The Connection Corner
A daily source of encouragement and inspiration to connect your heart to hope and faith.
Daily Devotional
Alone Was Never the AnswerJune 27, 2026 - 7:00 am- Packing Blessings Till They OverflowJune 26, 2026 - 7:00 am
- Mountain, Meet Your MakerJune 25, 2026 - 7:00 am
- Having Fun is Serious BusinessJune 24, 2026 - 7:00 am
- Pause Before You PostJune 23, 2026 - 7:00 am
- No Rebrand RequiredJune 22, 2026 - 7:00 am
- Daughter, I See YouJune 21, 2026 - 7:00 am
- Joy At The DoorJune 20, 2026 - 7:00 am
- Forgiveness Finds A WayJune 19, 2026 - 7:00 am
- Faith That Falls ForwardJune 18, 2026 - 7:00 am
Heart of the Artist
- Faith That Falls ForwardJune 18, 2026 - 7:00 am
- From Dusty Bibles to Daily BreadJune 14, 2026 - 7:00 am
- Leaving No SurvivorsJune 7, 2026 - 7:00 am
- When Joy Fills RoomsMay 31, 2026 - 7:00 am
- Paddleboards and PraiseMay 24, 2026 - 7:00 am
Stories About Songs
- The Beauty in the Broken RoadJune 28, 2026 - 7:00 am
- From Dusty Bibles to Daily BreadJune 14, 2026 - 7:00 am
- Leaving No SurvivorsJune 7, 2026 - 7:00 am
- When Joy Fills RoomsMay 31, 2026 - 7:00 am
- Paddleboards and PraiseMay 24, 2026 - 7:00 am
Giving the Love We Needed
Bri Dunn, Daily DevotionalIt is amazing when you can return the favor.
I have someone in my life who I am so close to. She is a young grandmother, and I knew she was special the first time I watched her hold that baby. She bounced him gently, humming as if the world could wait. As a new mom myself, I was just watching, trying to figure out how someone could be that calm and that steady.
“I have to ask,” I said. “How are you so good with kids? What’s your story?”
She began to tell me in pieces, snapshots from her life. She was fourteen when she had her first child. She remembers walking home from school, terrified to tell her mom, expecting anger, judgment, and resentment. She braced herself for the worst.
But it never came. Her mom met her with warm hands and gentle words. She wrapped her arms around her and helped her carry the weight of that. She warmed bottles, folded blankets, and kept dinner on the stove. She even made sure the baby was fed and bathed when my friend got home from school or work. My friend didn’t have to do it all on her own.
Now, years later, my friend has gone on to be a nurse practitioner. She has a beautiful family. She is a grandmother who still fusses over fussy babies, rocks them until they sleep, and sits beside her patients on their hardest days.
When I asked her how she does it, she said simply, “I remember how it felt when my mom met me with love and compassion. I want to give that same thing back to other people.”
She said that, and it made me think of 1 Corinthians 15:10: “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace to me was not without effect. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me.”
That’s what I was seeing in her life. Grace that met her in her fear and didn’t leave her there. Grace that steadied her, shaped her, and then showed up again—in her work, in her motherhood, and now in the way she cares so deeply for others.
Watching her, I realized that the love and care we receive is never meant to stay with us. It is meant to move through us and be poured out for others. And I wondered (and I hope you will too), who in my life needs to feel grace today through my actions? Who can I meet with the same compassion that carried me through my own hardest days?
A MOMENT TO REFLECT
Courage That is Already Inside You
Brenda Price, Daily DevotionalI woke up with that familiar tightness in my chest—the kind that makes the morning feel heavier than it should. My hands shook slightly as I poured my coffee, and for a moment, I wondered if something was wrong with me.
I kept telling myself I shouldn’t feel fear.
I’m supposed to be strong.
I’m supposed to be steady.
But the truth was obvious: I wasn’t.
I sat in the chair by the window and whispered the questions I didn’t have answers for.
Why do I feel like this?
Where is all this anxiety coming from?
And then, quietly, Scripture met me right where I was.
“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.”
That verse didn’t shame me for feeling afraid. It reminded me where fear didn’t come from—and where my strength did.
As I repeated the words out loud, something shifted. The knots in my chest loosened. My breathing slowed. Peace didn’t rush in all at once, but it settled—steady and sure. I remembered that fear wasn’t my inheritance. Courage wasn’t something I had to manufacture. God had already placed His Spirit within me.
And I’ll be honest—I may or may not have walked around the room telling that fear exactly where it could go.
By the time I grabbed my keys and headed out the door, nothing in my schedule had changed. But I had. Because God’s Spirit—powerful, loving, and steady—was stronger than my anxiety ever could be.
Later that day, I found myself telling friends about it.
“God’s Spirit is amazing,” I said. “He was stronger than my fear—and I didn’t have to pull courage out of thin air. It was already living in me.”
And that’s what I want you to hear today, too.
If you woke up anxious, overwhelmed, or unsure—know this: fear is not what God gave you. His Spirit lives in you. And I’ve never seen a battle He couldn’t handle.
A MOMENT TO REFLECT
The Craigslist Christmas Party
Daily Devotional, Linda MeyersShe walked down the dorm hallway in December, the air heavy with pine-scented candles and detergent, listening to laughter spill from every doorway. Everyone had plans. Everyone but her.
To be honest, she didn’t really have a place to go. Her childhood hadn’t been safe or warm—and that was the one thing she wished for every year. So her parents’ home wasn’t an option. And the thought of spending Christmas alone again settled heavy in her chest.
Tired of the ache, one night she posted on Craigslist, offering eight dollars an hour to rent parents for the holidays. She wasn’t hoping for much—maybe a shared meal, a few hours of attention, a small sense of belonging.
The replies surprised her. Some people offered to help for free. Others wrote back to say they, too, had nowhere to go. They, too, were longing for a place to belong, even if only for an evening.
The biggest surprise wasn’t the loneliness.
It was how willing strangers were to become family.
So she did the most natural thing she could think of. She hosted a potluck.
By midnight, strangers arrived carrying casseroles, cautious smiles, and quiet hope. Some came with wounds they didn’t have words for. Others came simply to offer what they could. That night became something holy. She found encouragement. She found connection. She even found a mentor who would walk with her for years to come.
The gathering became a tradition. Each year, she sets another place at the table, watching how welcoming the lonely stitches together hearts that have been frayed for far too long.
Looking back, it’s clear that belonging was never something she earned. It was something she was offered.
And that’s what makes this story feel so right for Christmas Day.
Because long before we ever thought to look for Him, God made a decision. As Paul writes in Ephesians, God chose in advance to adopt us into His family through Jesus Christ—because He wanted to. Because it brought Him joy.
Christmas is the moment God didn’t just visit us—He claimed us.
Not because we had a place prepared for Him, but because He was preparing a place for us.
Just as that table welcomed strangers into something that felt like family, God invites each of us into a belonging that is not earned, negotiated, or rented by the hour—but freely given through Christ.
And maybe today, as we celebrate the birth of Jesus, we’re reminded of this simple truth:
No one is meant to be alone.
There is always room at the table.
And you are already wanted.
A MOMENT TO REFLECT