Listen to today’s devo!

All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them. (Acts 2:4)

Expanded Passage: Acts 2:2-6

“It’s going to be temporary,” my friend told me. “We’re just ministering in this prison on the side. I don’t think it will really amount to much.” Soon after that conversation, she and her husband had built a flourishing prison ministry that touched a large number of inmates. Little did they know, God had placed a burden on one Christian inmate’s heart to pray for more church planters. Today, my friends serve as full-time prison ministers who have started several churches in largely unreached prisons and trained many volunteers. They are the first to admit they didn’t plan the success of their ministry.

God initiated something in their midst and empowered them, and they ministered where God’s power took them. Acts tells us about a more dramatic moment in which the Holy Spirit visibly rested on the disciples and gave them specific messages to share in a variety of languages. This explosion of growth in the early church was not the product of a careful plan. God initiated a supernatural work among his people. They had to faithfully move with God, but the initiative and resources were supplied by the Holy Spirit.

Whatever God’s next plans are for my friends, they aren’t expecting to figure it out on their own. They trust that God will lead them when it’s time to take the next step forward.

Let God lead and empower you for service through the Spirit.

Ed C. previously served as a Light from the Word devotional writer.

© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.