Praise the Lord. This is a brand new day in His Kingdom. He gave us a
balmy, beautiful, and brilliant day. Yesterday I attended a service of death
and resurrection for a young woman who was my neighbor for last 23 years. She
was a graduate of a local high School and had graduated from a Christian
University. She died in her sleep. She was 23 years old. The church was
filled with people of all ages. The service lasted for two and a half hours.
This young woman was born and raised in a beautiful Christian home. I was
blessed to be in the service yesterday. It was heart wrenching to see the
sudden and unexpected death of this beautiful young woman of 23 years. The
grief and loss is massive and beyond description. We do not have a simplistic
answer to the question of why young people with so much promise and potential
and possibility die so young. In the midst of and in the face of trials,
tragedies, and tears we lean on Jesus, who is the Resurrection and the
Life.
Many people from
out of state traveled for the service. Her school teachers attended the
service. The chancellor of the university wrote about her in his blog on the
University Web Page. This young woman loved the Lord and served Him faithfully
and joyfully. She loved people with great passion and affection. Over 40
people testified during the service how she touched their lives and how she
reached out to the last, the least, and the lost, both rich and poor. She had
gone on three mission trips to Africa and several mission trips within the
United States. She was a Christian Camp counselor. She was an avid
participant in High School and University life. She was a joyful singer and
servant of Jesus. She had lived a very full life in the short 23 year span of
her life. She was a fearless and courageous disciple of Jesus. I came home
resolved to serve Christ Joyfully and faithfully,
As I write this I
am thinking of three of godly men - Christ like men. One lives Pennsylvania.
One lives in California, and one lives in Vermont. Each of them loves Jesus.
They are facing death with great courage and with blessed hope and assurance
because of their faith and trust in Jesus our
Lord. In
the face of trials, in the midst of massive grief, Jesus our Savior who is the
Lord of Joy does grant His Joy. While attending the service of death and
Resurrection of the beautiful young woman I sensed " Joy"
unspeakable.
G. K. Chesterton
called joy “the gigantic secret of the Christian life.” Joy, he said, is always
at the center for the Christian; trials are at the periphery of life. Joy is
the ability to face reality—the good and bad, the happy and the sad, the
positive and the negative, the best and the worst—because we are satisfied with
Jesus. In I Peter we read about suffering, endurance, and joy.
Peter began his epistle by assuring his readers that their trials would only
last “a little while.” Of course, that “little while” seems to last forever
when we are in the furnace.
A wise pastor
friend of mine wrote recently to say that his responsibility is not just to help
people live well but to help them live with the great expectancy of heaven. “It
is to prepare them to die well, even with excitement toward heaven and not
regret.” Our hard times are not easy and sometimes they are
not good at all, but God can use them for our good and for his glory . He
intends to “prove” our faith genuine by the way we respond to our trials.
It is
always joy and trials, at the same time, working together, mixed together, so
that we have joy in our trials, joy beside our trials, joy within our trials,
and sometimes even joy in spite of our trials. Thus could David say in
Psalm
34:8,
after mentioning his fears and his troubles, “Taste and see that the Lord is
good.” Indeed, his mercies endure forever, but most of us only discover that
truth when we are in the furnace. Like the three Hebrew children of Daniel 3,
when we are cast into the furnace we suddenly discover “the fourth man” is there
with us. Jesus comes to us in our time of direst need, and just when we need
him most, he is there.
On April 5, 1943,
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was arrested and imprisoned by the Gestapo for his
resistance to the Nazi regime in Germany. For several years he had spoken out
against the Nazis, and eventually it caught up with him. As he saw his country
sliding into the abyss, he felt that he could not remain silent. Two years
later, only a few weeks from the end of World War II, he found himself in
Buchenwald Concentration Camp, facing the death sentence. On Sunday, April 8,
he led a service for other prisoners. Shortly after the final prayer, the door
opened and two civilians entered. “Prisoner Bonhoeffer, come with us,” they
said. Everyone knew what that meant—the gallows. Quickly the other men said
goodbye to him. An English prisoner who survived the war describes the moment:
“He took me aside [and said], ‘This is the end; but for me it is the beginning
of life.’” The next day he was hanged at Flossenburg Prison. The SS doctor who
witnessed his death called him brave and composed and devout to the very end.
“Through the half-open door I saw Pastor Bonhoeffer still in his prison clothes,
kneeling in fervent prayer to the Lord his God. The devotion and evident
conviction of being heard that I saw in the prayer of this intensely captivating
man moved me to the depths.”
“This is the end; but for me it is the beginning of life.” Surely such a man has discovered the “living hope” that goes beyond the grave. What a way to live! What a way to die! What way to live again for and in Eternity! In Christ,
Brown
http://youtu.be/ZIUCRXMM4pE
Thursday, August 22, 2013
Tuesday, August 20, 2013
Brown's Daily Word 8-20-13
Praise the Lord for this
new day. Our Lord is upon His throne. He in control. We need to be praying
for the devastating situation in Egypt, praying for Christians that Lord would
grant them courage and boldness to witness for Christ in the midst of chaos and
destruction. We are called to be the salt of the earth and light of the world.
May Jesus continue to send His Light and His grace on all of us. May He
empower us to be His witnesses in the cultures and countries where we live and
serve.
Transformation is at the heart of Christianity, and it is at the heart of what our Lord teaches, what He models and what He does in Scripture. Paul also emphasized transformation in Romans 12:2 when he said, "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." Here, Paul directed us away from conformity and toward transformation. The Message version of Romans 12:2 says, "Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking." In other words, we all will be shaped by something, and how we are shaped will affect the world around us for better or for worse. We always should be mindful of how we are being shaped and how we are affecting the world.
"Fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what He wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you" (Romans 12:2). The Lord of the New Creation and the New Birth, desires to change us from the inside out. We are changed by learning what God wants from us and by responding to it in obedience to His will. While the culture and the sinful world around us attempts to stunt our growth and keep us in sinful patterns of immaturity, the Lord desires for us to be transformed more and more into the likeness of Jesus Christ, bringing out the very best in us.
http://youtu.be/j_UvXe-of-s
In his book Culture Making,
Andy Crouch addresses the idea that Christians are to be transformational agents
of cultural change when he says, "It is not enough to condemn culture. Nor is
it sufficient merely to critique culture or to copy culture. The only way to
change culture is to create culture." We must be about transformation, and we
must be about creating culture. We are to be transformational agents in our
culture and in the world.
In one of his leadership
webinars, John Maxwell defined transformational leadership this way:
"Transformational leadership influences people to think, speak and act in such a
way that it makes a positive difference in their life and in the lives of
others." It is easy to see the Christian call to transformation in this
definition of transformational leadership. As a man of deep faith, Maxwell is
clearly picking up on the biblical call to purposeful living for the benefit of
transforming others in this definition of
transformational leadership.
Transformation is at the heart of Christianity, and it is at the heart of what our Lord teaches, what He models and what He does in Scripture. Paul also emphasized transformation in Romans 12:2 when he said, "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." Here, Paul directed us away from conformity and toward transformation. The Message version of Romans 12:2 says, "Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking." In other words, we all will be shaped by something, and how we are shaped will affect the world around us for better or for worse. We always should be mindful of how we are being shaped and how we are affecting the world.
"Fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what He wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you" (Romans 12:2). The Lord of the New Creation and the New Birth, desires to change us from the inside out. We are changed by learning what God wants from us and by responding to it in obedience to His will. While the culture and the sinful world around us attempts to stunt our growth and keep us in sinful patterns of immaturity, the Lord desires for us to be transformed more and more into the likeness of Jesus Christ, bringing out the very best in us.
In Christ,
Brown
Monday, August 19, 2013
Brown's Daily Word 8-19-13
The Lord blessed us
with special weekend. He also blessed us with a super week of Vacation Bible
School. The church building and the grounds of the church were buzzing with the
sweet sounds and sights of the children, like little lambs in the presence of
Jesus the Good Shepherd, coming to His presence with spontaneity and innocence.
We had Sunita and Andy visiting us for a week. Laureen spent part of the week
at home. Jessica and Tom joined us all for the weekend along with our nieces
and nephews. We took a day trip to gorgeous Ithaca, where we walked alongside
the beautiful lake and up to Taughannock Falls. On one afternoon we went
picking blueberries - gallons of the them. We had a backyard barbeque one
evening. A small herd of carefree deer came by frolicking. What a scene it
was!
The Lord blessed us with a wonderful day of celebration and worship in His house yesterday. The VBS staff led the worship, with the lessons and songs of VBS, followed by festive reception.
We are planning for a Baptismal service this coming Sunday. It will be held at the Nixon's Pond along Boswell Hill Road. The service will take place at 5 PM followed by a special dinner reception at the church. We are also planning for our annual prayer conference, to be held on 18-20 of October. The featured leader for the conference will be Rev. Nigel Mumford from England. Rev. Mumford is an ordained clergyman in the Church of England. We are expecting miracles, signs, and wonders from Jesus our Lord.
In the light of the prayer conference I was reading the story of a woman who was suffering for 12 years. Her story is recorded in Matthew 9, Mark 5, and Luke 8. This woman had taken a real chance by touching Jesus. According to the law, her touch could make Jesus unclean. However, because Jesus was the Son of God, His power of healing overcame her uncleanness. She must not have known this when she touched Him. What a crucial point this is. Our Lord Jesus was not ashamed to be touched by the untouchable, and he was not embarrassed to be publicly identified with the outcasts of this world. He was at home with publicans and sinners, he ate supper with gluttons and drunkards, he welcomed the prostitutes, he touched the lepers and, in this story, he is not ashamed to be touched by an unclean person.
Jesus was not ashamed to be touched by the untouchable. In fact, I think that he was delighted, and glad to identify himself with her. He must have been delighted that she had the courage to reach out and glad that He could heal her. I am certain that He did not care who knew about it, but rather that He wanted the whole crowd to know what he had done.
It is an amazing story which reveals the heart of our Lord Jesus. With our Lord there are no “untouchable” people. In Jesus’ eyes, the untouchables become touchables. He, by His divine touch, makes all untuochables touchable. By nature we all are untouchables. All have sinned and have come short the glory of God. Jesus came to seek and rescue the untouchables.
As Jesus asked, “Who touched me?” the woman knew that He was talking about her. The Book of Luke says that she came trembling and fell at Jesus’ feet. Then she publicly declared what Jesus had done for her and how she had been instantly healed. There may have been clapping and cheering all around. Before they went on, Jesus looked at the woman and said, “Daughter, your faith has healed you” (v. 48). The word Jesus used for daughter is unusual, and is the only time the gospels record Jesus using this particular word. It’s a term of affection and endearment, meaning something like “Sweetheart.” Then he said, “Go in peace,” or literally, “Go into peace,” meaning “Go from this place and walk in good health. You are healed physically and spiritually.”
Sometimes we men are accused of not being sensitive callous and unfeeling. On the other hand, the most sensitive man in all history is Jesus Christ. No one ever cared about people like He did. No one ever gave of Himself like He did. No one ever felt the pain of others like he did. As He walked down a crowded street, hundreds of hands reached out to Him, yet He felt the thin, sickly hand of faith. He felt her touch, He stopped, He turned, and He spoke to her. He was not offended or angry with her, nor was he too busy or too tired to bother with her. It is mind boggling to think about it. He whom all the forces of hell could not stop was diverted by the touch of a sickly hand! This woman did by her touch what Satan himself could not do. She stopped Jesus in his tracks, and He spoke to her as if she were the only person in the crowd.
Jesus loves us as if there were only one person in the universe to love. He hears us as if we were the only ones speaking to Him. He attends to our needs as if we were the only ones with needs in the universe. What a Christ! All that touches us touches him. He feels our pain, sorrow, rejection, loss, failure, hurt, and grief. Whatever it is that hurts us, He feels it. If it touches us, it touches Him. This is what the writer to the Hebrews meant when he said, “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses” (Hebrews 4:15). Thank God it is so.
We do not have a stoic Christ, nor do we have a preoccupied Christ who is too busy to notice our problems. It is not an unemotional Christ who runs the universe as if He were some kind of high-powered businessman. He is the sensitive Jesus who, as the hymn writer says, “feels our deepest woe.”
This story also reveals to us the amazing power of even a feeble faith. The woman did not have a huge amount of faith, but she had a mustard seed of faith, and through it God moved the mountain of her illness.
This story reveals to us that we need not agonize over the “correct” way to come to God. If we come to Jesus Christ in simple faith - even though our faith be as feeble as this woman’s was - He will not turn us away.
How simple it is to come to Christ! Only a touch, and this woman was healed. It was not a result of her toiling, nor by her promises to do better. She was not healed because of an offer to do something for Jesus if he would do something for her. No deals were cut. She merely reached out a trembling hand and in an instant she was healed. It was not a long process, but happened so quickly that it could only be called a miracle.
This is the story of what feeble faith can do. Coming to Christ is not difficult. The hardest part often is reaching out with the hand of faith. This is the power of feeble faith when it is directed toward the right object. We need not have a strong faith, but even a weak faith resting upon a strong object is enough. Who could be stronger than Jesus Christ himself?
In Christ,
Brown
http://youtu.be/ptsBk0KEFiE
The Lord blessed us with a wonderful day of celebration and worship in His house yesterday. The VBS staff led the worship, with the lessons and songs of VBS, followed by festive reception.
We are planning for a Baptismal service this coming Sunday. It will be held at the Nixon's Pond along Boswell Hill Road. The service will take place at 5 PM followed by a special dinner reception at the church. We are also planning for our annual prayer conference, to be held on 18-20 of October. The featured leader for the conference will be Rev. Nigel Mumford from England. Rev. Mumford is an ordained clergyman in the Church of England. We are expecting miracles, signs, and wonders from Jesus our Lord.
In the light of the prayer conference I was reading the story of a woman who was suffering for 12 years. Her story is recorded in Matthew 9, Mark 5, and Luke 8. This woman had taken a real chance by touching Jesus. According to the law, her touch could make Jesus unclean. However, because Jesus was the Son of God, His power of healing overcame her uncleanness. She must not have known this when she touched Him. What a crucial point this is. Our Lord Jesus was not ashamed to be touched by the untouchable, and he was not embarrassed to be publicly identified with the outcasts of this world. He was at home with publicans and sinners, he ate supper with gluttons and drunkards, he welcomed the prostitutes, he touched the lepers and, in this story, he is not ashamed to be touched by an unclean person.
Jesus was not ashamed to be touched by the untouchable. In fact, I think that he was delighted, and glad to identify himself with her. He must have been delighted that she had the courage to reach out and glad that He could heal her. I am certain that He did not care who knew about it, but rather that He wanted the whole crowd to know what he had done.
It is an amazing story which reveals the heart of our Lord Jesus. With our Lord there are no “untouchable” people. In Jesus’ eyes, the untouchables become touchables. He, by His divine touch, makes all untuochables touchable. By nature we all are untouchables. All have sinned and have come short the glory of God. Jesus came to seek and rescue the untouchables.
As Jesus asked, “Who touched me?” the woman knew that He was talking about her. The Book of Luke says that she came trembling and fell at Jesus’ feet. Then she publicly declared what Jesus had done for her and how she had been instantly healed. There may have been clapping and cheering all around. Before they went on, Jesus looked at the woman and said, “Daughter, your faith has healed you” (v. 48). The word Jesus used for daughter is unusual, and is the only time the gospels record Jesus using this particular word. It’s a term of affection and endearment, meaning something like “Sweetheart.” Then he said, “Go in peace,” or literally, “Go into peace,” meaning “Go from this place and walk in good health. You are healed physically and spiritually.”
Sometimes we men are accused of not being sensitive callous and unfeeling. On the other hand, the most sensitive man in all history is Jesus Christ. No one ever cared about people like He did. No one ever gave of Himself like He did. No one ever felt the pain of others like he did. As He walked down a crowded street, hundreds of hands reached out to Him, yet He felt the thin, sickly hand of faith. He felt her touch, He stopped, He turned, and He spoke to her. He was not offended or angry with her, nor was he too busy or too tired to bother with her. It is mind boggling to think about it. He whom all the forces of hell could not stop was diverted by the touch of a sickly hand! This woman did by her touch what Satan himself could not do. She stopped Jesus in his tracks, and He spoke to her as if she were the only person in the crowd.
Jesus loves us as if there were only one person in the universe to love. He hears us as if we were the only ones speaking to Him. He attends to our needs as if we were the only ones with needs in the universe. What a Christ! All that touches us touches him. He feels our pain, sorrow, rejection, loss, failure, hurt, and grief. Whatever it is that hurts us, He feels it. If it touches us, it touches Him. This is what the writer to the Hebrews meant when he said, “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses” (Hebrews 4:15). Thank God it is so.
We do not have a stoic Christ, nor do we have a preoccupied Christ who is too busy to notice our problems. It is not an unemotional Christ who runs the universe as if He were some kind of high-powered businessman. He is the sensitive Jesus who, as the hymn writer says, “feels our deepest woe.”
This story also reveals to us the amazing power of even a feeble faith. The woman did not have a huge amount of faith, but she had a mustard seed of faith, and through it God moved the mountain of her illness.
This story reveals to us that we need not agonize over the “correct” way to come to God. If we come to Jesus Christ in simple faith - even though our faith be as feeble as this woman’s was - He will not turn us away.
How simple it is to come to Christ! Only a touch, and this woman was healed. It was not a result of her toiling, nor by her promises to do better. She was not healed because of an offer to do something for Jesus if he would do something for her. No deals were cut. She merely reached out a trembling hand and in an instant she was healed. It was not a long process, but happened so quickly that it could only be called a miracle.
This is the story of what feeble faith can do. Coming to Christ is not difficult. The hardest part often is reaching out with the hand of faith. This is the power of feeble faith when it is directed toward the right object. We need not have a strong faith, but even a weak faith resting upon a strong object is enough. Who could be stronger than Jesus Christ himself?
In Christ,
Brown
http://youtu.be/ptsBk0KEFiE
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