Brown's Daily Word 9-26-12

Praise the Lord for this new day. Praise the Lord for His fresh grace which is sufficient for every need we have and every circumstance we might face. He is our ever present and our eternal contemporary.

I took a two mile walk late yesterday evening. The breeze was gentle. The surroundings were serene. I saw four deer freely and fearlessly frolicking with jubilant feet. My heart was infused with gratitude and joy. Praise the Lord for the refreshing rest that He offers us in the night. Praise the Lord for the world that our Lord fills with His beauty and grace.

We will meet for our Wednesday Evening Fellowship at 6 PM. There will be a very special meal prepared by a new chef who is new to our church family. Today is also "See You at the Pole" day around our nation, when high school students gather around the flagpole for prayer.

I am reading one of Lord's parables that is recorded in Mathew 20. The point of the parable is not the hard work of the laborers, but the generosity of the landowner. In the parable, God is the Landowner, for he owns the earth and everything in it. He hires laborers throughout the day, giving each the same pay at the end of the day. This is totally unfair according to human standards, but God does not work according to the world’s standards. God operates on the principles of grace and generosity. The parable reveals a surprising and disconcerting turn of events which may be disturbing to even us, but Jesus wants to introduce to them a man unlike any man they have known. Jesus was saying that the kingdom of God operates differently from the kingdom of this world and the way things normally work here. Jesus was also saying that we should serve the Landowner from the heart. There is always the danger of becoming angry at God because we think he is not treating us right. We think we should be rewarded for being a Christian and working for him. We think we should not have life so hard, and that he should be giving us more blessings. We may not understand why things always seem to be going wrong for us and why life is so hard. We complain to the Landowner that others have it so much easier than we do. Life does not seem fair, and we grumble and become bitter. We feel as if we have had to bear so many difficult things and others seem to have it so easy — even those who do not live for God. (See Psalm 73)
In our worldly mind set we are stunned that our Lord said that His Father “causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous” (Matthew 5:45). He sends his blessings on all, no matter how they treat him, which seems to us ultimately unfair. But God is a God of grace. He acts with generosity, even when it seems to us unfair. Sometimes those who live away from God seem to have life so much better than us, but that is the point — God operates from grace and is generous to all. We serve God from the heart, no matter what life brings us. It is not a matter of quid pro quo. We must not demand to be paid what we think is fair. He has promised to give us “whatever is right.” And in the day we stand before him, all things will be made right.
It is interesting in the parable that the workers hired at the beginning of the day have a contract. They agree with the landowner on a definite wage for a day’s work. The second group of workers work under an informal agreement, and are only told that their pay will be “what is right”. With the last group who only work one hour, and there is no mention of any kind of wage. They are only told that they can work in the vineyard. The only group that complains is the group who had agreed on a certain wage. When they agreed to the wage they thought it was good. By the end of it all they felt cheated and wanted to renegotiate. They grumbled and accused the landowner of unfair treatment. The point seems to be that these men carried a grudge as the other workers came alone with equal pay. They did not love the landowner; they only wanted what was due them, and then leave. In the end, they charged him with wrong. Still the landowner called them “friend” and gave them their wage, but he said to them, “Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn't you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go.”

The heart if the Gospel is that our God revealed in the Person of Jesus Christ, does not give wages, he gives gifts, according to his grace and generosity. We cannot work our way into heaven. We do not deserve anything, but by his grace we have all received more than we deserve. And in the end we will receive eternal life in his everlasting kingdom of joy. So we should live and work with joy, knowing that our heavenly Father loves us and will do what he knows is best.

In Christ,

Brown

" Lord God, almighty and everlasting Father, you have
brought us in safety to this new day: Preserve us with your
mighty power, that we may not fall into sin, nor be overcome
by adversity; and in all we do, direct us to the fulfilling of
your purpose; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. "

Book of Common Prayer

http://youtu.be/FLswy74-VCs

A Special Saturday Evening of Praise and Worship

Saturday September 29, 2012

Location: First United Methodist Church,
53 McKinley Avenue, Endicott, NY

Sponsored by Union Center United Methodist Church.

5:30 PM Community Dinner

6:30 PM Praise and Worship

Special Music by: "Treasure" Praise and worship band

Soloist: Emma Brunson

Brown's Daily Word 9-25-12

Praise the Lord for the wonderful season of Autumn. I drove around yesterday afternoon, gazing at the beautiful brilliant fall colors. It is amazing how the Lord of the earth decorates His Earth for us to see the beauty and splendor all around. He orchestrates the transition of all seasons. He displays the colors in the Autumn leaves. He generates the wind-whispers and the beauty in our changing days. I was reminded of His bountiful and manifold blessings. Indeed, He bestows grace upon grace all the days of our lives and beyond this world. As I drove I saw few deer grazing unhurriedly and unafraid. The air was cool and refreshing. As the night covered the earth the Lord displayed the beautiful Fall Moon dispelling the darkness. I said, along with the poet, "A thing of beauty is a joy forever".

Last evening Sunita flew to Rumania via Germany. She will be visiting some her colleagues in Rumania and the ministry of the Gospel in which they are involved. She will also be visiting some of her friends from her college days in Boston .

I have been looking at Philippians chapter 1. It is written, “conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ”. We are to live as a citizen of heaven while we are called and propelled to live as sojourners and pilgrims here on earth. This is vastly important for Christians now, at the beginning of the 21st century, because the surrounding culture has become increasingly hostile to Biblical truth. This is a call for nothing less than aggressive Christianity. We need this because the world is full of Christians in retreat. We have retreated when we ought to advance. Too many believers have been intimidated and have left the battlefield to the enemy.

Christ's word to the church is always "Go Forward!" As far as I know, the Lord never told his people to retreat—not ever. Jesus said, “Go and preach the gospel” (Mark 16:15). He called us to “Go and make disciples” (Mathew 28:19). In one of his books, Methodist evangelist E. Stanley Jones commented that the first Christians did not wring their hands in despair and say, “Look what the world has come to.” Instead, with great delight they declared, “Look what has come to the world.” It’s never been easy to be a Christian. It wasn’t then and it isn’t now. Blessed are they who are so excited about Jesus that they simply can’t keep quiet about it.

In Christ,

Brown

http://youtu.be/byIpfEVxhs4

A Special Saturday Evening of Praise and Worship

Saturday September 29, 2012

Location: First United Methodist Church,
53 McKinley Avenue, Endicott, NY

Sponsored by Union Center United Methodist Church.

5:30 PM Community Dinner

6:30 PM Praise and Worship

Special Music by: Praise and worship band

Soloist: Emma Brunson

Preacher: Pastor Marshall Sorber

A Morning Prayer by John Baillie

Here am I, O God,
of little power and of mean estate,
yet lifting up heart and voice to Thee
before whom all created things are as dust and a vapour.
Thou art hidden behind the curtain of sense,
incomprehensible in Thy greatness,
mysterious in Thine almighty power;
yet here I speak with Thee familiarly
as child to parent, as friend to friend.
If I could not thus speak to Thee,
then were I indeed without hope in the world.
For it is little that I have power to do or to ordain.
Not of my own will am I here,
not of my own will shall I soon pass hence.
Of all that shall come to me this day,
very little will be such as I have chosen for myself.
It is Thou, O hidden One, who dost appoint my lot
and determine the bounds of my habitation.
It is Thou who hast put power in my hand to do one work
and hast withheld the skill to do another.
It is Thou who dost keep in Thy grasp the threads of this day's life
and who alone knowest what lies before me to do or to suffer.
But because Thou art my Father, I am not afraid.
Because it is Thine own Spirit that stirs
within my spirit's inmost room,
I know that all is well.
What I desire for myself I cannot attain,
but what Thou desirest in me Thou canst attain for me.
The good that I would I do not,
but the good that Thou willest in me,
that Thou canst give me power to do.

Dear Father, take this day's life into Thine own keeping.
Control all my thoughts and feelings.
Direct all my energies.
Instruct my mind.
Sustain my will.
Take my hands and make them skillful to serve Thee.
Take my feet and make them swift to do Thy bidding.
Take my eyes and keep them fixed upon Thine everlasting beauty.
Take my mouth and make it eloquent in testimony to Thy love.
Make this day a day of obedience,
a day of spiritual joy and peace.
Make this day's work a little part
of the work of the Kingdom of my Lord Christ,
in whose name these my prayers are said,
Amen.

Brown's Daily Word 9-24-12

Praise the Lord for the good gifts that He gives to us with so much generosity and grace. Praise the Lord for the wonderful Good News of His salvation, redemption, and freedom. He blessed us with a beautiful weekend. Our church participated in Annual Apple Festival that is held in Endicott. New York Apples are some of the best in the world. The Lord blessed us with a Joyful Lord's Day, a day of worship and celebration.

One Christian theologian said, "I go to church on Sunday, not for the sermon, not for the music, but to witness to the fact that Jesus is Risen. Indeed we join His saints and servants around the corner and around the globe every Sunday because Jesus is Risen from the grave. Our Savior reigns.

I spoke to our grand daughter Ada this past Saturday for over 7 minutes. She is only 20 months old. It was a treat. Alice baked Peach pie and Blueberry pie for dessert for Sunday dinner yesterday. It was indeed a great day of celebration.

Sunita is flying to Romania today for two weeks with her work. Once again, I had a great Birthday celebration last week. I praise the Lord for so many of you who sent me Birthday wishes from around the corner and around the globe. I am so blessed.

I praise the Lord for Allan Crab. Allan conducted Handel's Messiah with the Downtown Singers for the last 28 years. I attended the performances almost every year, missing only one or two performances. Alan died two weeks ago.

I woke up early this morning, at 3:00 AM, and started listening to Handel's Messiah. I get blessed and refreshed. We are just three months away from Christmas Eve, 2012. Praise the Lord for artists and musicians who proclaime Jesus Christ as Lord.

C. S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia — The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe features four children, Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy. Lucy, the youngest of the children, stumbles through a wardrobe into a frozen world of Narnia, a place where it is always winter and never Christmas. The other children at first disbelieve her, but eventually they follow her through the wardrobe and into Narnia. The creatures there gasp as they see them and treat them as though they are very special. At first they are surprised, thinking there has to be some kind of mistake. Then they are not sure they want this kind of responsibility, in spite of how flattering it is. But then they meet Aslan — a lion who is the Christ-figure in the story. He eventually calls them by new names,: King Peter the Magnificent, King Edmund the Just, Queen Lucy the Valiant, Queen Susan the Gentle. They are also given gifts to help them accomplish their calling. They begin their wonderful journey of fulfilling their calling – a calling that was planned for them before the world began - and as they do, Narnia’s winter begins to break. The snow melts and summer’s warmth begins.
In the midst of chaos an confusion around the world, the Church of Jesus Christ declares and proclaims the Jesus who has ushered in His Kingdom on earth. The gates of hell cannot prevail against it. The snow is melting and summer is near. It is summer always somewhere on this wonderful world.
In his book "What Good Is God", Phillip Yancey tells of a group of American high school students who went on a mission trip to Afghanistan. They had great success and saw many people come to Christ as a result of their ministry. Dr. J. Christy Wilson (I had met Dr. Wilson in Boston in May, 1982) was their host while they were there. Wilson, born of missionary parents, took them to an unusual tourist site, the only cemetery in Afghanistan where ‘infidels’ could be buried. He walked to the first, ancient gravestone, pitted with age. ‘This man worked here thirty years and translated the Bible into the Afghan language,’ he said. ‘Not a single convert. And in this grave next to him lies the man who replaced him, along with his children who died here. He toiled for twenty-five years, and baptized the first Afghan Christian.’ As they strolled among the gravestones, he recounted the stories of early missionaries and their fates.
At the end of the row he stopped, turned, and looked the teenagers straight in the eye. ‘For thirty years, one man moved rocks. That’s all he did, move rocks. Then came his replacement, who did nothing but dig furrows. There came another who planted seeds, and another who watered. And now you kids — you kids — are bringing in the harvest.’
The group leader said, ‘It was one of the great moments of my life. I watched their faces as it suddenly dawned on these exuberant American teenagers that the amazing spiritual awakening they had witnessed was but the last step in a long line of faithful service stretching back over many decades. I’ll never forget that scene.’”
Perhaps at times we feel like all we do is move rocks — but we do it for Jesus, and we do it faithfully. Some day someone will come along and build on what we have done – and there will be a harvest. The Bible says, “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” Galatians 6:9
The Bible also says, “Therefore, my brothers (and sisters), be all the more eager to make your calling and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never fall, and you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” 2 Peter 1:10-11

In Christ,

Brown
http://youtu.be/X-LEVmxL5Y8

A Special Saturday Evening of Praise and Worship

Saturday September 29, 2012

Location: First United Methodist Church,
53 McKinley Avenue, Endicott, NY

Sponsored by Union Center United Methodist Church.

5:30 PM Community Dinner

6:30 PM Praise and Worship

Special Music by: "Treasure" Praise and worship band

Soloist: Emma Brunson

Preacher: Pastor Marshall Sorber