Brown's Daily Word 11-27-13

    Praise the Lord for this Thanksgiving Eve of 2013.  We are ready to celebrate Thanksgiving.  Janice and Jeremy are staying in Boston with the children to celebrate a New England Thanksgiving.  Sunita and Andy are staying in Washington, and plan to celebrate Thanksgiving with friends in Baltimore.  Tom and Jessica are planning to come up from Philadelphia after work tonight, and Laureen is coming in as well.  All of our Indian family, who live nearby, will be joining us for the day.  We are planning for an "Indian" Thanksgiving.  The Lord is good, and His faithfulness endures forever. 

    We will not meet for our Wednesday evening gathering today.  We will keep on praising the Lord God our Father from whom all good and perfect gifts come to us.  Praise the Lord for the wonderful gift of Salvation in Jesus Christ.  He is the reason for our rejoicing.  He is the reason for our celebrations.  He is the reason for our thanksgiving.  Praise the Lord for the gifts of faith, hope, and love -- the "holy trinity" from I Corinthians.  Alice and I praise the Lord for all of you, for our life together in Jesus.  We praise Him for His faithfulness to us as we are ministering in our 24th year here in Endicott.  We praise the Lord for the new and spacious 2-story addition, with which the Lord has blessed us as a church.  A new elevator is in the process of being installed and should be in full operation by December 7, the day of our Thanksgiving/Christmas banquet. 

    We praise the Lord for the times of blessings, and for His presence with us during times of trials.  He gives us His peace that passes all understanding.  We can all sing because of Christ, "It is well with my soul."  Praise the Lord for the Church around the corner and around the world.  Praise the Lord for the Advent season that is upon us.  People are preparing and planning to celebrate Advent and Christmas around the world.  Let us thankfully and joyfully prepare our hearts, our hearths, and our homes to celebrate the coming of Jesus. 

    In the first half of the 17th century, in the worst of times, Germany was in the midst of wars and famine and pestilence.  In the city of Eilenburg lived a pastor by the name of Martin Rinkart.  During one especially oppressive period, Rinkart conducted up to 50 funerals a day as a plague swept through the town and as the Thirty Years' War wreaked its own terror upon the people.  Among those whom Rinkart buried were members of his own family.  Yet, it was during those years of darkness and despair, when death and destruction greeted each new day, that Pastor Rinkart wrote 66 sacred songs and hymns.  Among them was the song "Now Thank We All Our God."  As sorrow beset him, Rinkart wrote this hymn of thanks and praise.

    "Now thank we all our God, With hearts and hands and voices, Who wondrous things hath done, In whom His world rejoices; Who, from our mothers' arms Hath blessed us on our way, With countless gifts of love, And still is ours today."    

    Rinkart demonstrated the valuable lesson that Thankfulness does not have to wait for prosperity and peace.  It is always a good time to praise God for the "wondrous things" He has done.

    May Jesus bless each of our gatherings and celebrations.  May He be praised!  All praise, honor, glory, and thanksgiving belong to Him. 

In Christ,

 Brown

http://youtu.be/WzX42Z0McFU

 

Brown's Daily Word 11-26-13

 

    Praise the Lord for this new day.  It has been snowing most of the day.  There has been a winter weather advisory posted through Thurday morning.  It has started snowing gently.  The freshly trimmed bush by the picture window of the parsonage is covered with fresh and friendly snow.  Alice and I walked in the mall last night.  The mall is decorated  and decked to the brim for Christmas.  Center court has a Christmas forset with a very lovely chreche.  The Stores are stacked with special Christmas merchandise.  We passed by one display containing Christmas carvings of Olive wood from the Holy Land.  Christmas music is played everywhere you go and I said, "It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas everywhere you go".  It has been reported that Catholic Charities of Broome County, received over 4200 turkeys from one collection center near the Walmart in Vestal.  Over 10,000 Operation Christmas Child packages were collected in our area.  People are generous and giving.  Area Churches are giving and serving and loving and worshiping the Lord.  I was in Wegmans yesterday... full of thousands of food items and full of thankful and joyful people.   Praise the Lord for America the Beautiful.  Praise the Lord for the Church, the Body of Christ on earth. 

 

    I was listening to a song by Jesus Culture the other day.  The song says "His love never fails".  I was reflecting on the life of Joseph, who could testify that "His love never fails".

   
    When James Boice published his exposition on this section of Genesis, he called Joseph “a man for all seasons.”  It seems like an apt title for a man who went through so many varied experiences.  Joseph had every reason to be vindictive, even revengeful, yet He stayed focused on the Lord and remained trustful prayerful, and grateful.  Somebody has said:
 
    "He was chosen and rejected.
    He was loved and hated.
    He was favored and abused.
    He was betrayed and rescued.
    He was promoted and imprisoned.
    He was tested and rewarded.
    He was slandered and praised."

    At no point did Joseph, ever take his eyes off the Lord.
    Adversity didn’t harden him.
    Prosperity didn’t ruin him.
    Temptation didn’t destroy him.
    Imprisonment didn’t embitter him.
    Promotion didn’t change him.

    Though Joseph was God’s man, he did not have an easy life. His story teaches us about:

    Trusting God when in the pit of despair.
    How to deal with sexual temptation.
    How to redeem a painful past.
    What to do while you wait.
    How to see God’s hand in all things.
    How to make wise plans.
    How God awakens a guilty conscience.
    The marks of true repentance.
    How to live for God in a pagan culture.
    Overcoming lingering bitterness.
    How to die well.

    Joseph stands before us as a man whose life was filled with turmoil.  It started early in his life and never really stopped.  Through it all, he emerged triumphant by God’s grace.  Joseph, the hero of God, rose out of the turmoil of a dysfunctional family.  The life story of Joseph proves you can come from a crazy, mixed-up family and still do amazing things for the Lord. 
      Life isn’t easy for any of us, and for most of us it can be quite difficult.  Spurgeon remarked that “God is to be seen in small things.”  Since God himself stands behind the universe he created, we should not be surprised to find his fingerprints everywhere, even in the tiniest details of life.
 In Christ,

  Brown

http://youtu.be/X_2qG22SPwU

Brown's Daily Word 11-25-13

 

    Praise the Lord for this new day.  Exactly one month from today -- yes, in just 30 days-- we will be celebrating Christmas.  WOW!  We had some snow yesterday.  Though it was blustery, it was brilliant.  Reports came in that it snowed at least 6 inches in Marathon yesterday.   

    The Lord blessed us wonderfully in His House yesterday.  Alice preached at Wesley.  I preached in Union Center.  Both of us preached on the theme of Thanksgiving.  The Evening worship service at the First United Methodist Church was a great blessing.  The music and hymn sing were powerful.  The preaching by Rev. Jan Divine was anointed.  We came home blessed and challenged. 

    In the worship services yesterday, I used part of Psalm 103 in my preaching and made reference to 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18: "Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus."  

    "Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus" ... These are powerful, life-giving words.  The words "give thanks" are a command. They indicate that thanksgiving is God's plan for your life.  Moreover, this command is in a Greek tense that means "keep on giving thanks" — in every situation, every occasion and every circumstance.  This verse does not say "Give thanks for all circumstances", but "Give thanks in all circumstances".  With this command comes the knowledge that God will use every circumstance (whether good or bad) for the good of those who are His through Jesus Christ.  

    Two women met on a college campus during an alumni gathering.  They had not seen each other for a few years.  The conversation went something like this:

    "I've gotten married since we last met."

    "Oh, that's good."

    "Well I don't know about that. My husband is twice as old as I am."

    "Oh, that's bad."

    "Well I don't know about that, he's worth a hundred million dollars."

    "Oh, that's good."

    "Well I don't know about that. He won't give me a cent."

    "Oh, that's bad."

    "Well I don't know about that. He did give me a five million dollar house."

    "Oh, that's good."

    "Well I don't know about that. It burned down last week."

    "Oh, that's bad."

    "Well, I don't know about that. He was in the house!"  

    "Oh, that's…"  Sometimes we  don't know whether something is good or bad, but one thing is certain, and it is the fact that we can always be thankful that God is working for our good in everything.  It is written, "God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them." (2 Corinthians 5:19)

    We can give thanks in every circumstance because God will use that circumstance (whether good or bad) for our good to bring good into your lives.  As Joseph said to his brothers, after they had done some despicable things to him: "Don't be afraid.  You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives." (Genesis 50:19-20)  

 In Christ,

    Brown

http://youtu.be/KxvAaq9q5Kw