, O daughter Zion, like a woman in labour; for now you shall go forth from the city and camp in the open country; you shall go […]
URC Daily Devotion 8th February
In days to come the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be raised up above the hills. Peoples shall stream to it, and many nations shall come and say:‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God […]
URC Daily Devotion 7th February
Hear this, you rulers of the house of Jacob and chiefs of the house of Israel,who abhor justice and pervert all equity,who build Zion with blood and Jerusalem with wrong!Its rulers give judgment for a bribe, its priests teach for a price, its prophets give oracles for money;yet they lean upon the Lord and say, “Surely the Lord is with us! No […]
URC Daily Devotion 6th February
Almost fifty years after Francis Xavier had arrived in Japan as its first Christian apostle, the presence of several thousand baptised Christians in the land became a subject of suspicion to the ruler Hideyoshi, who soon began a period of persecution. Twenty-six men and women, monastic and lay, were first mutilated then crucified near Nagasaki […]
URC Daily Devotion 5th February
Things had been going so well until now; decades of a sort of peace had been marked by dizzingly rising living standards for some and escalating celebrity status for a small number of well-known persons. But now, external threats are darkening the horizon and the internal contradictions and complacencies of the society are being exposed […]
URC Daily Devotion 4th February
Joyfully sing to the LORD, all you righteous;for it is good that the upright give praise.With harp and lyre praise the LORD and make music;with shouts of joy, a new song to him raise. Righteous and true is the word God has spoken;all the LORD’s actions his faithfulness prove.He loves true righteousness, judgment and justice;all […]
URC Daily Devotion 3rd February
And I said:Listen, you heads of Jacob and rulers of the house of Israel!Should you not know justice?— you who hate the good and love the evil,who tear the skin off my people, and the flesh off their bones;who eat the flesh of my people, flay their skin off them,break their bones in pieces, and chop them up like meat […]
URC Daily Devotion 2nd February
But I will gather you together, all you people of Israel that are left. I will bring you together like sheep returning to the fold. Like a pasture full of sheep, your land will once again be filled with many people. God will open the way for them and lead them out of exile. They […]
URC Daily Devotions 1st February
Alas for those who devise wickedness and evil deeds on their beds!When the morning dawns, they perform it, because it is in their power.They covet fields, and seize them; houses, and take them away;they oppress householder and house, people and their inheritance.Therefore, thus says the Lord:Now, I am devising against this family an evil from which you cannot remove your […]
URC Daily Devotions 31st January
For this I will lament and wail;I will go barefoot and naked;I will make lamentation like the jackals,and mourning like the ostriches.For her wound is incurable.It has come to Judah;it has reached to the gate of my people,to Jerusalem.Tell it not in Gath,weep not at all;in Beth-leaphrahroll yourselves in the dust.Pass on your way,inhabitants of […]