TODAY'S DEVOTION:
He Gives Us the Freedom of Grace
In today’s readings—Deuteronomy 16–18, Psalm 38, and Galatians 2—we are invited to a fresh encounter with the living God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Here is the God who liberates slaves, who gathers his people into festival and joy, who draws near to the wounded and the guilty with a mercy stronger than shame.
The journey through Deuteronomy roots us in memory. The people of Israel are called to celebrate—Passover, the Festival of Harvest, Shelters—a rhythm of life threaded with remembering deliverance and sharing joy, especially with those on the margins: the foreigners, orphans, and widows. Over and again, we hear: “Remember that you were once slaves in Egypt, so be careful to obey all these decrees.” This is no God of violence or coercion, but the One who sets the captive free and teaches us to share freedom, justice, and generosity. Every festival, every command, is an invitation to enter God’s justice and joy, his nonviolent shalom that undoes the powers of oppression.
Psalm 38 opens the heart of someone who aches—body and soul—under the weight of guilt and sickness. But he turns to God not as a punishing judge, but as the One who listens to every sigh and groan, the One who saves not through abandonment but through presence. This God does not demand blood for blood, but is near to the suffering and the brokenhearted, the One who pours out a love that goes deeper than our grief and fear.
In Galatians 2, Paul’s reminder pulses like a heartbeat: law was never meant to save—it was meant to point us, humble us, show our need for the radical grace of Christ. Peter falters, and fear’s shadow grows, but Paul calls him—and us—back to what is truest: “It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me… I live by trusting the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” The cross is not where God vents anger, but where Christ, in union with humanity, defeats sin, death, and fear. He absorbs all the world’s violence and ends its claim; he is the greater Moses, the Prophet who leads us into liberation.
This is Christus Victor—the God who, in Christ and by the Spirit, triumphs over all that enslaves us, not by violence but by love. He makes us new, fills us with the freedom of grace, and sends us out to live not in fear, but in the wide, deep, never-ending love of God. The gospel does not call us to maintain systems of fear and performance, but to rest in the blessing that “you are loved. Nothing gonna change it. No doubt about it.”
May your life today be a festival of remembrance—and participation—in the liberating love of God: the inexhaustible joy of the Father, the self-giving victory of the Son, and the renewing power of the Spirit. Where there is despair, may you find hope; where there is fear, may you know the courage of grace; and where there is sorrow, may you discover the freedom of being God’s beloved.
That’s a prayer I have for my family, for my wife, my daughters and my son—and that’s a prayer I have for you. May it be so.
We are not left behind
