Brown's Daily Word 11-16-11

 

Good morning, 

    Praise the Lord for this Wednesday.  We are just a week away from Thanksgiving Eve. The Lord blessed us with a very mild and winsome day yesterday.  I was walking around the church grounds yesterday looking at the Forsythia bush that was planted by dear brother Ed Hower, which is currently in bloom.  We have fresh flowers in November.  In Orissa , India the roses are in full bloom, along with the Poinsettias, which bloom profusely during Christmas season.  You will see the Poinsettias in bloom by the hedges and byways, welcoming the NEWBORN King.        

    We will gather for our Midweek service this evening at 6 PM with a full meal. followed by Bible Study and choir practice. 

    These devotions are posted on  my home page:  Brownnaik.blogspot.com and also on my face Book page.

   As I pause and ponder anew about Thanksgiving I confess that sometimes I grumble.  I ask the Lord for His Forgiveness.  Grumbling is forgetfulness.  Maya Angelou, African-American poet, tells of whiners who would come into her grandmother's store in Arkansas. Grandma would always quietly beckon Maya to come closer. Then she would bait the customer with "How are you doing today, Brother Thomas?"  As the complaining gushed forth, she would nod or make eye contact with her granddaughter to make sure Maya heard what was being said. As soon as the whiner left, her grandmother would ask Maya to stand in front of her. Then she would say the same thing she had said at least a thousand times: "Sister, did you hear what Brother So-and-So or Sister-Much-to-Do complained about?  You heard that!"  Maya would nod.

    Grandma would continue, "Sister, there are people who went to sleep all over the world last night, poor and rich and white and black, but they will never wake up again.  Sister, those who expected to rise did not .... And those dead folks would give anything, anything at all for just five minutes of this weather or 10 minutes of that plowing that person was grumbling about.  So you watch yourself about complaining, Sister" said Grandma.

    Grandma would conclude: "What you're supposed to do when you don't like a thing is change it.  If you can't change it, change the way you think about it.  Don't complain." 

    Paul said, "Do all things without murmuring ["complaining" in some translations]", using the same word found in the Greek translation of the Old Testament, the word found in the story of grumbling Hebrews. It's a word which sound like what it means—gongusmos.  Like our English word "murmur", it sounds like grumbling?  "Do all things without murmuring," for grumbling is forgetting.  That goes not only for our relationship with God but also for our relationships with one another.  Often, when I murmur about people close to me, it is because I forget the good things in their lives and in our relationship.

    God still graciously satisfies our hunger.  God still graciously feeds us with the Bread of Life, Jesus Himself.  Grace is something completely unearned and unmerited.  Thanksgiving is acknowledging that someone has given us what was not our due.  Thanksgiving is recognizing we have been given something not owed us.

    Americans are big on entitlement.  We presuppose that God owes us something or that God is in our debt although, in reality God's goodness is never earned.  If it were earned, it would be barter not blessing.  In fact, sometimes God surprises us in that when we least deserve it, God pours out gracious blessings on us.  An entitlement mentality seldom leads to thanksgiving.  When we think we've got it coming to us, what is there to be thankful for?  (So, according to that line of thinking, why not grumble when we don't receive what we think we deserve?)     

    Thankfulness," veteran preacher Warren Wiersbe once observed, "is the opposite of selfishness.  The selfish person says, ‘I deserve what comes to me! Other people ought to make me happy.'  But the mature Christian realizes that life is a gift from God, and that the blessings of life come only from God's bountiful hand."

    Thanksgiving is the response to grace.  Thanksgiving humbly acknowledges, "God, how good You are to me!"  Thanksgiving is responding to God's grace even in the midst of trouble.  "In everything," Paul wrote, "give thanks."  Not necessarily for everything, but in every situation, give thanks for who God is.

    Thanksgiving is a response to grace.  There are times when it is easy to forget that life itself is a gift of God's grace.  There are times when we forget what God has done in Jesus.

    Avery Brooke offers this straightforward prayer: "I have many things to be thankful for, God.  Sometimes I remember them and other times I forget.  When something large or small goes wrong, it fills my mind and I forget those things for which—when I remember—I am thankful.  Help me to remember the good things, God.  To name them, to savor them, and to be thankful to you.  Amen" (Avery Brooke, Plain Prayer for a Complicated World).

 In Christ,
  Brown
 http://youtu.be/dtfkyyPQLAE

Saturday , November19.2011

                       Praise and worship service:

                        First United Methodist Church , Endicott

                            Sponsored by  Union Center UMC

                        6 PM Gathering- Coffee- Fellowship

                        6.30PM  Worship

                         Music:     Jane Hettinger                        Speaker: Dave Hettinger

Brown's Daily Word 11-15-11

Praise the Lord for the wonderful season of of Thanksgiving that paves way for the Advent Season that culminates in the glorious Christmas Event and the season.  People are already saying, “Where did the year go?” Already the stores are filled with Christmas decorations, children are wondering what they will find under the tree.  My wife has already completed decorating two of multiple Christmas trees.  I was talking to one of the nurses at Lourdes yesterday who shared with me that she going get her fresh Christmas tree this Saturday.  These days Thanksgiving is basically a pre-season holiday, something you do to get in shape for Christmas.  We eat, we sleep, we watch football, and we don’t stop until January.

    Somebody said that it is the the art of giving thanks that separates man from the animals.  To receive a gift and say, “Thank you,” is one of the noblest things a man can do.  There is nothing small or trivial about it.  To say “Thank you” is to acknowledge that we have been given something we did not earn and do not deserve.  Happy is the man who understands that all of life is a gift of God and that life itself is the ultimate gift.  This is why the Bible says, “In everything give thanks.” (I Thessalonians 5:18)  When we can’t do anything else, we can always be grateful.  Someone has said, “If you can’t be thankful for what you have received, be thankful for what you have escaped.”

    Our Loving Heavenly Father has a way of  weaning us from our dependence on the things of the world.  A Bible commentator wrote over a century ago about how God weans us from dependence on the world.  First, he makes the things of the world bitter to us. S econd, he removes one by one the things upon which we depend.  Third, he gives us something better.  In the end, we find that we no longer need the things we used to think we couldn’t do without.  Then our walk with God is stronger than ever before.
    At the end of a bloody battle during the Civil War, someone found the following prayer folded in the pocket of dead Confederate soldier: "I asked God for strength, that I might achieve; I was made weak, that I might learn humbly to obey.  I asked for health, that I might do greater things; I was given infirmity, then I might do better things.  I asked for riches, that I might be happy; I was given poverty, that I might be wise.  I asked for power, that I might have the praise of men; I was given weakness, that I might feel the need of God.  I asked for all things, that I might enjoy life; I was given life, that I might enjoy all things.  I got nothing I asked for, but everything I had hoped for.  Almost despite myself, my unspoken prayers were answered.  I am, among men, most richly blessed."  It is a great advance in spiritual understanding to be able to say, “I got nothing I asked for, but everything I had hoped for.” 
    Several years ago I ran across a copy of a letter written by a woman named Lois Kaufman after the death of her husband and her two subsequent tumor operations.  The letter was written to Jesus. (The letter was published in the Biblical Bulletin, a publication of the Biblication Theological Seminary in Hatfield, Pennsylvania.)

"Dear Jesus,
    I’ve written a lot of “Thank Yous” lately, but this is my first one to you.  Until now I didn’t appreciate your gifts to me these past several months.  Thank you for taking Don home to be with you.  Now I’ll never be concerned with what the future holds for him.  His days are guaranteed.  Thank you for giving him such a wonderful Christmas.  Thank you for making his birthday last Sunday his best ever.
    "Thank you for putting me in the hospital three weeks after he died and showing me the way you could use his death in my life.  I wasn’t always sure how to approach others with the Gospel.  But now you have given me so many openings, I can hardly handle them all.
    "Thank you for my most recent surgery and for the lessons it taught me. Especially for showing me how much I needed you.  Thanks for letting me see what it is like to face surgery and suffering without you as I watched the difference in the lives of my roommates.
    "Thank you for the lessons Becky and Lori (her daughters) have learned from this.  I could never have taught them the way you did.  That’s because of the great Teacher you are.  I can’t wait to see what you give them on their heavenly report cards.
    "You know, Jesus, I wouldn’t have planned my life this way.  In fact, I would have planned it just the opposite.  I would have sought to avoid death’s knock.  I would have ducked out on the surgeries and tried to pretend that Christians were kept well by you all the time.  But I would have missed out on so much.
    "The kids are sorry they couldn’t be with their daddy on Father’s Day, but we were glad he could be with both his earthly and Heavenly Father this year.
    "Oh, I could go on with this letter, but I could never cover everything I have to thank you for. So I’ll send more, but for now please accept this as a beginning.
"Gratefully yours,
Lois"
    When we read something like that, we can only conclude one of two things: either that woman has lost her mind or she has chosen to put her confidence in God alone.  That’s the very choice we all face.
 In Christ,
 Brown

http://youtu.be/du0il6d-DAk

Brown's Daily Word 11-14-11

Good morning,

    Praise to the Lord the Almighty, the King of Creation.  This hymn was sung by our choir yesterday during our morning worship.  It was beautiful and powerful.  The Lord blessed us with a fantastic weekend of fellowship, worship, and witness.  Better is one day in His house than ten thousand elsewhere. 

    One of the readings for yesterday was taken from Mathew 25:14 ff.  The servants in this parable were each given talents according to their abilities.  Each servant had potential.  In fact, God has given us each of these talents with His hope that we will succeed and be fruitful and bring glory to Him.  The servants in this parable were all responsible for the talents that they had been given, even as God has entrusted us with the talents that He has invested in us.  We have an obligation to be all we can be and do all that we can do in developing these talents.

    A pastor tells of standing by his father’s tombstone and reading the words, "Born 1884 - Died 1970."  It suddenly occurred to him how much the little dash between those two dates symbolized".  (Herb Miller. Actions Speak Louder Than Verbs  Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1988, page 124).  It is what we do with the talents that God has entrusted to us that determines how much or how little is represented between the dashes.  That is the part of the responsibility that is up to each one of us.  We are responsible for what we do with the dashes between the dates of our births and deaths that will appear on our tombstones.
    The talents that are spoken of in this parable are symbolic of more than just money.  The talents also seem to be a metaphor for gifts and abilities.  The master who was issuing the talents to his servants was giving to each one according to his ability.  He expected his servants to invest, increase, multiply what they had been entrusted with.  The only way that they could succeed was to apply what they had been given.  Just as a seed cannot grow unless it is planted, so a talent cannot increase unless it has been invested.  Investing the talent meant that work was required.
    There is always a risk when we strive to invest something.  The master did not give these talents to his servants to be stored in a place for safekeeping until he had gotten back.  The master could have stored the talents (money) himself had that been his intention.  For the servants to invest the talents that they had been given meant that they had to take a risk.  There is an old adage that says "Nothing ventured, nothing gained".  There is also another adage that applies, "If you don’t succeed the first time, try, try again".  We all know that success is not always automatic, because it takes time and effort for an investment to begin to get profitable.
    The master came back to settle the accounts with his servants.  He was pleased with the success of the first two, who doubled the talents that they were given. They had proven themselves worthy of handling more and were rewarded with more as a result (Matthew 25:21,23).  The master also complemented them highly, "Well done thy good and faithful servant". (Matthew 25:21,23 KJV)  Then he came to the third servant who hid what he had been entrusted with because he was afraid.  The master called him "wicked and lazy" (Matthew 25:26 NRSV) because he never made an effort to invest what had been entrusted to him.  It was because of his laziness that what he had was taken away from him because he never made an investment with the talent that he was given.
    Regardless of the amount or the type of talent that God has given us, God wants us to be faithful in our service.  "For to every one who has will more be given, and he will have abundance; but from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away" (Matthew 25:29 RSV).  There is a known understanding regarding Matthew 25:29-----"use it or lose it".  We either use what God gave us or we lose the opportunity because our "fear" and lack of faith.  As Christian disciples, we have been entrusted with both our God-given talents (abilities) and the good news of the gospel so that we might be faithful and fruitful in investing what the Lord of the Harvest, has entrusted to us.  If we want to be fruitful,, then we must invest what God has entrusted us with.

   In Christ,

   Brown

 

http://youtu.be/8Jjb1wOUt4I