Mr. Lincoln's Devotional

 

A good friend, now with the Lord, was culling his possessions prior to moving into assisted living. He brought some things to our church rummage sale. Among them were several books. When I saw this one, I knew I needed it. I've always loved History and admired Abraham Lincoln (growing up, that would have been a highly unpopular opinion in my home town). 

There's been a lot of speculation about Lincoln's relationship with God. Just as now, if a person's faith doesn't line up perfectly with the tenets of a particular denomination or group, the person can be viewed as everything from heathen to heretic. And conversely, people hoping to move opinions about a person's faith can seize on any quip or reported quote to make a person like Lincoln more than what he was.

The majority of people do see Lincoln's faith as Christian. He was seen on numerous occasions with a little book on his person, "A Believer's Book of Days" which was a devotional guide published in the mid-1800s by the Religious Tract Society of London, England. When I think about what Lincoln endured in his presidency, as a believer myself, I cannot imagine how he made it day to day with the burdens he carried. Carl Sandburg, who wrote a forward that's often included in the reprints of "Lincoln's Devotional" wrote “... it is new testimony that he was a man of profound faith.”

When you look at a devotional guide, look for not just comforting thoughts, but the scripture and how the editor pairs it with the commentary. Lincoln himself told a friend in the toughest period of the Civil War "Take this book (the Bible) upon reason that you can, and the balance on faith, and you will live and die a better man."

Today's entry that Lincoln would have read, "There is now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." Romans 8:1 Followed up by this poem:

O LOve, thou bottomless abyss!

My sins are swallowed up in Thee;

Cover'd is my unrighteousness,

From condemnation now I'm free;

While Jesus' blood through earth and skies,

"Mercy, free boundless mercy!" cries.