Today is Thanksgiving Day in the United States, an official holiday stretching back to Abraham Lincoln. I love this day dedicated to feasting and giving thanks.

The Bible encourages feasting to remember the goodness and work of the Lord. In one example God instructed Moses regarding Passover: This day shall be for you a memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord; throughout your generations, as a statute forever, you shall keep it as a feast (Exodus 12:14).

It’s good and proper to focus on God’s benevolence. I’m thankful today for my wife, my children and their spouses, my granddaughter, my family and my extended family—every person a gift from the Lord. I’m grateful for good health, a warm house, a job I like and people I like working with, for the ability to travel abroad and to return to a free and prosperous country.

I earned none of these gifts. Everything I possess and enjoy pours from the hand of God. Today I revel in graciousness.

Savor the feast. Fasting awaits—but not this day. Enjoy a second piece of pie, and delight in the goodness of the Lord.

Photo by SANDY HIBBARD

At times when a tragedy is reported, like the sinking of a ship at sea, we refer to those who died as lost souls. You might hear a commentator say, The vessel went down with 27 souls aboard. We tend to refer to a person as a soul only when they’ve passed from this life. But we already possess a soul, it’s just buried under layers of life.

John prayed for his good friend Gaius, using this language of soul. I pray for good fortune in everything you do, and for your good health—that your everyday affairs prosper, as well as your soul!

John prays for favorable life circumstances ( a prayer I utter daily for friends and family), as well as his friend’s health (every prayer gathering I’ve ever attended involved praying for someone’s health). Then John prayed for Gaius’s soul.

John prayed for a soul at peace, a generosity of spirit, a willingness to fully engage the Lord, and a view beyond circumstances to eternity. A flourishing life and robust health are wonderful, but a thriving soul tops them both. May our souls prosper as well.

While I pray often for health and circumstances, I rarely find myself praying for my friend’s souls. Perhaps you would like to join me in praying for our souls today:

Lord, help our souls get along well, even as health rises and falls, and we stumble over rocks in our path. Remind us that our souls, the very core of are being, remain safe in you.

3 John 2 in Through the Bible in 2024

Photo by Robert Katzki

I value consistency. I return to a restaurant knowing that the dish I’ve been craving will be prepared just as before. I like getting into a vehicle that starts. I want the furnace to work in the winter and the lights to turn on every time I flip the switch.

John remained consistent in his teaching. He wrote to a friend, And now, dear lady, I am not writing you a new command but one we have had from the beginning. I ask that we love one another. And this is love: that we walk in obedience to his commands. As you have heard from the beginning, his command is that you walk in love.

In an earlier letter John wrote, God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. In his gospel John penned the most famous verse in the Bible: For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

John echoed the voice of Jesus who answered a question about rules in this way: Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself.

John’s emphasis on love remains consistent with the teachings of Jesus, as well as the other disciples, the Law, the prophets, and indeed all the Bible. Our love of God will manifest as love for the Scriptures, love for God, and love for our neighbor. Since all this is beyond our natural capabilities, God gave us his Holy Spirit to help us love.

John’s teachings finds unsteady footing in my life. But my lack of consistency fails to negate his message. As a follower of Jesus I’m commanded to love, and thankfully I have God’s help to do so.

2 John 5 in Through the Bible in 2024

Photo by Isabella Fischer

Some parts of the Bible are confusing, others seemingly incomprehensible. But in one matter—the way to eternal life—the Scriptures prove crystal clear.

This is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life. I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.

Believe in the name of Jesus or reject the name of Jesus. Eternal life or eternal death. One surpassing our wildest dreams, the other touching our deepest nightmares. Either way, you can be confident in your choice.

John also reminds us to stay confident in prayer, asking God for our wants and needs. I can pray with the understanding that eternal life has already begun, and I exist now in phase one. I live like the eternal being I already am. God will either answer all my prayers, or soon transform me beyond all my needs.

The potential for a long, unbroken relationship stretches out before you and me, should we choose to accept it. If so, pray today with confidence in the Son, the giver of life eternal.

1 John 5 in Through the Bible in 2024

Photo by Ben Collins