DAILY BREAD READING (Published Daily by Our Daily Bread Ministries)
JULY 19, 2026
READ: Daniel 6 (Focus vs 16-23)
MEMORY VERSE
“When Daniel was lifted from the den, no wound was found on him because he had trusted in his God” Daniel 6:23
BACKGROUND
Sentenced to life in prison, Vic shared with friends his sense of longing. When they said that Jesus would fill the empty spaces in Vic’s life, he mocked their statements. To Vic, Jesus being a man who died yet still lived today seemed fantastical.
Although skeptical, sometime later he began listening to a Christian radio station and even reading the Bible. Eventually he asked God to reveal Himself to him.
Vic’s anxieties and fears began to fade. He reflected, “Physically, I was incarcerated in a prison with two massive cage-like fences keeping me in, but mentally I was free and protected like Daniel when he was in the den with the lions.” Shortly thereafter, he received Jesus as his Savior.
Vic read the Old Testament story of Daniel, an exile from Judah who was thrown into a den with lions. Daniel had refused to stop praying to God three times a day, even when the king signed an edict disallowing all prayer for thirty days except to himself (Daniel 6:6-10).
The king was “greatly distressed” and regretted having to punish him with a certain death by the lions (vv. 14, 16). But God, revealing His power and authority, kept Daniel safe, and “the king was overjoyed” (v. 23).
Whatever our circumstances, including great hardship, God never leaves us. We need only to turn to Him.
Amy Boucher Pye
INSIGHT
When King Darius signed a decree that anyone who prayed to someone other than himself would be tossed into the lions’ den (Daniel 6:7), he was commanding a sentence of trial by ordeal—an ancient Near Eastern practice designed to put someone accused of a crime into a dangerous situation.
If the person survived, it was seen as proof of their innocence because it would’ve taken divine intervention to save them. When the king realized his decree would condemn Daniel, he couldn’t reverse it since Persian law was irrevocable (vv. 8, 12, 15).
Daniel’s survival proved both his innocence of wrongdoing and God’s presence with him, which meant he could legally walk free (vv. 21-22). God’s presence with Daniel reminds us today that no matter our circumstances, He’ll never leave us.
Monica La Rose
APPLICATION
How can you find safety and security in God? How can you look to Him for help and strength today?
PR’s (Pastor Richard) RE-EMPHASIS^ (From Today’s
Post)
“Whatever our circumstances, including great hardship, God never leaves us. We need only to turn to Him.”
PR’s TAKE
“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I (come) that they may have life and have it abundantly.” John 10:10 esv
PRAYER
“Freeing God, thank You for canceling my debt of sin through the death of Your Son, Jesus. I look to You for my salvation.”
TODAY’S HYMN/WORSHIP/PRAISE/GOSPEL SONG
“COME THOU FOUNT OF EVERY BLESSING”
Come, thou Fount of every blessing;
Tune my heart to sing thy grace;
Streams of mercy, never ceasing,
Call for songs of loudest praise.
Teach me some melodious sonnet,
Sung by flaming tongues above;
Praise the mount! I’m fixed upon it,
Mount of God’s unchanging love!
Here I raise my Ebenezer;
Hither by Thy help I’m come;
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home.
Jesus sought me when a stranger,
Wandering from the fold of God;
He, to rescue me from danger,
Interposed his precious blood.
O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be!
Let that grace now, like a fetter,
Bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart; O take and seal it;
Seal it for Thy courts above.
