Brown's Daily Word 10-22-09

Good morning,
Praise the Lord for this beautiful and bountiful day. We are having a day or two of Indian Summer. It is going to be brilliant. We still have a few scattered spots where the Autumn colors still magnificent and breath taking.
Someone once wrote, “If you have money, people want to give you more. If you’re rich and famous, people love to give things to you. If you’re rich and influential, corporate boards invite you to join them." There you can make lots of money just by attending meetings and giving your opinion on the direction of the company you know nothing about.
“While CEOs take home millions of dollars even when their companies perform poorly, the lowest-paid workers are the first to be laid off in bad economic times. The average CEO still earns 728 times the salary of the average worker." The real problem here is that our society has convinced us that wealth equals success. We value people on the basis of their bank accounts, regardless of how they made their money. Americans tend to believe that rich people are better, smarter, more attractive, and more successful than everyone else. We idolize the rich and despise the poor.
When we pause and ponder these things, they plainly don’t make sense. That’s the way of the world. However, our Lord's has a plan and purpose for each one of us. His plans are different than the world's plans, and if we want to find any joy in life we must follow His will and His ways.
Philippians 4:8 states, "Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever admirable - if anything is excellent or praiseworthy - think about such things." We are called to be Kingdom minded, and to keep our thoughts set on things of the Lord. We are invited to seek His Kingdom and His righteousness. Then, as we seek Him and serve Him, He bestows His rich blessings upon us. Our Lord is awesome and intriguing in His ways, in His divine purposes, and in His plans. It is a great thrill to know Him and serve Him. It is a great adventure to allow ourselves to be propelled by His power and mercy. He is the daily bread for our journey. He is the delight of every pilgrim.
Max Lucado tells the story about flying on a plane one time with a certain lady. He said, "She sat in 14E and I sat in 14D. She was rural and I was urban. She was homey and I was professional. But she could see and I was blind.
"I groaned. I had a bad attitude. My week had been hectic. The plane was late and overbooked. I had a toothache and had left the tooth medicine at the hotel. I wanted to sleep, but I had work to do. And now I was sitting next to Gomer Pyle’s mother.
"‘Oooh, boy, look at that one!’ She pointed at the plane ahead of us on the runway. ‘Is this one that big?’ ‘Yes,’ I hoped my brief response would show her that I wasn’t up for chitchat. It didn’t. ‘I’m hoping to see my boy in Dallas. Do you ever go to Dallas? I hope he’s OK. He had a stomach flu last week. He’s got a new dog. I can’t want to see it. It’s a Labrador. Do you know what that is? They are big and lovable...’
"She was uncanny. Not only could she add a syllable to every word, she could answer her own questions. As we were taking off, however, she got quiet. For several moments she said nothing. Then she suddenly let out a sound that would have called the pigs for dinner. ‘Oooooeeee, those trees down there look like peat moss!’ People around us stared like I was E. F. Hutton.
"’What river is that?’ I told her I didn’t know, so she flagged down a stewardess.
"When the drinks came around, I asked for a Coke; she asked for the list. ‘Tell me again?’ So the stewardess told her again, ‘Oh, it’s so hard to choose,’ she giggled. But she finally chose.
"When they brought her the drink, she exclaimed that she didn’t know apple juice came in cans. And when they brought her a sandwich, she opened the box and proclaimed loud enough for the pilot to hear, ‘Why, they even put mayonnaise in here.’
"When I pulled out my laptop computer, she was enthralled. ‘Now isn’t that clever.’ And that went on the whole flight. She didn’t miss a thing. If she wasn’t staring out the window, she was amazed by a magazine.
"If she wasn’t talking, she was ‘ooohing.’ She played with her fan. She turned her light on and off. She toyed with her seat belt. She savored her lunch. When we went through turbulence, I looked over at her to be sure she was all right, and she was grinning. You’d have thought she was riding the Ferris Wheel at the county fair!
"It occurred to me, about mid-journey, that she was the only person enjoying the trip. The rest of us, the ‘sophisticated,’ were too mature to have fun. And as I was staring at a computer screen -- eyes tired, mouth hurting, stressed-out, trying to find a message for stress-filled people and never noticing that the message was sitting beside me.
"And I might never have noticed had she not leaned over and said to me at the end of the flight. ‘Son, I may be out of place in saying this, but you’ve worked the entire trip. You need to relax, boy. You need to put that machine up and enjoy the journey.’ GULP."
"I smiled weakly and mumbled some excuse about needing to get the work done before tomorrow. But she wasn’t listening. She was squeezing her hands together in excitement as we landed. ‘Wasn’t that a fu-un trip?’ she asked as we were leaving the plane.
"I didn’t say anything. I just nodded and smiled. Off she walked, bouncing down the concourse as curious as a six-year-old. I watched her as long as I could, then turned to go to my next flight with a lesson learned. I resolved to keep my eyes open." Lucado concluded, "It does little good, I decided, to make the trip and miss the journey."
Most of us are so caught up with the negatives of life that we fail to see the good, the positive, the blessings, the excitement, and the enchantment of life. No wonder we are not as happy as we could be. We need to align ourselves with Jesus, our Risen Lord, and focus on all the blessings that He bestows upon us.
Philippians 2:14-15, “Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe.”

In Jesus our Lord,
Brown
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Qp11X6LKYY