Brown's Daily Word 2-26-14

    Here we are on the last Wednesday of February, 2014.  We will meet for our Wednesday Evening Gathering at 6 PM with a special meal and Bible Study followed by choir practice at 6:30 PM.  We will have a special ministry with children at 6:30 PM.  

 

    I was talking to one of our friends recently who had been on a short term mission trip to a far away place in a far away county.  She was telling me that the living conditions were not inviting but the ministry was a great joy and a great blessing.  She came home blessed and challenged.  She is ready to go back again  to a far away place.  Sometimes we look at these kinds of people and we think they are crazy, but the Lord honors this kind of craziness. 

 

    I get excited and challenged every time I read the miracle story of two men who had gone crazy for Jesus.  We read about them in Acts 16.  They had been thrown into a new mission field where the living conditions were not very conducive for ministry.  They were in the jail in the city of Philippi.  Paul and Silas were jailed in Philippi, and at midnight they began praying and singing hymns of praise to God. Acts 16:25 says that the other prisoners were listening to them.  No doubt these two strangers looked a mess after being severely beaten.  The fact that they were in stocks and under close guard told the other prisoners that Paul and Silas were not ordinary criminals.  Despite the harsh conditions, Paul and Silas were singing at midnight.  They knew that God had sent them to the jail to bear witness for their faith.  As Paul and Silas sang and the prisoners listened, they had no idea of the earthquake that was about to set them free (vv. 26-28).  Nor did they know that soon they would lead the Philippian jailer and his whole family to the Lord (vv. 29-34).  That was all hidden to them at the time and, as far as they knew, they would stay in prison a few days or a few weeks or a few months, and then they would go on trial.  After that, no one could say what might happen.

    They knew that we  are where we  are because God wants us  there, and that when he wants us somewhere else, we will be  be somewhere else.  Therefore, they worshipped and ministered in that stinky jail under cramped and confining conditions.   I believe that Paul and Silas were not praying and singing in prospect of some great miracle.  They simply bore witness to the goodness of the Lord in a most difficult situation.

    Paul and Silas were not trying to be quiet in the jail.  Evidently they prayed and sang loud enough that a crowd of prisoners listened to them, amazed that two men in stocks, having been beaten and roughed up, no doubt a sight to behold, would seem so cheerful and full of faith.

    When God calls, we can always find excuses to make.  “Not me, Lord.”  “Go ask someone else.”  “I’m busy.”  “I’m happy right where I am.”  For each of us, the issue is not our personal desire but, rather, our response when the call comes.  In the truly tough circumstances of life, we rarely get a choice in advance, which is probably a good thing because, if we did, we would be sorely tempted to run in the other direction.  It is, however, in moments like this that we discover the   presence and the power of the Lord at work .

    I’m not surprised that Paul and Silas sang in prison. Some of God’s best work gets done in prisons.  John Bunyan went to prison for preaching the gospel and wrote “Pilgrim’s Progress.”  Dietrich Bonhoeffer went to prison in World War II and died testifying to God’s grace.  Chuck Colson went to prison and God gave him the vision for Prison Fellowship.

    I wonder what Paul and Silas prayed at midnight.  I wonder if it was something like what Paul wrote several years later in 2 Thessalonians 2:16-17.

"May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word."

    When Eugene Peterson gave us his version in The Message, he started back in verse 15 and came up with this:

"So, friends, take a firm stand, feet on the ground and head high.  Keep a tight grip on what you were taught, whether in personal conversation or by our letter.  May Jesus himself and God our Father, who reached out in love and surprised you with gifts of unending help and confidence, put a fresh heart in you, invigorate your work, enliven your speech."

    I like Peterson's interpretation of this passage.  “Take a firm stand, feet on the ground and head high.”  We all need that reminder, especially as we face the tough times in our lives.  At midnight we need to keep a tight grip on what we know to be true.  If it’s true in the bright sunlight of noon, it’s just as true at midnight.  ("Do not doubt in the darkness what God has shown you in the light.")  It is completely conceivable that they prayed for courage and a “fresh heart” and to be made strong so they could bear witness to the Lord.

    At midnight each one of us needs to keep a tight grip on what we know to be true. 
In Jesus our Lord,

Brown

http://youtu.be/b6ncg2pLYks

 

Brown's Daily Word 2-25-14

   Praise the Lord for music that honors the Lord and blesses our hearts.  Our grandchildren love music.  The oldest, Micah, loves country western and  bluegrass.  Simeon loves hymns like, "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing".  Little Ada likes "Na, na  na , na.. Every move I make .. every breath I take I take in you, Jesus", as well as many hymns and choruses.  My wife loves to sing hymns and worship songs  both old and new.  I love all kinds of music from classical to modern to. . .  Praise the Lord for some of the great composers and musicians whose hearts were redeemed by the Savior.

 

    At the bottom of many of his musical manuscripts, the great organist and composer Johann Sebastian Bach often wrote the letters "INDNJC."  Those letters stood for "In Nomine Domini Nostri Jesu Christi" -- in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.  These letters did not appear on Bach's manuscripts by accident or without purpose.  Johann Sebastian Bach put those letters there for a reason. Considered a genius in the field of music, Bach recognized the one true Genius. Known for his extraordinary talent, Bach realized the source of all human talent. Praised for his musical gifts, Bach was aware of the primary giver of all gifts.  He affirmed with the New Testament writer James that "every good gift and every perfect gift is from above."  For these reasons, at the bottom of his manuscripts he wrote INDNJC.

 

    Most of us will never compose a musical manuscript, let alone one of the caliber of a Bach composition.  Yet, each day of our lives, we do compose "living" manuscripts of sorts.  Each day we have opportunities to use God-given time, talents, skills, and gifts as we write the notes which collectively compose the songs that others "hear" when they listen to our lives.  Each day that we live, we are effectively making music with our lives -- composing and performing the measures, verses, and stanzas which combine to form a "living symphony" of who we are and what we are about.

    Colossians 3:12-17 is one of several scriptural passages which reminds us of the importance of praising God through music.  I especially like verse 16 which declares: "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly -- and sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God."  Here is biblical evidence that from the very early days the church was a singing church, singing hymns and songs of praise and thanksgiving to God with their voices.  Thanking God with their singing and voices was not the only way members of the early church were instructed to worship and praise God, but they were also taught to worship and praise God with the entirety of their lives.  The next verse (Colossians 3:17) proclaims: "And whatever you do -- in word or deed -- do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus -- giving thanks to God the Father through Him."

    Whatever you do, wherever you are, remember that you are composing a "life manuscript," a living symphony of sorts.  Remember that as we  compose each note and play or sing each verse our Lord  calls upon us to do it INDNJC.  In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, we are to make music with our lives.  In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, we are to live and give thanks.  All of us are called upon by God to make the kind of music with our lives that will make a difference in our world.

In Jesus our Lord.

  Brown 

http://youtu.be/S6OgZCCoXWc

Brown's Daily Word 2-24-14

     The Lord blessed us with an awesome and wonderful week.  We had our three grandchildren: Micah 8, Simeon 6, and little Ada 3, for almost a week. It was wild and crazy and full of pure blessings.  Micah is a beautiful young girl who has a great heart of a  servant.  On Friday morning, she prepared the pancake breakfast for all the family all by herself.  Simeon is all active and an outdoor person, who spent much tome snowboarding and sledding with our nieces and nephews.  Ada was her grandma's girl, talking and singing and playing in the snow.  They love Jesus and love sing praises of and to Him.  On our way back to Boston we stopped at the Pilot Gas Station near Albany.  The three grand children ran into the store singing both loudly and eloquently, "I am C, I am Ch....  I said Lord thank you. According to your Word it is out of the mouth of babes".  After arriving in Boston we discovered that Simeon's jacket was missing, so on the way back home we stopped at the same Dunkin Donuts and Subway restaurant, just to check the lost and found desk about Simeons brand new jacket.  Alice walked into the Dunkin Donut shop and in seconds she found Simeon's jacket on the table, in tact.  Praise the Lord for America the Beautiful. 

    The Lord blessed us with a wonderful day in His house yesterday.  The Lord gave us a spring-like weather, with promises of the warmer seasons ahead.  I am ready for Spring and  summer.  I am thinking of lakes and rivers, oceans and seas.  

    I have been privileged to visit the Holy Land several times.  Every time I have been there I have visited the Sea of Galilee where our Lord Jesus spent much of His time in ministry.  I also have made a point to visit the Dead Sea.  The Dead Sea is called the Dead Sea for a reason: it's dead.  It is the saltiest body of water on the planet, nine times saltier than the ocean.  It is so salty that no fish can live in it.  It is so salty that sailboats don't sail on it—and this is a big body of water, 10 miles by 50 miles.  If you look out over the water, you'll never see a skier.  The only people who like the saltiness of the Dead Sea are the  tourists to Israel, because they can bob in the Dead Sea.  It's impossible to sink in water that is that salty, so tour buses drive there, people don swimsuits, and they go bobbing.

    I have bobbed  in the Dead Sea.  It's a lot of fun until you try to rinse off the salt.  The Dead Sea is located in the lowest part of the earth.  Interestingly, there is fresh water flowing into the Dead Sea continuously.  The Jordan River and several other streams feed into the Dead Sea, but the Dead Sea has no outlet.  Because it has no outlet, the fresh water comes in and sits there idly, and the hot desert sun evaporates it all.

    There is a danger for all of us in becoming  Dead Sea persons.  A Dead Sea person is the one who on a regular basis receives fresh blessings, fresh resources, fresh provisions from the Lord from whom all good and perfect gifts come, but has no outlet.  It is written: "But just as you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in complete earnestness, and in your love for us — see that you also excel in this grace of giving.  I'm not commanding you, but I want to test the sincerity of your love by comparing it with the earnestness of others.  For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich".  2 Corinthians 8:7 ff.

    Paul wanted the Corinthians to excel at something.  He was saying: You Corinthians are good at a lot of things but, unfortunately, giving isn't one of them, so I want to challenge you to put as much effort into excelling at generosity as you put into excelling at everything else.

    Sunita travels around the globe with her work.  She shares with me the evil of human trafficking today.  There was recently a big event held in Atlanta.  Forty thousand young people, mostly college students and Christ-followers, gathered for this big crusade to stop sex trafficking in our world today. They are excited about justice and caring for people who have become virtual slaves.  There are more slaves in the world today than in any previous time in history so these young people wanted to do something about it.  The CNN report was highly complimentary as they showed young people lifting their hands in worship.  They had these knockdown, drag-out worship times.  They listened to speakers who addressed the topic of trafficking.  Then they gave generously, selflessly, and sacrificially. . . and I thought to myself, Compared to their secular friends who never give anything to anybody but themselves, this is pretty cool.

    There's no greater joy than giving.

In Christ,

Brown

http://youtu.be/6_KXsMCJgBQ