Adam Holz, Author at Our Daily Bread Ministries Canada

Excelsior!

By Adam Holz|2024-09-04T02:33:18-04:00September 4th, 2024|

Sometimes surprisingly spiritual messages turn up in unexpected places, like in a comic book, for example. Marvel Comics publisher Stan Lee passed away in 2018, leaving behind a legacy of such iconic heroes as Spider-Man, Iron Man, the Fantastic Four, the Hulk and many others.

The famously smiling man with sunglasses had a personal catchphrase that he used to sign off in monthly columns in Marvel comics for decades—the Latin word excelsior. In a 2010 tweet, Lee explained its meaning: “‘Upward and onward to greater glory!’ That’s what I wish you whenever I finish tweeting! Excelsior!”

I like that. Whether Stan Lee realized it or not, his use of this unusual Latin phrase certainly resonates with what Paul wrote in Philippians as he admonished believers to look not behind, but ahead—and up: “But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (vv. 13–14 esv).

We can easily become entangled in regrets or second-guessing past decisions. But in Christ, we’re invited to relinquish regrets and a crippling focus on our failures to press upward and onward to God’s greater glory through embracing the forgiveness and purpose He so graciously gives us! Excelsior!

I’m Just the Driver

By Adam Holz|2024-08-04T02:33:26-04:00August 4th, 2024|

“Dad, can I spend the night with my friend?” my daughter asked, getting into the car after practice. “Honey, you know the answer,” I said. “I’m just the driver. I don’t know what’s happening. Let’s talk with Mom.”

“I’m just the driver” has become a joke in our home. Daily, I ask my organized wife where I need to be, when, and whom I’m taking where. With three teens, my “moonlighting” as a “taxi driver” sometimes feels like a second job. Often I don’t know what I don’t know. So I have to check in with the master calendar keeper.

In Matthew 8, Jesus encountered a man who also knew something about taking and giving instruction. A Roman centurion, this man understood that Jesus had the authority to heal, just as he had authority to issue commands to those under him. “Just say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me” (vv. 8–9). Christ commended the man’s faith (vv. 10,13), amazed that he understood what His authority looked like in action.

So what about us? What does it look like to trust Jesus with our daily assignments from Him? Because even if we think we’re “just the driver,” each assignment has kingdom meaning and purpose.

Jesus Removes the Stain

By Adam Holz|2024-07-26T02:33:20-04:00July 26th, 2024|

“Are. You. KIDDING?!” I yelled, digging through our dryer looking for my shirt. I found it. And . . . something else.

My white shirt had an ink spot on it. In fact, it looked like a jaguar pelt: blacks splotches coated everything. I clearly hadn’t checked my pockets, and a leaky pen had stained the entire load.

Scripture often uses the word stain to describe sin. A stain permeates the fabric of something, ruining it. And that’s how God, speaking through the prophet Jeremiah, described sin, reminding His people that its stain was beyond their ability to cleanse: “Although you wash yourself with soap and use an abundance of cleansing powder, the stain of your guilt is still before me” (Jeremiah 2:22).

Thankfully, sin doesn’t get the last word. In Isaiah 1:18, we hear God’s promise that He can cleanse us from sin’s stain: “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.”

I couldn’t get the ink stain out of my shirt. Neither can I undo the stain of my sin. Thankfully, God cleanses us in Christ, just as 1 John 1:9 promises: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”

“Help My Unbelief!”

By Adam Holz|2024-02-28T09:46:12-05:00February 28th, 2024|

“Where is my faith?—even deep down, right in, there is nothing but emptiness & darkness. . . . If there be God, please forgive me.”

The author of those words might surprise you: Mother Teresa. Beloved and renowned as a tireless servant of the poor in Calcutta, India, Mother Teresa quietly waged a desperate war for her faith over five decades. After her 1997 death, that struggle came to light when portions of her journal were published in the book Come Be My Light.

What do we do with our doubts or feelings of God’s absence? Those moments may plague some believers more than others. But many faithful believers in Jesus may, at some point in their lives, experience moments or seasons of such doubts.

I’m thankful that Scripture has given us a beautiful, paradoxical prayer that expresses both faith and the lack thereof. In Mark 9, Jesus encounters a father whose son has been demonically tormented since childhood (v. 21). When Jesus says that the man must have faith (“Everything is possible for one who believes” v. 23), the man responds, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” (v. 24).

This honest, heartfelt plea invites those of us who struggle with doubt to give it to God, trusting that He can fortify our faith and hold on to us firmly amid the deepest, darkest valleys we will ever traverse.

Sins Remembered No More

By Adam Holz|2023-11-14T01:33:31-05:00November 14th, 2023|

I never saw the ice. But I felt it. The back end of the pickup I was driving—my grandfather’s—fishtailed. One swerve, two, three—and I was airborne, flying off a fifteen-foot embankment. I remember thinking, This would be awesome if I wasn’t going to die. A moment later, the truck crunched into the steep slope and rolled to the bottom. I crawled out of the crushed cab, unscathed.

The truck was utterly totaled that December morning in 1992. God had spared me. But what about my grandfather? What would he say? In fact, he never said a single word about the truck. Not one. There was no scolding, no repayment plan, nothing. Just forgiveness. And a grandfather’s smile that I was okay.

My grandfather’s grace reminds me of God’s grace in Jeremiah 31. There, despite their tremendous failings, God promises a restored relationship with His people, saying, “I will forgive their wickedness, and I will remember their sins no more” (v. 34).

I’m sure my grandfather never forgot that I’d wrecked his truck. But he acted just like God does here, not remembering it, not shaming me, not making me work to repay the debt I rightfully owed. Just as God says He’ll do, my grandfather chose to remember it no more, as if the destructive thing I’d done had never happened.

First on the List

By Adam Holz|2023-10-19T02:33:07-04:00October 19th, 2023|

The morning commenced like a track meet. I practically jumped out of bed, launching into the teeth of the day’s deadlines. Get the kids to school. Check. Get to work. Check. I blasted full throttle into writing my “To Do” list, in which personal and professional tasks tumbled together in an avalanche-like litany:

“ . . . 13. Edit article. 14. Clean office. 15. Strategic team planning. 16. Write tech blog. 17. Clean basement. 18. Pray.”

By the time I got to number eighteen, I’d remembered that I needed God’s help. But I’d gotten that far before it even occurred to me that I was going at it alone, trying to manufacture my own momentum.

Jesus knew. He knew our days would crash one into another, a sea of ceaseless urgency. So He instructs, “Seek first [God’s] kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” (Matthew 6:33).

It’s natural to hear Jesus’ words as a command. And they are. But there’s more here—an invitation. In Matthew 6, Jesus invites us to exchange the world’s frantic anxiety (vv. 25–32) for a life of trust, day by day. God, by His grace, helps us all of our days—even when we get to number eighteen on our list before we remember to see life from His perspective.

How can we turn to God first each day? On stressful days, what helps you trust Jesus with things demanding your immediate attention?

Slow-Walking Sin Out the Door

By Adam Holz|2023-07-19T02:33:10-04:00July 19th, 2023|

Winston knows he’s not supposed to chew them. So he’s adopted a sly strategy. We call it slow-walking. If Winston spies a discarded, unguarded shoe, he’ll casually meander in that direction, grab it, and just keep walking. Slowly. Nothing to see here. Right out the door if no one notices. “Uh, Mom, Winston just slow-walked your shoe out the door.”
It’s apparent that sometimes we think we can “slow-walk” our sin past God. We’re tempted to think that He won’t notice. It’s no big deal, we rationalize—whatever “it” is. But like Winston, we know better. We know those choices don’t please God.

Like Adam and Eve in the garden, we may try to hide due to the shame of our sin (Genesis 3:10) or pretend like it didn’t happen. But Scripture invites us to do something very different: to run to God’s mercy and forgiveness. Proverbs 28:13 tells us, “Whoever conceals their sins does not prosper, but the one who confesses and renounces them finds mercy.”

We don’t have to try to slow-walk our sin and hope no one notices. When we tell the truth about our choices—to ourselves, to God, to a trusted friend—we can find freedom from the guilt and shame of carrying secret sin (1 John 1:9).

The Gospel in Unexpected Places

By Adam Holz|2023-06-29T02:33:25-04:00June 29th, 2023|

Recently, I found myself someplace I’d seen in movies and on TV more times that I could count: Hollywood, California. There, in the foothills of Los Angeles, those enormous white letters marched proudly across that famous hillside as I viewed them from my hotel window.

Then I noticed something else: down to the left was a prominent cross. I’d never seen that in a movie. And the moment I left my hotel room, some students from a local church began to share Jesus with me.

We might sometimes think of Hollywood as only the epicenter of worldliness, in utter contrast with God’s kingdom. Yet clearly Christ was at work there, catching me by surprise by His presence.

The Pharisees were consistently surprised by where Jesus turned up. He didn’t hang out with the people they expected. Instead, Mark 2:13–17 tells us He spent time with “tax collectors and sinners” (v. 15), people whose lives practically screamed “Unclean!” Yet there Jesus was, among those who needed Him most (v. 17).

More than 2,000 years later, Jesus continues to plant His message of hope and salvation in unexpected places, among the most unexpected of people. And He’s called and equipped us to be a part of that mission.

The God Who Restores

By Adam Holz|2023-05-30T02:33:19-04:00May 30th, 2023|

On November 4, 1966, a disastrous flood swept through Florence, Italy, submerging Giorgio Vasari’s renowned work of art The Last Supper under a pool of mud, water, and heating oil for over twelve hours. With its paint softened and its wooden frame significantly damaged, many believed that the piece was beyond repair. However, after a tedious fifty-year conservation effort, experts and volunteers were able to overcome monumental obstacles and restore the valuable painting.

When the Babylonians conquered Israel, the people felt hopeless—surrounded by death and destruction and in need of restoration (Lamentations 1). During this period of turmoil, God took the prophet Ezekiel to a valley and gave him a vision where he was surrounded by dry bones. “Can these bones live?” He asked. Ezekiel responded, “Lord, you alone know” (Ezekiel 37:3). God then told him to prophesy over the bones so they might live again. “As I was prophesying,” Ezekiel recounted, “there was a noise, a rattling sound, and the bones came together” (v. 7). Through this vision, God revealed to Ezekiel that Israel’s restoration could only come through Him.

When we feel as if things in life have been broken and are beyond repair, God assures us He can rebuild our shattered pieces. He’ll give us new breath and new life.

All for Jesus

By Adam Holz|2023-05-25T02:33:04-04:00May 25th, 2023|

When Jeff was fourteen, his mom took him to see a famous singer. Like many musicians of his era, B. J. Thomas had gotten caught up in a self-destructive lifestyle while on music tours. But that was before he and his wife were introduced to Jesus. Their lives were radically changed when they became believers in Christ.

On the night of the concert, the singer began to entertain the enthusiastic crowd. But after performing a few of his well-known songs, one guy yelled out from the audience, “Hey, sing one for Jesus!” Without any hesitation, B. J. responded, “I just sang four songs for Jesus.”

It’s been a few decades since then, but Jeff still remembers that moment when he realized that everything we do should be for Jesus—even things that some might consider to be “non-religious.”

We’re sometimes tempted to divvy up the things we do in life. Read the Bible. Share our story of coming to faith. Sing a hymn. Sacred stuff. Mow the lawn. Go for a run. Sing a country song. Secular stuff.

Colossians 3:16 reminds us that the message of Christ indwells us in activities like teaching, singing, and being thankful, but verse 17 goes even further. It emphasizes that as God’s children, “whatever [we] do, whether in word or deed, [we] do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus.”

We do it all for Him.

About Adam Holz

Daily

Topics

Discover

Resources

Get Involved