Good morning,
Praise the Lord for this last day of September. Praise the Lord for this Friday. Sunday is coming. Pray for our weekly TV outreach this evening at 7 PM on Time Warner Channel 4. Praise the Lord for so many from various churches who are involved in laboring tirelessly in the recovery and restoration work in our region after the recent floods which devastated the area. There is a team coming from Danville, NY tomorrow, which will be working in our neighborhood. We are providing meals for this team. The team coming from one of our Methodist churches in Danville Area.
We will gather for our Saturday Evening worship at the First United Methodist Church, Endicott at 6 PM for coffee fellowship followed by worship at 6:30PM. We will gather for worship Sunday at 8:30 AM and 11:00 AM at Union Center UMC and at 9:30 AM at Wesley.
We read in HEBREWS 10:25, "Let us not give up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another--and all the more as you see the Day approaching."
There was trouble in little "Critter-town" USA, in that squirrels had overrun three particular congregations. The Elders of the first church decided that the squirrels were all predestined to be there, and that they would not interfere with the sovereignty of God and His eternal decrees. The second church determined that they could not harm any of God’s little creatures, so they tenderly gathered them all up, and set them free on the outskirts of town. In two days they had all returned. It was only the third church that succeeded in keeping these little critters away. The Elders baptized all the squirrels and registered them as members, and now they only see them on Christmas and Easter.
The writer of Hebrews has listed three preceding directives before the one he mentioned in Hebrews 10:25. They are: (1). Let us draw near to God (v.22). (2). Let us hold firmly to our hope (v.23). (3). Let us stir up one another to love and to do good deeds (v. 24). The fourth directive is, as written in Hebrews 10:25, is "Let us not give up meeting together..." (v. 25). There is a sense that our assembly together should not be neglected and that it should remain "frequent."
Individually, we each need to gather for worship, prayer, and the study of God’s Word, along with ministry and witnessing. Collectively, we need each other's presence, fellowship, strength, and encouragement.
The phrase, "as you see the Day approaching", refers to the Lord’s return. Even in the early church some had fallen out of fellowship, and in this verse we are encouraged to "exhort one another" toward remaining attentive to our attendance.
"Blessed are those you choose and bring near to live in your courts! We are filled with the good things of your house, of your holy temple." (Psalm 65:4). "My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God. Blessed are those who dwell in your house; they are ever praising you." (Psalm 84:2,4).
"Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere; I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked." (Psalm 84:10).
"...I rejoiced with those who said to me, ’Let us go to the house of the Lord.’" (Psalm 122:1).
A little old man was seen every Sunday morning walking to church. He was deaf, so he could not hear a word of the sermon or the music of the choir, or the hymns sung by the congregation. A scoffer asked, "Why do you spend your Sundays in that church when you can’t hear a word?" He replied, "I want my neighbors to know which side I’m on!"
See you in church.
Brown
http://youtu.be/5kX8xlW04jQ
Saturday , October 2.2011
Praise and worship service:
First United Methodist Church , Endicott
Sponsored by Union Center UMC
6PM Gathering- Coffeee- Fellowship
6.30PM Worship
Music: Laureen Naik
Speaker: Rev William Puckey
Please mark your calendar for our prayer conference, which will begin on Friday, October 14 and continue through Sunday morning, October 16.
The Keynote Speaker: Kelly Johnson from Memphis, TN.
The Prayer Team will include: Sunita and Andy, Rob and Jenn, and Meredith from Washington, DC.
The tentative schedule follows:
Friday, October 14 at 6 PM - opening session at Union Center UMC
Saturday, October 15, 9 AM - noon - concert of prayer at UCUMC
The Prayer teams will be available to pray for people for salvation, restoration, healing, deliverance...
Saturday, 5:30 PM - banquet at First UMC, 53 McKinley Ave., Endicott
6:30 PM worship service, including an open invitation to pray at the altar following the worship service. I invite you to be a part of the prayer team during that time.
Sunday morning worship at 8:30 and 11 AM. at UCUMC Kelly Johnson will be preaching. There will be a time for prayer / a concert of prayer
Saturday, October 1.2011 at 6:30 PM (Coffee Fellowship at 6 PM) at First United Methodist Church, 53 McKinley Avenue in Endicott.
Our youth will be attending the Word of Life Superbowl at the arena and other sites on November 4 & 5.
Our annual Thanksgiving Banquet will be held on Saturday, November 19.
The Russian Men's Ensemble will be in concert on December 3.
We are planning for a trip to the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Extravaganza on December 6, leaving here at 6 AM, spending the day in NYC, and attending the show at 5 PM. There are optional sites to visit, including the Ground Zero 9/11 Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine. The trip costs $90 per person, including the bus ticket and a ticket to the show. Anyone who wants to reserve a spot on the bus should make their check payable to Union Center United Methodist Church, memo "Radio City Christmas Extravaganza".
Here at Union Center- Wesley- Endicott, we focus on " World as our Parish"., We remind ourselves that we serve under a captain who has never lost a battle. Jesus Christ the Head of the Church is Faithful. We are invited to embrace 7 holy habits of Christian faithfulness. We are called to FOCUS on our prayer life, our relationship with Christ, reading the Bible, faithful worship attendance, financial gifts to Christ and His Church,, serving Jesus with our hands, and sharing the good news of His Great Redemption,with others. May Christ be praised.
Friday, September 30, 2011
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Brown's Daily Word 9-29-11
Good morning,
Praise the Lord for the gift of this new day. Praise the Lord for the gift of life in and through Jesus Christ our Lord. Praise the Lord for those who have gone before us loving and serving the Lord with all their bloopers and blunders. It is written that we are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses. Abraham is known for his faith. Samson is known for his strength, David is known for his heart. Hebrews 11:8, "By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going."
"In the New Testament Paul spoke of Abraham and commended the faith of Abraham to us as “Only believe.” Genesis 12:1 God’s first words to Abram were leave and go. Leave your country. Leave your people. Leave your father’s household. Step out of your comfort zone. Leave everything that is familiar to you. Abandon your desires. Leave your preferences. Turn your back on your daily routine. "Go to the land that I will show you." Go to the unknown, the unfamiliar. Go to the place where you will have to trust Me in a way that you have never trusted Me in your whole life. Go where I will have to provide everything for you. Go, letting Me be your road map, your atlas. Go, allowing Me to be your provisions, your Bread of life and your living water. Go Abram and watch Me be your all in all through it all. Go and I will bless you.
When God called Abram he called him alone to a journey. Isaiah 51:2 later notes this point but Abraham did not go on alone. Instead He took all his excess baggage with him - his family, his nephew Lot, his material possessions, and all the responsibilities of being a patriarch. He did not yet realize that it is hard to hold on to the Lord when our hands are full of everything that have given us security and comfort. It was the antithesis of the very thing that sounded so simple and straightforward at the start of our story - God called and Abram went. God, however, called Abram to rip himself away from all of these things so that he could find out that God, and God alone, is the source of security and comfort. He is our provider and He alone can supply us with the things that will endure throughout time.
When we really look deep into the story what we really find is not a story of a super human saint but a story of the hesitant, faltering, first steps of a man who doubted God, who was not perfect, who made mistakes, who sinned, who did not trust God to protect him or to fulfill his promises. Very quickly we find Abram paying the price for not following God’s directions more explicitly. Slowly God stripped away the things that kept Abraham from getting closer to Him and to His will.
Abram and Lot quarreled over possessions and land (perhaps Abram should have left Lot behind), so they split and go separate ways. A severe famine struck the land and Abram needed to search for food and help in a foreign land. There
Abram lied about his wife, telling the Pharoah that Sarai was his sister. Afraid for his own life, he did this not once but twice! Abram doubted God’s promise to give him a child by Sarah so he takes Sarah’s handmaiden Hagar and had a child by her, whom he named Ishmael. When God ultimately fulfilled his promise, Ishmael and Issac were at odd’s with each other, separating the family.
When the Lord commanded Abraham to offer Isaac as a sacrifice, we notice that Abraham actually set out to offer his beloved son, Isaac. Abraham had come a long way in the road of obedience to the Lord. All along the way Abram learned many things, got closer and closer to his God given goals, mission and quest but he did not live to see it complete fulfilled or finished. He died before he could see God’s plan fulfilled, and yet, despite Abram’s failures, doubts and hestitancy, God still claimed and upheld him as a man of faith.
Genesis 15:6 "Abram believed the LORD, and he credited it to him as righteousness." Four times this is repeated in the New Testament, in Romans 4:3, and 22, Galatians 3:6, and James 2:23.
Did Abram struggle with believing God and trusting Him? Yes! Yet, Abram ultimately placed his trust in God. God is calling us each of us out of our personal Comfort Zone into service for his kingdom.
In Christ,
Brown
http://youtu.be/QJCxt2DjZK0
Saturday , October 2.2011
Praise and worship service:
First United Methodist Church , Endicott
Sponsored by Union Center UMC
6PM Gathering- Coffeee- Fellowship
6.30PM Worship
Music: Laureen Naik
Speaker: Rev William Puckey
Please mark your calendar for our prayer conference, which will begin on Friday, October 14 and continue through Sunday morning, October 16.
The Keynote Speaker: Kelly Johnson from Memphis, TN.
The Prayer Team will include: Sunita and Andy, Rob and Jenn, and Meredith from Washington, DC.
The tentative schedule follows:
Friday, October 14 at 6 PM - opening session at Union Center UMC
Saturday, October 15, 9 AM - noon - concert of prayer at UCUMC
The Prayer teams will be available to pray for people for salvation, restoration, healing, deliverance...
Saturday, 5:30 PM - banquet at First UMC, 53 McKinley Ave., Endicott
6:30 PM worship service, including an open invitation to pray at the altar following the worship service. I invite you to be a part of the prayer team during that time.
Sunday morning worship at 8:30 and 11 AM. at UCUMC Kelly Johnson will be preaching. There will be a time for prayer / a concert of prayer
Saturday, October 1,2011 at 6:30 PM (Coffee Fellowship at 6 PM) at First United Methodist Church, 53 McKinley Avenue in Endicott.
Our youth will be attending the Word of Life Superbowl at the arena and other sites on November 4 & 5.
Our annual Thanksgiving Banquet will be held on Saturday, November 19.
The Russian Men's Ensemble will be in concert on December 3.
We are planning for a trip to the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Extravaganza on December 6, leaving here at 6 AM, spending the day in NYC, and attending the show at 5 PM. There are optional sites to visit, including the Ground Zero 9/11 Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine. The trip costs $90 per person, including the bus ticket and a ticket to the show. Anyone who wants to reserve a spot on the bus should make their check payable to Union Center United Methodist Church, memo "Radio City Christmas Extravaganza".
Here at Union Center- Wesley- Endicott, we focus on " World as our Parish"., We remind ourselves that we serve under a captain who has never lost a battle. Jesus Christ the Head of the Church is Faithful. We are invited to embrace 7 holy habits of Christian faithfulness. We are called to FOCUS on our prayer life, our relationship with Christ, reading the Bible, faithful worship attendance, financial gifts to Christ and His Church,, serving Jesus with our hands, and sharing the good news of His Great Redemption,with others. May Christ be praised.
Praise the Lord for the gift of this new day. Praise the Lord for the gift of life in and through Jesus Christ our Lord. Praise the Lord for those who have gone before us loving and serving the Lord with all their bloopers and blunders. It is written that we are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses. Abraham is known for his faith. Samson is known for his strength, David is known for his heart. Hebrews 11:8, "By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going."
"In the New Testament Paul spoke of Abraham and commended the faith of Abraham to us as “Only believe.” Genesis 12:1 God’s first words to Abram were leave and go. Leave your country. Leave your people. Leave your father’s household. Step out of your comfort zone. Leave everything that is familiar to you. Abandon your desires. Leave your preferences. Turn your back on your daily routine. "Go to the land that I will show you." Go to the unknown, the unfamiliar. Go to the place where you will have to trust Me in a way that you have never trusted Me in your whole life. Go where I will have to provide everything for you. Go, letting Me be your road map, your atlas. Go, allowing Me to be your provisions, your Bread of life and your living water. Go Abram and watch Me be your all in all through it all. Go and I will bless you.
When God called Abram he called him alone to a journey. Isaiah 51:2 later notes this point but Abraham did not go on alone. Instead He took all his excess baggage with him - his family, his nephew Lot, his material possessions, and all the responsibilities of being a patriarch. He did not yet realize that it is hard to hold on to the Lord when our hands are full of everything that have given us security and comfort. It was the antithesis of the very thing that sounded so simple and straightforward at the start of our story - God called and Abram went. God, however, called Abram to rip himself away from all of these things so that he could find out that God, and God alone, is the source of security and comfort. He is our provider and He alone can supply us with the things that will endure throughout time.
When we really look deep into the story what we really find is not a story of a super human saint but a story of the hesitant, faltering, first steps of a man who doubted God, who was not perfect, who made mistakes, who sinned, who did not trust God to protect him or to fulfill his promises. Very quickly we find Abram paying the price for not following God’s directions more explicitly. Slowly God stripped away the things that kept Abraham from getting closer to Him and to His will.
Abram and Lot quarreled over possessions and land (perhaps Abram should have left Lot behind), so they split and go separate ways. A severe famine struck the land and Abram needed to search for food and help in a foreign land. There
Abram lied about his wife, telling the Pharoah that Sarai was his sister. Afraid for his own life, he did this not once but twice! Abram doubted God’s promise to give him a child by Sarah so he takes Sarah’s handmaiden Hagar and had a child by her, whom he named Ishmael. When God ultimately fulfilled his promise, Ishmael and Issac were at odd’s with each other, separating the family.
When the Lord commanded Abraham to offer Isaac as a sacrifice, we notice that Abraham actually set out to offer his beloved son, Isaac. Abraham had come a long way in the road of obedience to the Lord. All along the way Abram learned many things, got closer and closer to his God given goals, mission and quest but he did not live to see it complete fulfilled or finished. He died before he could see God’s plan fulfilled, and yet, despite Abram’s failures, doubts and hestitancy, God still claimed and upheld him as a man of faith.
Genesis 15:6 "Abram believed the LORD, and he credited it to him as righteousness." Four times this is repeated in the New Testament, in Romans 4:3, and 22, Galatians 3:6, and James 2:23.
Did Abram struggle with believing God and trusting Him? Yes! Yet, Abram ultimately placed his trust in God. God is calling us each of us out of our personal Comfort Zone into service for his kingdom.
In Christ,
Brown
http://youtu.be/QJCxt2DjZK0
Saturday , October 2.2011
Praise and worship service:
First United Methodist Church , Endicott
Sponsored by Union Center UMC
6PM Gathering- Coffeee- Fellowship
6.30PM Worship
Music: Laureen Naik
Speaker: Rev William Puckey
Please mark your calendar for our prayer conference, which will begin on Friday, October 14 and continue through Sunday morning, October 16.
The Keynote Speaker: Kelly Johnson from Memphis, TN.
The Prayer Team will include: Sunita and Andy, Rob and Jenn, and Meredith from Washington, DC.
The tentative schedule follows:
Friday, October 14 at 6 PM - opening session at Union Center UMC
Saturday, October 15, 9 AM - noon - concert of prayer at UCUMC
The Prayer teams will be available to pray for people for salvation, restoration, healing, deliverance...
Saturday, 5:30 PM - banquet at First UMC, 53 McKinley Ave., Endicott
6:30 PM worship service, including an open invitation to pray at the altar following the worship service. I invite you to be a part of the prayer team during that time.
Sunday morning worship at 8:30 and 11 AM. at UCUMC Kelly Johnson will be preaching. There will be a time for prayer / a concert of prayer
Saturday, October 1,2011 at 6:30 PM (Coffee Fellowship at 6 PM) at First United Methodist Church, 53 McKinley Avenue in Endicott.
Our youth will be attending the Word of Life Superbowl at the arena and other sites on November 4 & 5.
Our annual Thanksgiving Banquet will be held on Saturday, November 19.
The Russian Men's Ensemble will be in concert on December 3.
We are planning for a trip to the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Extravaganza on December 6, leaving here at 6 AM, spending the day in NYC, and attending the show at 5 PM. There are optional sites to visit, including the Ground Zero 9/11 Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine. The trip costs $90 per person, including the bus ticket and a ticket to the show. Anyone who wants to reserve a spot on the bus should make their check payable to Union Center United Methodist Church, memo "Radio City Christmas Extravaganza".
Here at Union Center- Wesley- Endicott, we focus on " World as our Parish"., We remind ourselves that we serve under a captain who has never lost a battle. Jesus Christ the Head of the Church is Faithful. We are invited to embrace 7 holy habits of Christian faithfulness. We are called to FOCUS on our prayer life, our relationship with Christ, reading the Bible, faithful worship attendance, financial gifts to Christ and His Church,, serving Jesus with our hands, and sharing the good news of His Great Redemption,with others. May Christ be praised.
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Brown's Daily Word 9-28-11
Good morning,
Praise the Lord for this new day. We will gather for our Wednesday gathering this evening at 6 PM for a meal and for study and prayer at 6:30PM followed by the choir practice at 7.30PM
We all love the story of Jacob. We all can identify with Jacob along our own life's journey. As Jacob returned home after so many years, he wrestled with the Lord along the way. It was an all night battle. We wonder about the idea of wrestling with God, and whether it is better in God’s eyes to ask the questions and embrace the struggle, rather than not to seek God at all, or to have a shallow faith without depth.
Throughout the Bible, there are countless stories of Bible heroes who would seem to be less than deserving of the name. Yet God appears to desire people with fire and vibrant personalities who seem to get it wrong almost as often as they get it right. Jacob was just one of those vibrant personalities. He was filled with passion - a passion for life, a passion for success, a passion for getting ahead at all costs, a passion for everything he did. Through this struggle, this all night battle, he developed a passion for God.
Within the struggle we see the self-limitation of God, who meets us on our own level and within the manner of our personality. Another thing that makes us uncomfortable is the idea that God appears to be unable to prevail in this wrestling match, and vulnerable to the coming of daylight. I suggest that what we really see is a choice on God’s part to be vulnerable. At any moment God could have chosen to overpower Jacob and win the wrestling match. However, God chose, before the struggle had even began, to limit himself in such a way as to be equal to Jacob. As long as Jacob would remain to struggle, God would remain to struggle with him.
I also find it interesting that God would choose this method, this timing, in order to engage Jacob. Why would He wrestle with Jacob in the middle of the night?
Perhaps because it was a method of which Jacob could understand. His whole life has been a struggle of one kind or another. Each scenario - from his brother, to his father, to his father-in-law, and now to God - had been about finding a way to triumph in any given situation. In some respects, this struggle was invitational to Jacob in ‘language’ that Jacob could understand. The invitation was to enter a relationship with God, which Jacob did in way familiar to him. It also cannot be over looked, that it occurred at his most vulnerable moment - while he was alone, removed from all that he has to depend upon, frightened and in the dark. It was then that God began the encounter with Jacob. It is often takes such times before we will let God in to begin to work in our lives.
Anytime we engage in struggle with God, we are indeed changed. When daylight came and the struggle was over, Jacob left changed. He left with a new name and a new identity, but he also leaves with a limp, a new humility, and a new respect for what God can do. He left limping so that, from now on, he could live and walk, by leaning on the Lord alone. Jacob had stolen the blessings of his father. We never can steal blessings from God. Blessings are freely given as signs of the grace of the Lord.
Jacob uttered desperately to the Lord, "I will not let you go until you bless me". I believe that it was the Lord Jesus Christ, the Pre-Existent , with whom Jacob wrestled all night. The Lord blessed him and gave him a new name. Jacob was born again at that moment and a new name given to him. The Lord offers the very same gift of grace to every one who comes to Jesus and surrenders his or her life to Him, saying, "I give up. I surrender." Then and there we are born again. We are given a new name and a new identify. WOW!
The encounter Jacob had with God mirrors one yet to come when he would meet his brother face-to-face. How would he handle that struggle? Jacob learned and began to realize that whatever would come his way, whether by his own hand or by another way, he could prevail because of his encounter with God.
Kathleen Norris sees the Jacob story as a story about grace. She concludes the discussion of this story most eloquently: “As Psalm 139 puts it, darkness is as nothing to God, who can look right through whatever evil we’ve done in our lives to the creature made in the divine image. I feel as awe-struck as Jacob, because I realize that this is how God looks at us, staring onto our faces in order to be delighted, to see the creature God made and called good, along with the rest of Creation.
“God loves to look at us, and loves it when we look back at him. Even when we try to run away from our troubles, as Jacob did, God will find us, and bless us, even (and I would add - especially) when we feel most alone, unsure if we’ll survive the night. God will find a way to let us know that God is with us, in this place, wherever we are, however far we think we’ve run. "
Maybe it's time to wrestle with God. Maybe it's time to stop running and engage in the struggle, to determine whose going to be in control of the issues and parts of our lives we’ve yet to deal with. Maybe it's time.
In Christ,
Brown
http://youtu.be/7x2IpLSfqp8
We will be back to our Wednesday schedule, including Bible study, fellowship, and prayer, starting September 14, 2011. We meet with a meal at 6 PM, with the Bible study beginning at 6:30 PM. We began a 4 week study on the theme, "Why? Making Sense of God's Will", by Adam Hamilton. Topics include, "Why Do the Innocent Suffer?", Why Do My Prayers Go Unanswered?", "Why Can't I See God's Will for My Life?", and "Why God's Love Prevails". Following the completion of this study we will be using Rick Warren's study, "Forty Days of Love". This will lead us to the beginning of the Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons. More information will follow in the church newsletter.
Saturday , October 1.2011
Praise and worship service:
First United Methodist Church , 53 McKinley Ave Endicott
Sponsored by Union Center UMC
6PM Gathering- Coffeee- Fellowship
6.30PM Worship
Music: Laureen Naik
Speaker: Rev William Puckey
Please mark your calendar for our prayer conference, which will begin on Friday, October 14 and continue through Sunday morning, October 16.
The Keynote Speaker: Kelly Johnson from Memphis, TN.
The Prayer Team will include: Sunita and Andy, Rob and Jenn, and Meredith from Washington, DC.
The tentative schedule follows:
Friday, October 14 at 6 PM - opening session at Union Center UMC
Saturday, October 15, 9 AM - noon - concert of prayer at UCUMC
The Prayer teams will be available to pray for people for salvation, restoration, healing, deliverance...
Saturday, 5:30 PM - banquet at First UMC, 53 McKinley Ave., Endicott
6:30 PM worship service, including an open invitation to pray at the altar following the worship service. I invite you to be a part of the prayer team during that time.
Sunday morning worship at 8:30 and 11 AM. at UCUMC Kelly Johnson will be preaching. There will be a time for prayer / a concert of prayer
Saturday, September 24 at 6:30 PM (Coffee Fellowship at 6 PM) at First United Methodist Church, 53 McKinley Avenue in Endicott.
Our youth will be attending the Word of Life Superbowl at the arena and other sites on November 4 & 5.
Our annual Thanksgiving Banquet will be held on Saturday, November 19.
The Russian Men's Ensemble will be in concert on December 3.
We are planning for a trip to the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Extravaganza on December 6, leaving here at 6 AM, spending the day in NYC, and attending the show at 5 PM. There are optional sites to visit, including the Ground Zero 9/11 Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine. The trip costs $90 per person, including the bus ticket and a ticket to the show. Anyone who wants to reserve a spot on the bus should make their check payable to Union Center United Methodist Church, memo "Radio City Christmas Extravaganza".
Here at Union Center- Wesley- Endicott, we focus on " World as our Parish"., We remind ourselves that we serve under a captain who has never lost a battle. Jesus Christ the Head of the Church is Faithful. We are invited to embrace 7 holy habits of Christian faithfulness. We are called to FOCUS on our prayer life, our relationship with Christ, reading the Bible, faithful worship attendance, financial gifts to Christ and His Church,, serving Jesus with our hands, and sharing the good news of His Great Redemption,with others. May Christ be praised.
Praise the Lord for this new day. We will gather for our Wednesday gathering this evening at 6 PM for a meal and for study and prayer at 6:30PM followed by the choir practice at 7.30PM
We all love the story of Jacob. We all can identify with Jacob along our own life's journey. As Jacob returned home after so many years, he wrestled with the Lord along the way. It was an all night battle. We wonder about the idea of wrestling with God, and whether it is better in God’s eyes to ask the questions and embrace the struggle, rather than not to seek God at all, or to have a shallow faith without depth.
Throughout the Bible, there are countless stories of Bible heroes who would seem to be less than deserving of the name. Yet God appears to desire people with fire and vibrant personalities who seem to get it wrong almost as often as they get it right. Jacob was just one of those vibrant personalities. He was filled with passion - a passion for life, a passion for success, a passion for getting ahead at all costs, a passion for everything he did. Through this struggle, this all night battle, he developed a passion for God.
Within the struggle we see the self-limitation of God, who meets us on our own level and within the manner of our personality. Another thing that makes us uncomfortable is the idea that God appears to be unable to prevail in this wrestling match, and vulnerable to the coming of daylight. I suggest that what we really see is a choice on God’s part to be vulnerable. At any moment God could have chosen to overpower Jacob and win the wrestling match. However, God chose, before the struggle had even began, to limit himself in such a way as to be equal to Jacob. As long as Jacob would remain to struggle, God would remain to struggle with him.
I also find it interesting that God would choose this method, this timing, in order to engage Jacob. Why would He wrestle with Jacob in the middle of the night?
Perhaps because it was a method of which Jacob could understand. His whole life has been a struggle of one kind or another. Each scenario - from his brother, to his father, to his father-in-law, and now to God - had been about finding a way to triumph in any given situation. In some respects, this struggle was invitational to Jacob in ‘language’ that Jacob could understand. The invitation was to enter a relationship with God, which Jacob did in way familiar to him. It also cannot be over looked, that it occurred at his most vulnerable moment - while he was alone, removed from all that he has to depend upon, frightened and in the dark. It was then that God began the encounter with Jacob. It is often takes such times before we will let God in to begin to work in our lives.
Anytime we engage in struggle with God, we are indeed changed. When daylight came and the struggle was over, Jacob left changed. He left with a new name and a new identity, but he also leaves with a limp, a new humility, and a new respect for what God can do. He left limping so that, from now on, he could live and walk, by leaning on the Lord alone. Jacob had stolen the blessings of his father. We never can steal blessings from God. Blessings are freely given as signs of the grace of the Lord.
Jacob uttered desperately to the Lord, "I will not let you go until you bless me". I believe that it was the Lord Jesus Christ, the Pre-Existent , with whom Jacob wrestled all night. The Lord blessed him and gave him a new name. Jacob was born again at that moment and a new name given to him. The Lord offers the very same gift of grace to every one who comes to Jesus and surrenders his or her life to Him, saying, "I give up. I surrender." Then and there we are born again. We are given a new name and a new identify. WOW!
The encounter Jacob had with God mirrors one yet to come when he would meet his brother face-to-face. How would he handle that struggle? Jacob learned and began to realize that whatever would come his way, whether by his own hand or by another way, he could prevail because of his encounter with God.
Kathleen Norris sees the Jacob story as a story about grace. She concludes the discussion of this story most eloquently: “As Psalm 139 puts it, darkness is as nothing to God, who can look right through whatever evil we’ve done in our lives to the creature made in the divine image. I feel as awe-struck as Jacob, because I realize that this is how God looks at us, staring onto our faces in order to be delighted, to see the creature God made and called good, along with the rest of Creation.
“God loves to look at us, and loves it when we look back at him. Even when we try to run away from our troubles, as Jacob did, God will find us, and bless us, even (and I would add - especially) when we feel most alone, unsure if we’ll survive the night. God will find a way to let us know that God is with us, in this place, wherever we are, however far we think we’ve run. "
Maybe it's time to wrestle with God. Maybe it's time to stop running and engage in the struggle, to determine whose going to be in control of the issues and parts of our lives we’ve yet to deal with. Maybe it's time.
In Christ,
Brown
http://youtu.be/7x2IpLSfqp8
We will be back to our Wednesday schedule, including Bible study, fellowship, and prayer, starting September 14, 2011. We meet with a meal at 6 PM, with the Bible study beginning at 6:30 PM. We began a 4 week study on the theme, "Why? Making Sense of God's Will", by Adam Hamilton. Topics include, "Why Do the Innocent Suffer?", Why Do My Prayers Go Unanswered?", "Why Can't I See God's Will for My Life?", and "Why God's Love Prevails". Following the completion of this study we will be using Rick Warren's study, "Forty Days of Love". This will lead us to the beginning of the Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons. More information will follow in the church newsletter.
Saturday , October 1.2011
Praise and worship service:
First United Methodist Church , 53 McKinley Ave Endicott
Sponsored by Union Center UMC
6PM Gathering- Coffeee- Fellowship
6.30PM Worship
Music: Laureen Naik
Speaker: Rev William Puckey
Please mark your calendar for our prayer conference, which will begin on Friday, October 14 and continue through Sunday morning, October 16.
The Keynote Speaker: Kelly Johnson from Memphis, TN.
The Prayer Team will include: Sunita and Andy, Rob and Jenn, and Meredith from Washington, DC.
The tentative schedule follows:
Friday, October 14 at 6 PM - opening session at Union Center UMC
Saturday, October 15, 9 AM - noon - concert of prayer at UCUMC
The Prayer teams will be available to pray for people for salvation, restoration, healing, deliverance...
Saturday, 5:30 PM - banquet at First UMC, 53 McKinley Ave., Endicott
6:30 PM worship service, including an open invitation to pray at the altar following the worship service. I invite you to be a part of the prayer team during that time.
Sunday morning worship at 8:30 and 11 AM. at UCUMC Kelly Johnson will be preaching. There will be a time for prayer / a concert of prayer
Saturday, September 24 at 6:30 PM (Coffee Fellowship at 6 PM) at First United Methodist Church, 53 McKinley Avenue in Endicott.
Our youth will be attending the Word of Life Superbowl at the arena and other sites on November 4 & 5.
Our annual Thanksgiving Banquet will be held on Saturday, November 19.
The Russian Men's Ensemble will be in concert on December 3.
We are planning for a trip to the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Extravaganza on December 6, leaving here at 6 AM, spending the day in NYC, and attending the show at 5 PM. There are optional sites to visit, including the Ground Zero 9/11 Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine. The trip costs $90 per person, including the bus ticket and a ticket to the show. Anyone who wants to reserve a spot on the bus should make their check payable to Union Center United Methodist Church, memo "Radio City Christmas Extravaganza".
Here at Union Center- Wesley- Endicott, we focus on " World as our Parish"., We remind ourselves that we serve under a captain who has never lost a battle. Jesus Christ the Head of the Church is Faithful. We are invited to embrace 7 holy habits of Christian faithfulness. We are called to FOCUS on our prayer life, our relationship with Christ, reading the Bible, faithful worship attendance, financial gifts to Christ and His Church,, serving Jesus with our hands, and sharing the good news of His Great Redemption,with others. May Christ be praised.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Brown's Daily Word 9-27-11
Good morning,
Praise the Lord for some summer-like days the Lord has given us here in New York. It will be very warm again today. Alice and I walked for over five miles last evening in one of the beautiful parks that had fully flooded during the recent floods. Though the park was closed for few days it is open now. The Lord is displaying brilliant Autumn colors all around us. It is a feast for human eyes. Blessed be His name.
The Old Testament reading for last Sunday was taken from Exodus 17: 1-7 God delivered the Israelite people from the cruel and oppressive hands of the Egyptians, yet still their faith in God’s deliverance was weak. When the Egyptians pursued them, they grumbled. Trapped against the seashore with the Egyptians coming quickly, they believed their fate to be death, but God parted the seas, providing safe passage, and saved their very lives. They passed through and escaped death.
From there the barren and difficult desert lay before them. The people complained once more. What would they eat? What would they drink? How would they survive? Once again, God provided for them. He sent bread - called manna - which fell from heaven. On manna the people were fed throughout their wandering. There was also water, miraculous water, that poured from a rock at God’s command. It was a life giving source.
Yet, there were many more uncertain, even rocky, times ahead for the Israelites. God found little to be pleased about with these people. It wasn't long until some put their faith and trust in idols, believing that the idols would sustain them in the frightening and barren wilderness. Others became sexually promiscuous and immorally lax on their journey. Where was their faithfulness to God and God’s ways then? Still others tested the faithfulness of God and, in spite of all they had witnessed, still others continued to grumble and complain, unhappy in their faith.
These were not simultaneous events, but the faithless exercises the Israelite people as they wandered in the wilderness for many, many years.
Paul retold the story of the journey of the Israelites, including the Lord's invitation to them, gently saying “Keep going, keep going!” Paul warned in 1 Corinthians 10 to be careful not to make the same mistakes. “If you think you are standing firm,” Paul said, “be careful that you don’t fall.” Remember the Israelites in the desert.
Life can be like a wilderness experience at times. Periods of our lives can seem like such struggles to survive. Sometimes we are lost in a wilderness of our own making. Sometimes creating difficulty for ourselves is our primary end, only we cannot see it until we are surrounded with barren existence. Sometimes we don’t realize we are in the wilderness, until we are so far in there that we cannot see any way out.
At other times, it seems the whole world against us. We may not deserve what we have been dealt. We did not necessarily create the problems, but here we are all the same. What do we do? How do we handle it? What is the path to take? Sometimes that’s not so clear. Sometimes, it appears there is no way out of the wilderness.
Paul’s then took time to remind us that there is nothing new about the trials and tribulations we face. They are same ones people have faced down through time. They are the same ones our family, friends, and coworkers face today as well. Paul also reminds us that God is faithful. God will not let us face anything beyond our strength to bear it. He reminds us that in such times God will provide us a way out of our dilemma, or support us so that we can stand it.
In Christ,
Brown
http://youtu.be/UWndDW_271g
We will be back to our Wednesday schedule, including Bible study, fellowship, and prayer, starting September 14, 2011. We meet with a meal at 6 PM, with the Bible study beginning at 6:30 PM. We began a 4 week study on the theme, "Why? Making Sense of God's Will", by Adam Hamilton. Topics include, "Why Do the Innocent Suffer?", Why Do My Prayers Go Unanswered?", "Why Can't I See God's Will for My Life?", and "Why God's Love Prevails". Following the completion of this study we will be using Rick Warren's study, "Forty Days of Love". This will lead us to the beginning of the Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons. More information will follow in the church newsletter.
September 24.2011
Praise and worship service:
First United Methodist Church , Endicott
Sponsored by Union Center UMC
6PM Gathering- Coffeee- Fellowship
6.30PM Worship
Music: Laureen Naik
Speaker: Rev William Puckey
Please mark your calendar for our prayer conference, which will begin on Friday, October 14 and continue through Sunday morning, October 16.
The Keynote Speaker: Kelly Johnson from Memphis, TN.
The Prayer Team will include: Sunita and Andy, Rob and Jenn, and Meredith from Washington, DC.
The tentative schedule follows:
Friday, October 14 at 6 PM - opening session at Union Center UMC
Saturday, October 15, 9 AM - noon - concert of prayer at UCUMC
The Prayer teams will be available to pray for people for salvation, restoration, healing, deliverance...
Saturday, 5:30 PM - banquet at First UMC, 53 McKinley Ave., Endicott
6:30 PM worship service, including an open invitation to pray at the altar following the worship service. I invite you to be a part of the prayer team during that time.
Sunday morning worship at 8:30 and 11 AM. at UCUMC Kelly Johnson will be preaching. There will be a time for prayer / a concert of prayer
Saturday, September 24 at 6:30 PM (Coffee Fellowship at 6 PM) at First United Methodist Church, 53 McKinley Avenue in Endicott.
Our youth will be attending the Word of Life Superbowl at the arena and other sites on November 4 & 5.
Our annual Thanksgiving Banquet will be held on Saturday, November 19.
The Russian Men's Ensemble will be in concert on December 3.
We are planning for a trip to the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Extravaganza on December 6, leaving here at 6 AM, spending the day in NYC, and attending the show at 5 PM. There are optional sites to visit, including the Ground Zero 9/11 Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine. The trip costs $90 per person, including the bus ticket and a ticket to the show. Anyone who wants to reserve a spot on the bus should make their check payable to Union Center United Methodist Church, memo "Radio City Christmas Extravaganza".
Here at Union Center- Wesley- Endicott, we focus on " World as our Parish"., We remind ourselves that we serve under a captain who has never lost a battle. Jesus Christ the Head of the Church is Faithful. We are invited to embrace 7 holy habits of Christian faithfulness. We are called to FOCUS on our prayer life, our relationship with Christ, reading the Bible, faithful worship attendance, financial gifts to Christ and His Church,, serving Jesus with our hands, and sharing the good news of His Great Redemption,with others. May Christ be praised.
Praise the Lord for some summer-like days the Lord has given us here in New York. It will be very warm again today. Alice and I walked for over five miles last evening in one of the beautiful parks that had fully flooded during the recent floods. Though the park was closed for few days it is open now. The Lord is displaying brilliant Autumn colors all around us. It is a feast for human eyes. Blessed be His name.
The Old Testament reading for last Sunday was taken from Exodus 17: 1-7 God delivered the Israelite people from the cruel and oppressive hands of the Egyptians, yet still their faith in God’s deliverance was weak. When the Egyptians pursued them, they grumbled. Trapped against the seashore with the Egyptians coming quickly, they believed their fate to be death, but God parted the seas, providing safe passage, and saved their very lives. They passed through and escaped death.
From there the barren and difficult desert lay before them. The people complained once more. What would they eat? What would they drink? How would they survive? Once again, God provided for them. He sent bread - called manna - which fell from heaven. On manna the people were fed throughout their wandering. There was also water, miraculous water, that poured from a rock at God’s command. It was a life giving source.
Yet, there were many more uncertain, even rocky, times ahead for the Israelites. God found little to be pleased about with these people. It wasn't long until some put their faith and trust in idols, believing that the idols would sustain them in the frightening and barren wilderness. Others became sexually promiscuous and immorally lax on their journey. Where was their faithfulness to God and God’s ways then? Still others tested the faithfulness of God and, in spite of all they had witnessed, still others continued to grumble and complain, unhappy in their faith.
These were not simultaneous events, but the faithless exercises the Israelite people as they wandered in the wilderness for many, many years.
Paul retold the story of the journey of the Israelites, including the Lord's invitation to them, gently saying “Keep going, keep going!” Paul warned in 1 Corinthians 10 to be careful not to make the same mistakes. “If you think you are standing firm,” Paul said, “be careful that you don’t fall.” Remember the Israelites in the desert.
Life can be like a wilderness experience at times. Periods of our lives can seem like such struggles to survive. Sometimes we are lost in a wilderness of our own making. Sometimes creating difficulty for ourselves is our primary end, only we cannot see it until we are surrounded with barren existence. Sometimes we don’t realize we are in the wilderness, until we are so far in there that we cannot see any way out.
At other times, it seems the whole world against us. We may not deserve what we have been dealt. We did not necessarily create the problems, but here we are all the same. What do we do? How do we handle it? What is the path to take? Sometimes that’s not so clear. Sometimes, it appears there is no way out of the wilderness.
Paul’s then took time to remind us that there is nothing new about the trials and tribulations we face. They are same ones people have faced down through time. They are the same ones our family, friends, and coworkers face today as well. Paul also reminds us that God is faithful. God will not let us face anything beyond our strength to bear it. He reminds us that in such times God will provide us a way out of our dilemma, or support us so that we can stand it.
In Christ,
Brown
http://youtu.be/UWndDW_271g
We will be back to our Wednesday schedule, including Bible study, fellowship, and prayer, starting September 14, 2011. We meet with a meal at 6 PM, with the Bible study beginning at 6:30 PM. We began a 4 week study on the theme, "Why? Making Sense of God's Will", by Adam Hamilton. Topics include, "Why Do the Innocent Suffer?", Why Do My Prayers Go Unanswered?", "Why Can't I See God's Will for My Life?", and "Why God's Love Prevails". Following the completion of this study we will be using Rick Warren's study, "Forty Days of Love". This will lead us to the beginning of the Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons. More information will follow in the church newsletter.
September 24.2011
Praise and worship service:
First United Methodist Church , Endicott
Sponsored by Union Center UMC
6PM Gathering- Coffeee- Fellowship
6.30PM Worship
Music: Laureen Naik
Speaker: Rev William Puckey
Please mark your calendar for our prayer conference, which will begin on Friday, October 14 and continue through Sunday morning, October 16.
The Keynote Speaker: Kelly Johnson from Memphis, TN.
The Prayer Team will include: Sunita and Andy, Rob and Jenn, and Meredith from Washington, DC.
The tentative schedule follows:
Friday, October 14 at 6 PM - opening session at Union Center UMC
Saturday, October 15, 9 AM - noon - concert of prayer at UCUMC
The Prayer teams will be available to pray for people for salvation, restoration, healing, deliverance...
Saturday, 5:30 PM - banquet at First UMC, 53 McKinley Ave., Endicott
6:30 PM worship service, including an open invitation to pray at the altar following the worship service. I invite you to be a part of the prayer team during that time.
Sunday morning worship at 8:30 and 11 AM. at UCUMC Kelly Johnson will be preaching. There will be a time for prayer / a concert of prayer
Saturday, September 24 at 6:30 PM (Coffee Fellowship at 6 PM) at First United Methodist Church, 53 McKinley Avenue in Endicott.
Our youth will be attending the Word of Life Superbowl at the arena and other sites on November 4 & 5.
Our annual Thanksgiving Banquet will be held on Saturday, November 19.
The Russian Men's Ensemble will be in concert on December 3.
We are planning for a trip to the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Extravaganza on December 6, leaving here at 6 AM, spending the day in NYC, and attending the show at 5 PM. There are optional sites to visit, including the Ground Zero 9/11 Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine. The trip costs $90 per person, including the bus ticket and a ticket to the show. Anyone who wants to reserve a spot on the bus should make their check payable to Union Center United Methodist Church, memo "Radio City Christmas Extravaganza".
Here at Union Center- Wesley- Endicott, we focus on " World as our Parish"., We remind ourselves that we serve under a captain who has never lost a battle. Jesus Christ the Head of the Church is Faithful. We are invited to embrace 7 holy habits of Christian faithfulness. We are called to FOCUS on our prayer life, our relationship with Christ, reading the Bible, faithful worship attendance, financial gifts to Christ and His Church,, serving Jesus with our hands, and sharing the good news of His Great Redemption,with others. May Christ be praised.
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