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Monday, February 19, 2018

Brown's Daily Word 2/19/18



Praise the Lord for the spectacular morning with which He has blessed us this day.  I trust you all had a refreshing and renewing weekend along with a great day in His house with His people yesterday. We had a full weekend including the banquet on Saturday and the worship and celebration yesterday.  Alice preached yesterday from Isaiah 53.  We took a long walk in the early afternoon, soaking in the grace of the Lord and His matchless beauty that He displays in season and out of season.  We praise the Lord that the days are getting longer and warmer.

 

Alice and I have been watching the series, "When Calls the Heart". The new season began yesterday.  The series is about the life and days in the Canadian Frontier in the early part of the 20th Century.  The milieu, the cultural moorings, the ethos, the role of church and the community, family, and school are refreshing and therapeutic.  The presentation is devoid of vulgarity and obscenity. 

 

Praise the Lord for His church, and our homes and families.  I praise the Lord for all of you who love the Lord and dare to live with passion, zeal, dedication, and courage.  

 

I was born and raised in the context of simplicity together with an abundance of the things money could not buy, accompanied by simple gifts.  My life was shaped by men and women who loved the Lord and lived from day to day in the Light of Jesus Christ.  One of them was my uncle, the older brother of dad.  My uncle was brilliant and handsome.  He had attained an 8th grade education.  He was an ardent believer and follower of Jesus our Lord.  He served during World War II.  He was blessed with a poetic and photographic memory with Holy imagination.  He read and retained the Bible.  He was a poet and wonderful story teller.   We heard the Biblical stories during our childhood days, and he brought the Biblical stories to life.  I attribute my knowledge of the Bible as a young man to my uncle’s teaching and preaching.  Although I was young teenager at the time I have not forgotten those verses that he taught me.  They pop into my heart and mind from time to time.This passage is one of them:

"But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.   We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair;   Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed;   Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.   For we which live are always delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh."2 Cor 7-11

 

I have been thinking of two wonderful and deeply committed Christian leaders in Orissa, one of whom was a medical doctor and another was the Bishop.  They were my mentors and friends.  They were traveling together in an SUV a few years ago when both were involved in an accident and both were killed at the scene.  It was a great loss.  I have been thinking about another physician a friend of ours.  Although He is an athlete, he has developed heart problems.  He has been under medical care lately.  He and his wife are dedicated Christians.  He now is retired from full time practice.  He and wife continue to serve the Lord in the Church.  He will be going to Africa in April, where he goes frequently to work in a mission hospital.  He never gets tired of serving the Lord. Another man I am thinking of is an ordained minister, a colleague of mine.  He and his wife serve the Lord with great zeal and passion although he has had complicated heart surgeries.  Despite the heart impediments he continues to serve the Lord fearlessly.  

 

My wife and I have been blessed with four beautiful daughters who love the Lord and serve Him.  Our oldest daughter, who lives in Boston with her beautiful family, has heart for the least, the last, and the lost.  She has served them with great love and passion.  She is involved in health care and medicine.  She comes against injustice vocally and vigorously.  She has been selected to do further graduate studies in healthcare administration at Dartmouth, one of the Ivy League schools. She takes her calling and vocation seriously.  She stands in the gap.  She is fearless and committed with compassion and caring concern.  Praise the Lord for all of you who love the Lord and serve Him for such a time as this.  

 

I love to read and reflect from Hebrews, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.  Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endued the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”  Hebrews 12:1-2  This verse in Hebrews tells us that we are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses, showing us that we are not alone.  A host of great men and women have gone before us to pave the way, to pay the price, to show us that the cause is just and righteous.  Let us always be aware of those who have gone on before us. 

 

We have responsibility as believers.  We must throw off everything that hinders.  This speaks about the running weights which a runner in training would use to increase stamina and strength.  There are things that must be put off if we are going to be effective.  It may be that we have to lay off some good things that are not the best things so that we might do what God has called us to do – to do the main thing.  We also have responsibility to keep our lives clean and pure.  Hebrews also goes on to say that we must lay aside the sin that so easily entangles or besets us.

 

Furthermore, we have a race that is set before us.  This indicates to us that the Lord of our lives has a plan.  All of us need to recognize that Satan also has a plan.  Satan plans to divert, divide, and destroy.   According to John 10:10 we must be ever vigilant and seek to do everything we can to make sure that God’s plan is accomplished.  We do not have to set our own agenda or our own mission, but we are to fix our eyes on Jesus.  We are called and commissioned to press on and run and finish the race well.




Brown





https://youtu.be/aIR5zFSkWUY

 



Brown

Saturday, February 17, 2018

Brown's Daily Word 2/17/18

Praise the Lord that it is Saturday and Sunday is coming.  It is a very sweet Saturday here in our church this day as our church is hosting a Sweetheart Banquet.  The banquet is scheduled for 6:00 PM today.  The church is preparing and fixing a very special menu with sumptuous and delicious entrees and diverse decadent desserts.  There will be special music following the banquet.  We have so many reasons to celebrate and rejoice and to taste the good things of the Lord and feast on His abundance and generosity.  We will gather for Sunday school tomorrow at 9:30 AM and for worship at 10:30AM.  Plan to be in the house of the Lord to worship the Risen Savior.  May Jesus the Lord of the church bring about a great outpouring of His Spirit and anointing and great revival accompanied by a great harvest in the world.    

 

We had some face time with our grandchildren Addie and Asha yesterday, along with their mommy Sunita in Washingtton . Gabe was in school.  Addie loves chicken curry.  Asha loves mangoes.  Sunita told me that Asha had two and a half mangoes one day last week.  (She is not quite two and half years old).  They are all going to Florida next week for a short vacation.  Asha is wearing her swim suit all the time and talking non-stop of going to the beach.  Sunita was sharing with me that Gabe has a new student in his class who is a young girl, a miracle child.  Her mom is a US Congress woman.  During the pregnancy it was discovered that her baby had severe high risk complications.  She was advised for abortion. The mom and her husband refused the doctor’s advice and through much prayer and medical intervention the baby was born at full term, but she was born without kidneys.  Her dad gave her one of his kidneys.  She is a beautiful winsome girl.  Praise the Lord for committed Christian parents who have the courage and audacity to follow Jesus in the face of extreme adversities.  Somehow Jesus comes and gives us the victory.

 

Men and women of deep faith, self-abandon, and extreme courage make it easy for others to believe in Jesus.  Somebody once said that the saints are those who make it easier for others to believe in Jesus.

 

The early church was incredibly generous with its time, its energy, and its material resources because the church knew what Jesus had done for them, and they believed what he said about centering their lives in his kingdom.  They shared their resources inside and outside of the church.  They helped the needy and took care of orphans and widows. They tended to the sick, and as they did that, they won more people to Christ.  In the early fourth century the emperor known as Julian the Apostate came to power.  He hated Christianity and wanted the empire  to revert back to paganism.  That goal was nearly impossible to accomplish because by that time the church was so widespread and so generous that it was touching most of the people in the empire.  At one point Julian became so frustrated, that in a rare moment of honesty he said, "Those Christians not only feed their own poor but they feed ours as well."

 

The early church realized that storing up possessions on earth is silly because it all gets left behind, so they centered their lives in God's kingdom and gave generously to all in need.  This is the call of God on us as well.  May Jesus, the Lord of the Church, ferment our lives to be generous, sacrificial, energetic, enthused and fervent.  May He provoke us to live with gratitude and serve Him with gladness.  See you in church.

 

Brown 

https://youtu.be/8MfBQ30Ta9w