Good morning,
Praise the Lord for this new day. It is going to be a brilliant day. Thank you Jesus. The Lord blessed us with a wonderful Wednesday gathering for fellowship and study. It is a great blessing to be together in the name of Jesus and under His sovereign authority.
I love to read stories about missionaries and about committed servants and ambassadors of our Lord Savior Jesus Christ. When I read these living testaments I get provoked to love the Lord more and I am propelled to remain faithful to Him with great passion. Alexander Duff was born in Scotland in 1806 and went to India when he was 24. Along the way he endured two shipwrecks. In India he spent almost 40 years, laboring for Christ and His kingdom. He wrote to his daughter later in life, "Why should I, who have been the child of so many mercies, be faithless or doubting? If any man living should trust in the Lord absolutely, and cast upon him the burden of all his cares . . . I am that man. All my days I have been a child of Providence, the Lord leading me and guiding me in ways unknown to me – in ways of His own, and for the accomplishment of his own heavenly ends." (William Paton, Alexander Duff: Pioneer of Missionary Education, p. 232).
The Lord stood by him, guiding him all is life. He will do that for us too as we offer ourselves up to Him for his use and His mission, but it does not mean that we will be spared terrible losses. It means Christ comes alongside us in all of our trials and troubles. He governs all things, and He helps us, sustains, us and turns all losses into gain as we trust Him.
Alexander Duff founded a college, called Scottish Church College of Calcutta. It is well-known for its beautiful campus, renowned faculty, robust intellectual milieu and its English Palladian architecture. Its students and alumni call themselves "Caledonians" in the name of the college festival, "Caledonia". Scottish Church College, Kolkata is perhaps the only college of India which can boast of producing a large number of extraordinary personalities most of whom are not only famous in the country but also havae earned international repute. The very impressive and a very long list of alumni of the college includes the names of Governors, Chief Ministers, Ministers, Vice-Chancellors of some eminent Universities of India, Jurists, Administrators, Ambassadors, Speakers, Educators, Historians, Scholars, Doctors, Authors, Poets, Dramatists, Novelists, Political Leaders, and Christian Leaders.
Another man who answered God's call to serve as a missionary to unreached people was William Carey, the father of modern missions. Carey left for India from England in 1793 and never came home. Through the witness of William Carey and those came after him, my grandfather came to know Christ, and later I came to know Chist, and millions have come to Christ in India now. William Carey labored 40 years without a furlough. He lost two wives in death. Once, when he had a fever, 110 leeches were attached to his thigh.
On March 11, 1812—after almost 20 years of hard work—a fire broke out and destroyed years of irreplaceable work, the draft of the great polyglot dictionary, ten prints of the Bible that had been going through the press, and the translation of the Ramayana which he and his partners had been working on for six years. Carey was out of town in Calcutta. When Marshman told him of the fire, tears filled his eyes, and later he said, "In one short evening the labours of years are consumed. How unsearchable are the ways of God! I had lately brought some things to the utmost of perfection of which they seemed capable, and contemplated the missionary establishment with perhaps too much self-congratulation. The Lord has laid me low, that I may look more simply to him." (Mary Drewry, William Carey: A Biography, pg. 154).
Carey knew, and Carey learned painfully to know better, that the mission of Christ goes forward by looking more simply to Him. "I will be with you, I will help you." In all Carey's losses, the Lord stood with him. He never forsook him nor could he have endured as he did without him. His watchword was "Expect great things from God, attempt great things for God." First trust him, then trust his promise, and He will stand with you. He will give you strength. Then . . . THEN . . . "attempt great things for God." You will open your mouth and the nations will hear and be glad.
This is the call of the Risen Lord to all of us today. Let us put your lives in His hands and trust Him to be there as we venture something new for Him. It's time that we take Grace to another place!
In Christ,
Brown
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fawtIF-SPM4
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