This perpetual calendar includes:
- Remarkable testimonies of souls won to the Savior
- Explanations of gospel concepts
- Answers to frequently-asked questions
- Stories of real-life witnessing opportunities
- Encouragements and tips for sharing the glorious gospel
October 23
“That in nothing I shall be ashamed, but with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death” (Php 1:20). In the same spirit, Jim Elliot prayed: “Father, make of me a crisis man. Bring those I contact to decision. Let me not be a milepost on a single road; make me a fork, that men must turn one way or another on facing Christ in me.” He grieved at the theoretical Christianity he saw everywhere; people debating theory but missing the most obvious and plainly-spoken commands of the once-crucified and now triumphant Companion of all those who walked the way of the Cross. With deep feeling he wrote: “It makes me boil when I think of the power we profess and the utter impotency of our action. Believers who know one-tenth as much as we do are doing one hundred times more for God, with His blessing and our criticism. Oh if I could write it, preach it, say it, paint it, anything at all, if only God’s power would become known among us.”
Today’s Reading: Mark 15-16; Luke 1 Memorize: Ephesians 1:20October 22
“I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications…be made for all men…For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior; who will have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim 2:1-4). During the English Keswick Week of 1925, Irish evangelist W.P. Nicholson was preaching the gospel in the Market Square. In the audience one night was a missionary on furlough from West Africa. To a man standing beside him, he spoke a word of invitation; the only reply he received was a severe blow on the face. That night, this man’s conversion was earnestly prayed for. The next night, the missionary, while sitting in the Skiddaw Street Tent, became conscious that the man seated next to him was in spiritual distress. Turning to speak to him, he found the same man who, the night before, had struck him on the face. A little later it was the missionary’s joy to lead this man into the light and liberty of salvation in Christ. Does God answer prayer?
Today’s Reading: Mark 12-14 Memorize: Ephesians 1:6-7October 21
How important is consistent Christian testimony to effective gospel witness. In Chartist times (a Victorian era workplace reform movement), people often labored in little hovels for a mere pittance. W. Y. Fullerton tells of a Christian in the market town of Kettering, England, who worked his knitting machine in a little lean-to behind a grocer’s shop. He didn’t earn enough to buy sufficient food for his family. Each morning he came, a hungry man, and had to walk down between piles of the food his body longed to have. The shop keeper noticed he walked with clenched fists, muttering to himself, and was afraid he was a dangerous Chartist, prone to violence against shop owners. But as he surreptitiously listened one day, he finally heard what the believer was saying. Here he was, with his ill-nourished body, walking between the things he might so easily have attempted to steal, and he kept repeating the words at the end of Psalm 25, “Let integrity and uprightness preserve me.”
Today’s Reading: Mark 9-11 Memorize: Galatians 5:24October 20
At meetings being held in the north of England, Lionel Fletcher noticed a rough-looking man showing the ravages of sin on his face. He was the first to rise at the end and rush to the preacher. The story poured out in sobs. His son had trusted Christ shortly before. His father was the worse for drink when Charlie told him he’d been saved. Grabbing his belt, the man began to lash his son, and did so each night he dared attend the meetings. One bitter night, finding his son hiding in the pigsty for warmth, he dragged him out and threw him in the coal cellar, all the while hearing Charlie pleading with God to save his father. Now here he was weeping out his repentance, saying, “He’s beaten me; Charlie’s beaten me.” Then, suddenly, at the door appeared Charlie, called from the mill by friends who had seen his father go forward. They embraced, and “Charlie’s hand stole up to his father’s face, and he began to pat it, and I heard him say, ‘Father, how I love you, how I love you.’” “Love never fails” (1 Cor 13:8).
Today’s Reading: Mark 6-8 Memorize: Galatians 5:17October 19
“What do you have that you did not receive? Now if you did indeed receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?” (1 Cor 4:7). C.S. Lewis writes in Mere Christianity: “Every faculty you have, your power of thinking or your moving your limbs from moment to moment, is given to you by God. If you devoted every moment of your whole life exclusively to His service, you would not give Him anything that was not in a sense His own already. So that when we talk of a man doing anything for God or giving anything to God, I will tell you what it is really like. It is like a small child going to his father and saying, ‘Daddy, give me sixpence to buy you a birthday present.’ Of course, the father does, and he is pleased with the child’s present. It is all very nice and proper, but only an idiot would think that the father is sixpence to the good on the transaction. When a man has made [this] discovery God can really get to work. It is after this that real life begins. The man is awake now. —pp. 125-126
Today’s Reading: Mark 3-5 Memorize: Galatians 5:4-5October 18
Edward Studd, after making a fortune in the tea business in India, returned to England to raise his family in a life of lavish excess, living for the world that is soon to be burned. But in 1875, that changed when their father was saved under the preaching of D.L. Moody. The three eldest boys, C.T., Kynaston and George, had been brought up in a religious environment that was, as C.T. later wrote, “a Sunday thing, like one’s Sunday clothes, to be put away on Monday morning.” But now Edward Studd was “a real live play-the-game Christian.” Within a year, all three were saved. The Studd boys were the talk of the Empire, all of them outstanding athletes, and C.T. the most renowned of them all. When, shortly after, C.T. gave up everything to be a missionary in China, it shook the upper class to its foundation. Thousands were converted or moved to be wholly obedient to God. As he wrote: “If Jesus Christ is God and died for me, then no sacrifice is too great to make for Him.”
Today’s Reading: Matthew 26-28; Mark 1-2 Memorize: Galatians 4:4-5October 17
How were the books of the Bible selected? “Canonicity” refers to the standard used to include these writings. God determined canonicity by inspiring certain men to write the Bible. Norman Geisler and William Nix give the questions used by the early church to determine this: 1. Is it authoritative? Though the writers claimed no authority themselves, their books have phrases like “Thus says the Lord” more than 2000 times, claiming to be God’s Word. 2. Is it prophetic? The apostles and prophets were the “holy men” God used. Their writings express a consistent view of God and His ways, and so seem to be the Word of God. 3. Is it authentic? The biblical books are the most reliable historical ancient document. Where they can be tested, they are accurate. They prove to be God’s Word. 4. Is it dynamic? The books accepted must be life-changing (see 2 Tim 3:16-17). 5. Was it received? The books accepted by the early church were later canonized, but they had already evidenced their inspiration.
Today’s Reading: Matthew 23-25 Memorize: Galatians 3:23-4