Good morning,
This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. We will gather this evening for our mid-week fellowship, Bible Study, and Choir practice. I am looking at Psalm 117 this morning.
"Good things come in small packages," according to the old adage, and often this is true. It is most certainly the case with Psalm 117. By far it is the shortest poem in the Book of Psalms - the original Hebrew has all of sixteen words - The first two and last two Hebrew words of Psalm 117 constitute that familiar phrase that is sprinkled throughout the Book of Psalms: hallelu yah. We transliterate this phrase into the English word "hallelujah," now known the world-over because of Mr. Handel's famous chorus. In secular circles, and maybe in also the way we ourselves use the word, "hallelujah" is a way to express joy. In Hebrew this is actually in the imperative mood. Hallelu is a command meaning "Praise!" The two Hebrew words used in verse 2 are among the richest and loveliest in the Old Testament: they are often yoked together: chesed and emet. The translation here of "love" is pretty weak. Because chesed may well be the Old Testament's equivalent of what in the New Testament will be called "grace." God's chesed is very nearly the number one reason the psalmists list again and again for praising God.
Chesed is God's lovingkindness, his abiding love, his core tendency to stick with his people even when they don't stick with him; to forgive sin even when such a divine pardon is by no means warranted. Chesed is what sent Jesus our Lord to this world, and once the Son of God arrived here in our own flesh and blood, chesed is the grace and goodness that radiated so brilliantly from Jesus' every pore that it attracted sinners, prostitutes, lepers, and tax collectors the way a bright porch light draws in moths on a summer night. The grace of Jesus let people know there was forgiveness available no matter how greasy they'd lived up until the moment they met the Savior. If ever there were a one-word answer to the question of why God sent his only begotten Son to die on a cross, that answer would be chesed.
"The Word was made flesh and dwelled among us." . . full of grace and truth." That line is almost a throwback to Psalm 117 because the other word in verse 2, translated as "faithfulness," is the word emet, and though it can mean "faithfulness," it is also translated as "truth" and is the source of our English word "amen." The "grace and truth" of the incarnate Son of God as John proclaims him is very nearly identical with the chesed wai emet that Psalm 117 chalks up as reasons #1 and #2 for making the praise of God our proper human task and vocation every moment of every day.
We are fixed in the loving stare of a God who has something more than just our best interests at heart. We draw our every breath and live out our every day under the gaze and care of a God whose grace and truth, whose abiding desire to save us and stick with us forever, ensures that we have a very bright future. Psalm 117 summons us to worship God and to invite others to join the glory song, but our words and our lives need to be consistent with the God of all grace who is the target of all true praise.
In Christ,
Brown
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usfiAsWR4qU
Come Away With Me (A Time of Refreshing, Renewal & Meeting with Jesus)
When was the last time you were STILL enough to actually encounter Jesus?
No matter where you are on your Journey (Curious about Jesus or Been Walking w/Him for Yrs), This Weekend – He wants to Encounter YOU!
Once You Encounter Jesus – You Will Never Be The SAME!!
In Zechariah 4:6 it is written, "Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord of hosts." As we approach the end of the year, the Lord has placed before us many open doors - for worship, for ministry, and for service. We have been blessed to have many prayer warriors in the life of the church, who are faithfully and joyfully engaged in lives of fervent prayer.
Sunita and Andy's church in Washington, DC goes on retreat together twice a year. Sunita always returns from these events blessed, refreshed, and inspired. We attempted to have our church's prayer retreat at Sky Lake, but scheduling conflicts prohibited it, so we are planning to have our upcoming prayer retreat at our own church here in Union Center. We invite all of you to come and be a part of this event. Keep praying for the Lord to refresh our hearts and renew our minds.
Praise the Lord for each one who has offered his or her time, talents, and treasures to make the upcoming prayer weekend possible. The schedule follows:
Friday, November 5 - 6 PM Supper, with Indian and Italian dishes. A love offering will be received.
6:30 PM The Prayer Conference convenes.
Saturday, November 6, 8:30 AM breakfast, prepared by Kathy Dence and team. A love offering will be received.
9:00 AM - 13 noon The Prayer Conference continues.
5 PM Thanksgiving Banquet, held at First United Methodist Church on McKinley Avenue. The menu includes homemade pies, rolls, turkey, and the trimmings. Lou Pasquale is the head chef, together with Rodney Haines as his sous chef. Sign-up sheets for the banquet are located in the Narthex, or reservations can be confirmed by calling the church office at 748-6329.
6:30 PM Worship service in the sanctuary at First UMC, Endicott. Music will be provided by Aric Phinney and the team. The speaker will be Kelly Johnson.
Sunday morning worship services will be at UCUMC at 8:30 and 11:00 AM, with Sunday School at 9:50 AM. Kelly Johnson will be speaking to a combined Adult Sunday School at that time. Worship service will be held at Wesley UMC at 9:30 AM.
12:30 PM There will be a meal immediately following the 11:00 AM service. Chefs for the meal are Jeremy and Matt Smith. The menu includes Carribean pork, braised chicken, candied sweet potatoes, salad, green beans, and rolls.
Saturday Evening Worship Service:October 30, 2010
Music by Laureen Naik and team
Preacher: Jeff Vansyckle
November 6, 2010 - ( Saturday) There will be a Thanksgiving banquet. At 5 PM a traditional Thanksgiving menu will be served, including home made rolls and pies. Chef: Lou Pasquale and team. (Reservations: Call the Church office (607)-748-6329 or email at umcgospel@aol.com
The banquet will be followed by 6:30 PM Worship
Music: Aric Phinney and the team
Speaker: Kelly Johnson from Nashville, TN.
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Brown's Daily Word 10-26-10
Good morning,
Praise the Lord for this new day. He is alive and well. He is upon the His throne. All is well. He makes all things well in His time.
Victor Frankl was a Jewish Medical Doctor during 1930’s. Frankl was a pioneer of modern day psychotherapy, and he developed much of his theory for Psychotherapy while he was a prisoner in a WWII concentration camp, arrested along with other Jews and imprisoned. As a Medical Doctor, he was put to work treating other prisoners.
While serving in that capacity, Frankl had an opportunity to observe people under the most trying of circumstances. He saw people as they lived… and he saw them as they died. He had expected that people who were weak would die and those who were strong would survive. However, that wasn’t always true and it caused Frankl to wander if there wasn’t something else involved. What he observed became the source of his “Logo Therapy.” He noticed that those who lived had one thing in common: they had chosen to live rather than die.
He found that when everything else had been taken, friends, food, dignity, health… the one thing their captors could not take away was – choice, the choice to live.
According to Frankl, the last of man’s inalienable rights was the right of individual to choose how they would respond in any given situation. Victor Frankl said: “You cannot always control your circumstances, but you have the power to control your response to your circumstances.”
It reminds me of the story of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego. When commanded by the Babylonian King to bow down to his golden idol they replied:
"O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up." (Daniel 3:16b-18)
Even if God doesn’t rescue us…
we WILL NOT bow down.
we WILL NOT fall down
we WILL NOT stumble down before your idol.
We know that we have the peace of God when we are able to stand tall and look dead into the fiery furnace in our life and say: "Even if He doesn’t rescue me …. I will not stumble"
Isaiah 26:1-3 is an amazing passage, “In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah: We have a strong city; God makes salvation its walls and ramparts. Open the gates that the righteous nation may enter, the nation that keeps faith. You will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast, because he trusts in you.”
In vs. 1 we are told we have a strong city; God makes salvation its walls and ramparts. The imagery God is using is that of safety and peace INSIDE the walls of a city. In other words, if we are to find God’s peace & security then we must be inside the walls. We must be where He wants us to be. Therein lies all salvation, peace, and security.
In Christ,
Brown
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8_EfDqF7YI
October 30, 2010
Music by Laureen Naik and team
Preacher: Jeff Vansyckle
November 6, 2010 - ( Saturday) There will be a Thanksgiving banquet. At 5 PM a traditional Thanksgiving menu will be served, including home made rolls and pies. Chef: Lou Pasquale and team. (Reservations: Call the Church office (607)-748-6329 or email at umcgospel@aol.com
The banquet will be followed by 6:30 PM Worship
Music: Aric Phinney and the team
Speaker: Kelly Johnson from Nashville, TN.
Praise the Lord for this new day. He is alive and well. He is upon the His throne. All is well. He makes all things well in His time.
Victor Frankl was a Jewish Medical Doctor during 1930’s. Frankl was a pioneer of modern day psychotherapy, and he developed much of his theory for Psychotherapy while he was a prisoner in a WWII concentration camp, arrested along with other Jews and imprisoned. As a Medical Doctor, he was put to work treating other prisoners.
While serving in that capacity, Frankl had an opportunity to observe people under the most trying of circumstances. He saw people as they lived… and he saw them as they died. He had expected that people who were weak would die and those who were strong would survive. However, that wasn’t always true and it caused Frankl to wander if there wasn’t something else involved. What he observed became the source of his “Logo Therapy.” He noticed that those who lived had one thing in common: they had chosen to live rather than die.
He found that when everything else had been taken, friends, food, dignity, health… the one thing their captors could not take away was – choice, the choice to live.
According to Frankl, the last of man’s inalienable rights was the right of individual to choose how they would respond in any given situation. Victor Frankl said: “You cannot always control your circumstances, but you have the power to control your response to your circumstances.”
It reminds me of the story of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego. When commanded by the Babylonian King to bow down to his golden idol they replied:
"O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up." (Daniel 3:16b-18)
Even if God doesn’t rescue us…
we WILL NOT bow down.
we WILL NOT fall down
we WILL NOT stumble down before your idol.
We know that we have the peace of God when we are able to stand tall and look dead into the fiery furnace in our life and say: "Even if He doesn’t rescue me …. I will not stumble"
Isaiah 26:1-3 is an amazing passage, “In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah: We have a strong city; God makes salvation its walls and ramparts. Open the gates that the righteous nation may enter, the nation that keeps faith. You will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast, because he trusts in you.”
In vs. 1 we are told we have a strong city; God makes salvation its walls and ramparts. The imagery God is using is that of safety and peace INSIDE the walls of a city. In other words, if we are to find God’s peace & security then we must be inside the walls. We must be where He wants us to be. Therein lies all salvation, peace, and security.
In Christ,
Brown
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8_EfDqF7YI
October 30, 2010
Music by Laureen Naik and team
Preacher: Jeff Vansyckle
November 6, 2010 - ( Saturday) There will be a Thanksgiving banquet. At 5 PM a traditional Thanksgiving menu will be served, including home made rolls and pies. Chef: Lou Pasquale and team. (Reservations: Call the Church office (607)-748-6329 or email at umcgospel@aol.com
The banquet will be followed by 6:30 PM Worship
Music: Aric Phinney and the team
Speaker: Kelly Johnson from Nashville, TN.
Monday, October 25, 2010
Brown's Daily Word & World update 10-25-10
Good morning,
Here we are just two months away from Christmas, as my wife reminded me yesterday. Thank you Jesus. My wife is mentally getting ready for the Christmas music and the decorations. We are getting ready for our Prayer Conference weekend that begins on Friday, November 5, with gathering for food and fellowship at 6 PM. Our friend, Kelly Johnson, from Memphis, Tennessee will be with us for the entire weekend. The added blessing will be to have Sunita and Andy with us for the entire weekend also. It now appears that we will have our grandchildren, Micah and Simeon, with us for that weekend by ourselves.
The Lord blessed us with a beautiful weekend of worship, fellowship, and celebration. There are many who are praying for us for Saturday Evening worship services. The Lord is blessing us wonderfully. He is faithful and very gracious. This past Saturday we had present in the evening gathering a woman who is 90 years old. She attended the worship with her daughter and gave testimony to the wonder working of Jesus in her life. She and her husband are celebrating their 68th wedding anniversary. She thanked the Lord for His grace and mercy through all these years of worshipping and serving the Lord. The youngest in attendance was a baby who is 5 months old. Another woman testified that she learned ply piano as a little girl. The Lord got hold of her life and now she plays the songs of the Redeemer. What a blessing it has been serving the Savior with her gifts and talents! One of people who testified that the Lord is faithful and trustworthy is a man who is a contractor. He had a slow season in his business, but remained obedient to the Lord, giving his time and talent to the Lord. One evening he received an e-mail that his bid was selected for a large contract for his business. He praising the Lord for His unfailing love and faithfulness.
Every person’s life is like a power tool with an electrical plug. When we’re plugged into the Risen Lord and his resources, those resources flow into our lives to empower us to do that which we could not do on our own. The love we need in order to care about people, the patience we need when we’re frustrated, the courage we need in the face of fear…all these things come from being plugged into God’s grace. Lives that don’t plug into God’s grace won’t have the resources to leave a very significant mark.
Lives that refuse to plug into God’s grace are self-sufficient lives that rely on self and ego. It takes humility to admit that we have sinned against God and to trust in Christ for our salvation, but until we do that we cannot plug into God’s grace. Instead, we find that we are like a power saw trying to cut wood without a power supply.
Only lives empowered with God’s resources will leave a mark that lasts. I think of the names of Christians who have made a difference in the past, such as Augustine, John Wesley, Mother Teresa, John Wycliffe, and Galileo.
I want to live a life that is meant to last for ever. If we want to live that kind of life we must find our strength in God’s resources and multiply our influence through other people. We must be willing to pay the price, centering our lives around the good news of Jesus, and not give up no matter what.
In the 1800s a man named Alfred Nobel woke up on morning and opened the newspaper, only to see his own obituary printed. Imagine the shock of seeing your own obituary printed in the paper. You see, Alfred’s brother had died, and the newspaper mistakenly printed Alfred’s obituary instead of his brother’s. Alfred was a very wealthy person who had made his fortune by inventing dynamite. As he read his own obituary, he wondered if he really wanted to be remembered as Alfred Nobel, creator of a weapon of mass destruction.
Alfred decided he wanted his life to count for more than that. He decided he wanted to live a life that was built to last. He wanted to leave a legacy, so he started making changes. When Alfred died, he left most of his immense wealth gained from his invention of dynamite to a foundation designed to honor people who made a positive difference in the world. Thus was born the Nobel foundation, with prizes each year in five areas, including peace. Winners of this prize would include Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Albert Schweitzer.
In Christ,
Brown
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1E_kTQssB0I
October 30, 2010
Music by Laureen Naik and team
Preacher: Jeff Vansyckle
November 6, 2010 - ( Saturday) There will be a Thanksgiving banquet. At 5 PM a traditional Thanksgiving menu will be served, including home made rolls and pies. Chef: Lou Pasquale and team. (Reservations: Call the Church office (607)-748-6329 or email at umcgospel@aol.com
The banquet will be followed by 6:30 PM Worship
Music: Aric Phinney and the team
Speaker: Kelly Johnson from Nashville, TN.
Here we are just two months away from Christmas, as my wife reminded me yesterday. Thank you Jesus. My wife is mentally getting ready for the Christmas music and the decorations. We are getting ready for our Prayer Conference weekend that begins on Friday, November 5, with gathering for food and fellowship at 6 PM. Our friend, Kelly Johnson, from Memphis, Tennessee will be with us for the entire weekend. The added blessing will be to have Sunita and Andy with us for the entire weekend also. It now appears that we will have our grandchildren, Micah and Simeon, with us for that weekend by ourselves.
The Lord blessed us with a beautiful weekend of worship, fellowship, and celebration. There are many who are praying for us for Saturday Evening worship services. The Lord is blessing us wonderfully. He is faithful and very gracious. This past Saturday we had present in the evening gathering a woman who is 90 years old. She attended the worship with her daughter and gave testimony to the wonder working of Jesus in her life. She and her husband are celebrating their 68th wedding anniversary. She thanked the Lord for His grace and mercy through all these years of worshipping and serving the Lord. The youngest in attendance was a baby who is 5 months old. Another woman testified that she learned ply piano as a little girl. The Lord got hold of her life and now she plays the songs of the Redeemer. What a blessing it has been serving the Savior with her gifts and talents! One of people who testified that the Lord is faithful and trustworthy is a man who is a contractor. He had a slow season in his business, but remained obedient to the Lord, giving his time and talent to the Lord. One evening he received an e-mail that his bid was selected for a large contract for his business. He praising the Lord for His unfailing love and faithfulness.
Every person’s life is like a power tool with an electrical plug. When we’re plugged into the Risen Lord and his resources, those resources flow into our lives to empower us to do that which we could not do on our own. The love we need in order to care about people, the patience we need when we’re frustrated, the courage we need in the face of fear…all these things come from being plugged into God’s grace. Lives that don’t plug into God’s grace won’t have the resources to leave a very significant mark.
Lives that refuse to plug into God’s grace are self-sufficient lives that rely on self and ego. It takes humility to admit that we have sinned against God and to trust in Christ for our salvation, but until we do that we cannot plug into God’s grace. Instead, we find that we are like a power saw trying to cut wood without a power supply.
Only lives empowered with God’s resources will leave a mark that lasts. I think of the names of Christians who have made a difference in the past, such as Augustine, John Wesley, Mother Teresa, John Wycliffe, and Galileo.
I want to live a life that is meant to last for ever. If we want to live that kind of life we must find our strength in God’s resources and multiply our influence through other people. We must be willing to pay the price, centering our lives around the good news of Jesus, and not give up no matter what.
In the 1800s a man named Alfred Nobel woke up on morning and opened the newspaper, only to see his own obituary printed. Imagine the shock of seeing your own obituary printed in the paper. You see, Alfred’s brother had died, and the newspaper mistakenly printed Alfred’s obituary instead of his brother’s. Alfred was a very wealthy person who had made his fortune by inventing dynamite. As he read his own obituary, he wondered if he really wanted to be remembered as Alfred Nobel, creator of a weapon of mass destruction.
Alfred decided he wanted his life to count for more than that. He decided he wanted to live a life that was built to last. He wanted to leave a legacy, so he started making changes. When Alfred died, he left most of his immense wealth gained from his invention of dynamite to a foundation designed to honor people who made a positive difference in the world. Thus was born the Nobel foundation, with prizes each year in five areas, including peace. Winners of this prize would include Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Albert Schweitzer.
In Christ,
Brown
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1E_kTQssB0I
October 30, 2010
Music by Laureen Naik and team
Preacher: Jeff Vansyckle
November 6, 2010 - ( Saturday) There will be a Thanksgiving banquet. At 5 PM a traditional Thanksgiving menu will be served, including home made rolls and pies. Chef: Lou Pasquale and team. (Reservations: Call the Church office (607)-748-6329 or email at umcgospel@aol.com
The banquet will be followed by 6:30 PM Worship
Music: Aric Phinney and the team
Speaker: Kelly Johnson from Nashville, TN.
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