To write a devotional, pick one short Bible passage, read the chapter around it, and decide the single point it makes for your reader. Then write 250 to 500 words in a fixed order: the key verse, quoted exactly; one specific story from ordinary life; a turn that ties the story back to the passage; one thing to do today; and a prayer of two to four sentences. A devotional is finished when someone can read it once and tell you its point in a sentence.
What a devotional is for
A devotional is a short reflection on Scripture written to be read alone, usually one a day, in a few quiet minutes. It turns up in daily guides, church newsletters, Advent booklets and blogs, and at the start of a board meeting. It does less than a sermon and more than a verse printed on a mug: it opens one passage, sets it beside one moment of life, and sends the reader into the day with one thing to think about.
| Devotional | Sermon | Bible study | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who it's for | DevotionalOne reader, alone | SermonA congregation, listening | Bible studyA group, discussing |
| Scope | DevotionalOne passage, one point | SermonA passage, worked through | Bible studyA passage, question by question |
| Voice | DevotionalPersonal, often first person | SermonPublic, to the room | Bible studyMore questions than answers |
| Ends with | DevotionalA prayer and one action | SermonA call to respond | Bible studyQuestions to apply it |
If you are preparing for a pulpit, see how to write a sermon; for a small group, a Bible study template gives the discussion its structure.
The parts of a devotional
Most published devotionals use some version of the same shape. The proportions matter more than the labels: the story gets the most room, and the prayer gets the least.
| Part | What it does | Length |
|---|---|---|
| PartTitle | What it doesNames the point, not the reference | Length3–8 words |
| PartReading | What it doesThe full passage, as a reference to look up | LengthOne line |
| PartKey verse | What it doesQuoted exactly, with reference and translation | Length1–3 verses |
| PartStory | What it doesOne specific incident from ordinary life | Length100–175 words |
| PartTurn | What it doesRetells the passage and ties it to the story | Length60–120 words |
| PartApplication | What it doesOne thing to do or notice today | Length30–60 words |
| PartPrayer | What it doesTwo to four sentences in the reader's voice | Length30–60 words |
| PartTakeaway | What it doesThe point in one line | LengthUnder 15 words |
The key verse sits at the top the way an epigraph sits at the top of a chapter, with one difference: a devotional has to earn it. Everything below the verse should help the reader understand it better, not just nod along.
If you are writing for a publication, its guidelines beat any table. The Upper Room, a daily devotional guide published in Nashville, asks for meditations of no more than 350 to 400 words and describes a four-part method: retell the passage briefly, describe one specific incident, show how the truth applies in the days ahead, and revise after a few days. Its editors sum up the scale in four words: "Think snapshot, not movie."
How to write a devotional, step by step
- Choose one passage and read the whole chapter
Start with a passage that has caught you, not a topic you feel you should cover, and read the chapter around it. Mark 6:31, where Jesus tells the apostles to "rest a while," reads on its own like a promise of rest. In context the rest lasts about as long as a boat ride: by verse 34 the crowd has run ahead and Jesus is teaching again. A devotional on that verse can be about Jesus noticing tired people. It can't promise that rest always comes.
- Write the point in one sentence
Before any story, write the point as a sentence you could say across a kitchen table: "Jesus noticed his friends hadn't eaten and called that a reason to stop." If it takes two sentences, you have two devotionals. Save the second for tomorrow.
- Find one specific story
Make it one incident on one day, with things a reader can see and hear: the saltines in the glove box, not "a busy season." This is show, don't tell on a small scale. Your own life is the usual source; something you watched, or a checked moment from history, works too if you credit it.
- Turn back to the passage
Retell the passage in its own setting, briefly, with only the background the reader needs, and let the story and the text meet. Claim only what the passage supports. If you need three cross-references to make the point, it belongs to a different passage.
- Give one application
"Trust God more" is not an application; nobody knows what to do with it at 7 a.m. Name an action small enough for today: eat lunch away from your desk, call the person you have been avoiding, read the passage again before bed.
- Write a short prayer
Two to four sentences in the reader's voice ("I" or "we"), borrowing a word from the verse so the two echo each other. Don't summarize the devotional again in the form of a prayer.
- Let it rest, then cut
Leave the draft for a day or two, then read it aloud. Cut a throat-clearing first sentence and any second point, check the verse word for word against your translation, and check the length against the publication's limit.
A devotional example
An original devotional written to that shape, about 330 words. The story is fictional; the Scripture is from the King James Version.
No leisure so much as to eat
Read Mark 6:30–34.
And he said unto them, Come ye yourselves apart into a desert place, and rest a while: for there were many coming and going, and they had no leisure so much as to eat. (Mark 6:31, KJV)
In the last week of the school year I graded forty-one essays in my car. I ate lunch there too, mostly saltines from the glove box, parked behind the gym with the engine running for the air conditioning and a red pen behind my ear. On Thursday a colleague knocked on the window, handed me half a turkey sandwich and said, "Eat this somewhere that isn't here." I laughed. Then I did it: twelve minutes on a bench by the baseball field, no essays. I don't remember a single paper from that week. I remember the sandwich.
The apostles in Mark 6 had just come back from their first mission. Jesus had sent them out two by two with no bread and no money, and now they crowded around him to report everything they had done and taught. Mark adds one detail about the state they were in: they had not had time to eat. Jesus heard the report, and the first thing he answered was the hunger. Come apart. Rest a while.
The rest didn't last. People saw the boat leave, ran ahead on foot and were waiting on the shore, and Jesus began teaching again. But the invitation came first, and it came from him. He didn't wait for his friends to finish the work before he noticed they were tired.
For today: Take one meal away from your work. Put the laptop, the phone or the pile of papers where you can't see it, and eat slowly enough to taste the food.
Prayer: Lord Jesus, you noticed when your friends had no time to eat. When you call me apart today, help me go. Amen.
Thought to carry: Rest is his invitation, not my reward for finishing.
Why it works
- The title borrows the verse's strangest phrase, so the reader meets it twice.
- The story is one afternoon with objects you can picture, and the writer is not its hero; the colleague is.
- The turn includes the interruption, so it promises no more than the text does.
- One application, doable before dinner, and a prayer that reuses "noticed" and "apart."
Quoting Scripture: translations and permissions
Quote one translation consistently, word for word, and name it after the reference: (Mark 6:31, KJV). Whether you can print it freely depends on its copyright.
| Translation | US status | Worth knowing |
|---|---|---|
| TranslationKing James Version (KJV), 1611 | US statusPublic domain | Worth knowingFamiliar cadence; some words have shifted meaning |
| TranslationAmerican Standard Version (ASV), 1901 | US statusPublic domain | Worth knowingLiteral, older English |
| TranslationWorld English Bible (WEB) | US statusPublic domain (dedicated) | Worth knowingA modern-English update of the ASV |
| TranslationESV, NIV, NKJV, NLT and most modern translations | US statusCopyrighted | Worth knowingLimited quotation with a notice; check the terms |
Two details catch writers out. In the United Kingdom the KJV is not public domain: the Crown controls its printing through letters patent. And each modern translation sets its own limits. Crossway, for example, currently allows up to 500 verses of the ESV without written permission if they make up less than a quarter of your work, among other conditions, with a copyright notice. Read the current permissions page before you print a booklet or a book.
If you put a verse in your own words, say so and drop the quotation marks; a paraphrase dressed as a quotation misleads the reader. For a series, keep a short style sheet: the translation, how you write references (Mark 6:31 or Mk 6:31), and whether pronouns for God are capitalized (the KJV doesn't; some publishers do).
Writing a devotional series
Many devotionals come in a series: thirty days on one book, a booklet for Advent, a year of entries. The church calendar sets some of the counts.
| Series | Entries | Note |
|---|---|---|
| SeriesOne week | Entries7 | NoteA good first project: seven passages from one chapter |
| SeriesOne month | Entries28–31 | NoteOne theme or one short book |
| SeriesAdvent | Entries22–28 | NoteStarts on the fourth Sunday before Christmas, so the count changes each year; 25 entries for December 1–25 avoids that |
| SeriesLent | Entries40 or 46 | NoteAsh Wednesday to Holy Saturday is 40 days without Sundays, 46 with them; decide about Sundays first |
| SeriesOne year | Entries365 | NoteMap every passage before drafting the first entry |
Plan the series in a table before you draft: day, passage, one-sentence point, story idea. The table shows where three stories in a row come from your kitchen and where two days make the same point. Give the last day a sense of ending rather than just stopping. A devotional template gives every day the same fields.
Mistakes that weaken a devotional
What works
- One point you can say in a sentence
- One afternoon, with things you can see
- The verse read in its chapter
- One action small enough for today
- A prayer of two to four sentences
What weakens it
- Three points and a summary
- General lines about life's storms
- A verse lifted out of its setting
- "Trust God more" as the takeaway
- A prayer that repeats the devotional
Lifting a verse out of its setting is the most common problem. Jeremiah 29:11 ("thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end") was written to exiles in Babylon who had been told to build houses and plant gardens because the wait would last seventy years. Philippians 4:13 ("I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me") follows Paul's lines about learning to be content whether full or hungry. Both make strong devotionals about what they actually say: faithfulness through a long wait, contentment in want. Neither promises a good result on Friday's exam.
Notes on funeral and wedding sermons
A funeral or wedding sermon is closer to a devotional than to a Sunday sermon: one passage, one point, a story that belongs to the people in the room, a short prayer. What changes is who you are talking to.
Funeral sermon
- Speak to the living. The eulogy tells the person's life; the sermon offers comfort and hope to the people grieving. Ask who is giving the eulogy so you don't tell the same stories.
- Preach from the readings the family chose. If they picked Psalm 23 or John 14 ("Let not your heart be troubled"), that is your text, read in its setting: Jesus saying it to his friends on the night before his death.
- Use the person's name and a detail or two from the family, and ask how many minutes you have. At about 130 words a minute, five minutes is roughly 650 words.
Wedding sermon
- Speak to the couple and let the guests overhear. Use one true detail from your conversations with them, cleared with them first.
- Read the favorite passages in context. 1 Corinthians 13 was written to a quarreling church about how its members treat each other, which still fits a marriage. The KJV says "charity" where most modern translations say "love," so use the translation the couple expects to hear. Ruth 1:16 ("whither thou goest, I will go") is a widow's promise to her mother-in-law; it works at a wedding if you tell that story honestly.
- Keep it short and gentle. The vows are the center of the ceremony, and humor should never come at the couple's expense.
For a full Sunday message the preparation runs longer, and a sermon outline template holds the larger structure.
Writing devotionals in Strokes
A devotional series is a stack of short documents that have to stay consistent. Strokes, a desktop editor that keeps documents as files on your own machine, handles that as a project: one folder for the series, one document per day ("Day 01 – Rest a while"). Version history saves drafts automatically, so cutting a 520-word entry to 380 doesn't cost you the version with the longer story. When the set is done, export it as PDF for a printed booklet, Word for a publisher or EPUB for an ebook, or share one day by link with your small group.
The AI Assistant works as a first reader: add a draft to a chat and ask whether it makes one point or two, or whether the turn claims more than the verse says. Keep the writing your own. Some publishers, The Upper Room among them, do not publish AI-generated content.
Frequently asked questions
How long should a devotional be?
Most run 250 to 500 words. A publication's guidelines set the limit; The Upper Room asks for no more than 350 to 400. A devotion read aloud is measured in minutes: at about 130 words a minute, five minutes is roughly 650 words.
Which Bible translation should I quote in a devotional?
The one your readers know, quoted exactly and named after each reference. The KJV, ASV and World English Bible are public domain in the US; modern translations such as the ESV and NIV allow limited quotation with a notice, so check the current terms before you print.
Does a devotional need a personal story?
Not always. Something you saw happen, a checked moment from history or a close look at an image in the passage can do the same work. Some publications do ask for an incident from your own life.
Can I use AI to write a devotional?
Check the guidelines first: some publishers, including The Upper Room, do not publish AI-generated content. AI is more useful as a reader, asked whether a draft makes one point and where the story drags. Check every quoted verse against the printed translation yourself.
