The Believer's Daily Treasure

The Believer’s Daily Treasure is a Christian devotional first published in the 1850s, offering a Bible verse and short meditation for each day of the year. President Abraham Lincoln owned a copy of this devotional—an early edition bearing his signature has survived—and evidence suggests he read from it during some of the most difficult and formative years of his life.

This edition draws from one of the earliest printings issued by the Presbyterian Board of Publication. It restores the devotional without later editorial revisions that shifted the tone or content to match modern civic themes.

In many places, bible verses in the original devotional had bits of prior versus, or removed the ends of verses, likely to fit into the small book's format of two days on a page. In some cases the verse reference was wrong, once even referring to the wrong book of the bible. Since we aren't confined to a small book format, I corrected these issues and used the complete text of the verses from the 1769 Oxford King James Version, which would have been in common use during Lincoln's time.

Why This Website

It is a short devotional that can be read in just a few minutes each day.
Applewood Books makes a hardcopy edition, based on a later reprint, which I recommend.
This site is based on an early printing of the devotional, close to the version Lincoln is known to have owned.
It reflects the kind of spiritual reading that guided Lincoln during times of leadership, personal loss, and war.
It presents scripture in the disciplined daily form that shaped the moral life of earlier Americans.

A Resource for Faith and Reflection

Whether you’re here because you admire Abraham Lincoln, are seeking a disciplined way to stay in the Word, or want to explore a devotional with deep historical roots, this site is for you. It’s a simple way to walk through scripture every day, guided by a text that inspired hearts and minds across generations.

This devotional helped shape a president. It can help shape us, too.