Brown's Daily Word 9-7-12

Praise the Lord this new day. Praise the Lord for America the beautiful. I have been privileged to have lived here in the United States since the 5th of September, 1974. Best of all, I have been part of the Church of Jesus Christ all of my life. It is a great blessing to be part of the Church of Christ our Lord. It is also a great blessing to live in beautiful Broome County, New York, USA.

I have watched the recent Political Party debates and discourses. There has been an intense debate from historians and sociologists concerning the issue of how "Christian" Christian America was. What is not in dispute now is that America is no longer a Christian nation. It is a post-Christian nation at best and an anti-Christian nation at worst. Stanley Hauerwas and William Willimon, both formerly from Duke University, and both of whom I have met personally, open their book "Resident Aliens" with the following: "Sometime between 1960 and 1980, an old, inadequately conceived world ended…and a new world began. When and how did we change? Although it may sound trivial, one of us is tempted to date the shift sometime on a Sunday evening in 1963. Then, in Greenville, South Carolina, in defiance of the state’s time-honored blue laws, the Fox Theater opened on Sunday. Seven of us—regular attenders of the Methodist Youth Fellowship at Buncombe Street Church—made a pact to enter the front door of the church, be seen, then quietly slip out the back door and join John Wayne at the Fox.
That evening has come to represent a watershed in the history of Christendom, South Caroline style. On that night, Greenville, South Carolina—the last pocket of resistance to secularity in the Western world—served notice that it would no longer be a prop for the church. There would be no more free passes for the church, no more free rides. The Fox Theater went head to head with the church over who would provide the world view for the young. That night in 1963, the Fox Theater won the opening skirmish."

The authors continue, "American parents of that generation never worried about whether their children would grow up Christian. The church was the only show in town. [And] Church, home and state formed a national consortium that worked together to instill “Christian values.” People grew up Christian simply by being lucky enough to be born in places like Greenville, South Carolina, or Pleasant Grove, Texas.?"
The news that we no longer live in a Christian culture is alarming. The realization that we no longer live in a Christian culture means that we as believers in Jesus Christ must order and live our lives differently. We must live, as Hauerwas and Willimon make clear by the title of their book, as resident aliens. In many ways we have awakened to find ourselves behind cultural enemy lines. Consequently, we must live as strangers and pilgrims in this nation and in this world.

The Early Christians lived in a pagan world , often a very hostile world. Paul reminded Christians in the Book of Titus to submit to and obey the secular rulers, and to be kind, peaceful, humble and courteous with everyone else. He reminded them to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for any honest work, to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, and to show perfect courtesy toward all men.
As believers in an unbelieving world—as resident aliens—we are to be good citizens. In fact, we ought to be the best citizens. We should be patriotic, pay our taxes, vote, obey the law, and honor those in authority over us. Paul said in Romans 13 that all secular government exercises its authority by the will of God. Is there ever a time when we must disobey secular authorities? Yes. We do so when they command us to do that which clearly violates God’s commandments and when they prohibit that which is clearly a command of God. When Peter and John were commanded to cease preaching Christ in Acts chapter 4, they suffered beatings and declared that they must obey God rather than man, because Jesus had commanded them to go into all the world and preach the gospel. As strangers and pilgrims in this world we are to be kind, peaceful, humble, and courteous to everyone else.

Martin Luther rightly observed that we Christians live in two kingdoms: the kingdom of God and the kingdom of man. Our primary citizenship is in the kingdom of God. We are resident aliens here, strangers and pilgrims. Our job is to live as citizens of that kingdom of God. We must order the manner of our lives after the customs and commands of that kingdom. As Paul wrote in Philippians 2:
"Do all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world (vv. 14-15)."

If not us, then who? If not now, then when? "Do all the good you can. By all the means you can. In all the ways you can. In all the places you can. At all the times you can. To all the people you can. As long as ever you can.” ― John Wesley

In Christ,

Brown

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Brown's Daily Word 9-6-12

Praise the Lord that He is upon the Throne and all is well. He reigns. He rules. He overrules. He is in control. I have been watching some of our nations political debates and discourse. At times I get discouraged. We all need encouragement from time to time. All of us at some time or other face a crisis when everything seems to fall apart. There are times of discouragement, when things go wrong even when we are trying to do right. In all of those kinds of situations we need to be encouraged in the Lord.
In the midst of a time of great distress it is said of David in 1 Samuel 30:6, "But David strengthened himself in the LORD his God.” David and his company of six hundred men had been off serving in the military of Kind Achish of Gath, (where the enemies of Israel, the Philistines, lived) and in the process had left their wives and children in Ziklag unprotected. A raiding band of Amalekites the persistent and longtime enemies of Israel, came down on the village, capturing the women and children for slaves, looting the place and carried of everything of value, leaving behind nothing but a smoking pile of rubble.
“Now it happened, when David and his men came to Ziklag, on the third day, that the Amalekites had invaded the South and Ziklag, attacked Ziklag and burned it with fire, (2) and had taken captive the women and those who were there, from small to great; they did not kill anyone, but carried them away and went their way. (3) So David and his men came to the city, and there it was, burned with fire; and their wives, their sons, and their daughters had been taken captive.” When David and his men arrived home all that remained was heap of smoking ruins. Everything was gone; wives, children, cattle and all their property. What do you do when life falls apart? Many follow the adage, “When in trouble, when in doubt, run in circles and scream and shout!”
It is interesting to note how David’s men reacted when they discovered their terrible loss. Verse four, “Then David and the people who were with him lifted up their voices and wept, until they had no more power to weep.’
Some of them sat down and wept until they has no more tears to shed. But others complained and blamed David. Verse six,
“Now David was greatly distressed, for the people spoke of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and his daughters….” Some went so far as to suggest that they stone David. It is always easy in a crisis to blame somebody else or to look for a scapegoat.
A lot of times when our life gets hairy we are tempted to do what David’s troops did. We are tempted to take it out on someone else. Misery loves company. When we are in the pit of despair and instead of spending time with God and asking Him what to do we do the stupid thing. We are hurting so we hurt someone else. Hurt people hurt people.
It is very possible that God intended that a crisis be allowed in David’s life that would force him to seek some answers from the Lord Himself. David had a choice. He could either, as a great many of us do, just stand there and continue to look, and see nothing but the disaster or he could look beyond them and see God. David looked to the Lord and he met God and found the strength and direction to carry one. Then verse six continues with “…But David strengthened himself in the LORD his God.”
It is now, here in the book of 1 Samuel 30:6 we find one of the most eloquent “but's” in the Bible. David had lost just as much as any of the rest of the men. David’s only worldly possession at that moment was the clothes he wore. Everything else was gone; his property was carried off by raiders, his home was a mass of smoldering embers. But there was one thing that the Amalekites had not and could not take from him, they could not take his relationship with the Living Lord.

Alexander Maclaren states it this way, “Whatever else we lose, as long as we have Him we are rich; and whatever else we possess, we are poor as long as we do not have Him. God is enough; whatever else may go.”

In Christ,

Brown

http://youtu.be/DwHj7l1M9g4

"May God, who sees all things, and who is the Ruler of all spirits and the Lord of all flesh - who chose our Lord Jesus Christ and us through Him to be a peculiar people - grant to every soul that calls upon His glorious and holy Name, faith, peace, patience, long-suffering, self-control, purity, and sobriety, to the well-pleasing of His Name, through our High Priest and Protector, Jesus Christ, by whom be to Him glory, and majesty, and power, and honor, both now and forevermore". AMEN.

- Clement of Rome

Brown's Daily Word 9-5-12

Praise the Lord for this new day. Praise the Lord for the rest that He offers us as His wonderful gift. Praise the Lord for all His provisions for the journey that we take in this life. Praise the Lord for all His promises along the way. Praise the Lord for His power that He bestows upon us all the way.

In the Book Joshua the words STRONG AND COURAGEOUS occur together three different times in the first 9 verses of the first chapter, each with a different emphasis. The first time he used those words, he described the POSSESSION that God has given His people. In verse 7, he explained that after He gives us the POSSESSION in verse 6, he clearly shows us the PERSEVERANCE that is required of us to claim the PROMISES that He mentions in verse 9.
As Joshua stood to receive his instruction from the Lord he had to be awed. He could see for miles in every direction, mountains on one side, the ocean on another, and an incredible expanse everywhere he turned. God described the possession as he told him in verses 3-5, " I will give you every place where you set your foot, as I promised Moses. Your territory will extend from the desert to Lebanon, and from the great river, the Euphrates--all the Hittite country--to the Great Sea on the west. No one will be able to stand up against you all the days of your life".
Think of it! The land is yours, everywhere you walk, so you can go in and clean it up, and clean it out. No one will be able to stand against you, because it is God who has gone before you. When you stop to think about it, that is what God gives the believer. Christ has won the victory for us and by faith we are able to claim it, because it is His to give. The incredible expanse of the Christian life, the entire vista, is ours! If we are devoted to Him, we cannot measure it.
We can compare our Christian walk with the entire book of Joshua. In verses 3 and 4, the desert and the great river are mentioned. Believers, growing in grace, walking with the Lord, are guaranteed to see some dry places and some very deep water. The mere mention in verse five that no one can stand against you means that there’s going to be someone trying to do just that. It’s almost as if the writer of Joshua knew what we as believers would be going through many years, even centuries, later. The same battles that Israel fought against a physical foe are the same ones we battle on the spiritual front. For many of us, while we are confident of our salvation in Christ, it still seems that almost every day there is conflict. Sometimes that conflict is a skirmish, while at other times it is a full blown battle.
From the moment we believe, we have Christ’s promises of peace. We have His assurance that He will never leave or forsake us, and that He gives us peace that passes understanding. We are forgiven, redeemed, a new creation. At the same time, as we take our journey in this life in Christ, as His redeemed and loved, the battle begins. There is much to be conquered. We wrestle with the works of the flesh (Galatians 5) Most of the time this is a painful process that we would rather not go through. However, the Lord of the battle does not give us the entire victory all at once. There are victories that the Lord must give quickly, lest we perish, but there are other battles that must be fought daily. We must never be complacent in our walk. As we yield to Christ, as we trust and obey, God gives us the victory. He that begins the good work will complete it. We can always be confident of the outcome, but it is a battle that will never end this side of glory.
2 Peter 1:3-4 tells us "According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue: Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises.....
May we walk in His grace and in His victory today. Blessed be His Name

"Teach me. O God, to use all the circumstances of my life to-day that they may bring forth in me the fruits of holiness rather than the fruits of sin.
Let me use disappointment as material for patience:
Let me use success as material for thankfulness:
Let me use suspense as material for perseverance:
Let me use danger as material for courage:
Let me use reproach as material for long-suffering:
Let me use praise as material for humility:
Let me use pleasures as material for temperance:
Let me use pains as material for endurance."
~John Baillie's A Diary of Private Prayer

In Christ ,

Brown

http://youtu.be/e8HgAVenbUU

Brown's Daily Word 9-4-12

Praise the Lord for this sweet summer season, which is coming to an abrupt conclusion. I trust you all had a beautiful and blessed summer. The Lord blessed us with a beautiful summer. Last week we had our two older grandchildren from Boston here with us for whole week. We spent a couple of days at Sky Lake, one of our church's beautiful retreat and camping centers. We took our nieces and nephews with us. Sky Lake is a place of beauty. In the words of John Keats, one of the Romantic Poets of England, "A thing of beauty is a joy for ever: Its loveliness increases; it will never Pass into nothingness".

One morning we were all involved in a scavenger hunt around the lake. I was gazing at the tall and majestic trees all around the lake and surroundings when, suddenly, the children who were walking ahead of us running back screaming except our grandson Simeon, who marched forward, unafraid. I went forward a few yards to explore the situation. I thought I saw the big tail of an alligator. After a closer encounter I found out that it was a huge Turtle bathing in the morning sunshine. The children were all scared and screaming except young man Simeon, who was brave and unafraid, who was moving toward the wild creature . I pulled him back and beat the Turtle on its shell with a stick. That huge creature was not afraid of us. Only after some intentional provocation by us did it very reluctantly crawl back into the waters of the lake. It was one of the sights and sounds of our trip to the Sky Lake this summer.

Micah and Simeon are now back in Boston at their natural habitat. Grandmom Alice took them this past weekend and returned back home yesterday. Today is the First Day of school for most teachers and staff here in New York. Countless students will be back in School tomorrow for another year after the long summer holidays. Praise the Lord for schools and colleges. No one likes to be called a dummy or to be considered stupid. The fact is that society places a high value on education in our day and age. People spend hundreds and thousands of dollars so that they might get an advanced degree and be educated.

The Bible is, however the "last word" on education. The Word of the Lord declares, "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom." Paul wrote in Ephesians 1: "I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better" (Ephesians 1:16,17). That was Paul’s prayer. This is our prayer this morning as we once again discover God’s wisdom for our lives. We pray that the Lord our Savior will give us wisdom and revelation so that we may know him better. "THE FEAR OF THE LORD IS THE BEGINNING OF WISDOM"

In Christ,

Brown

http://youtu.be/6CMclLT_Hjg