Brown's Daily Word 6/17/15

Praise the Lord for the another Wednesday.  We will have one more Wednesday here at our present location.  We will meet for our Wednesday Gathering this evening at 6:00 PM.  The Lord blesses us with abundant foods in these meetings.  Best of all He blesses us with sweet fellowship.  We have been meeting on Wednesdays since 1990.   The Lord has blessed us, His Sprit has provoked us,  and He has filled our cups to the brim.  Recently we had some friendly and invigorating rains.   I drove by some of the countryside yesterday, where everything is all green.  All the corn fields look vigorous and jubilant, praising the Lord and dancing before Him.

 

    One of the headlines I read recently said, "Missionary Pioneer Elisabeth Elliot Passes Through Gates of Splendor ".  I praise the Lord for the courageous, valiant,  and fearless witness of Jim and Elizabeth Elliott.  Jim Elliott  passed through the Gates of Splendor in 1955 as a very young and a very passionate missionary along with four other winsome missionaries.  I have been moved and blessed by the witness and the writtings of Eliabeth Elliott.  I met her in person a few years ago in Boston.

    A recent survey revealed the nineteen most popular stars on Twitter.  The list consisted of the people from the entertainment world who are often confused and lost.  I do not envy them nor do I begrudge them their moment in the spotlight.  But it did make me stop and think, "Who are the stars from God’s point of view?"  In my view, Elizabeth Elliot is a star.
 Jesus himself said, “You are the light of the world . . . Let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in Heaven" (Matthew 5:14, 16).  Paul said the same thing in Philippians 2:15, “You shine like stars in the world.”  The word “star” was also used in the first century for a navigational beacon that would shine in the dark to lead the ships safely into the harbor.  Christians are bright stars in a dark world.  We are put here to shine the light and so guide others safely home to God.
    Paul told the Philippians that they were “stars in the world.”  Many centuries ago Tertullian declared that “the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.” Wherever the church has gone, the cost of a new field has always been paid in blood.  I read about an inscription that  read something like this, “We plant this seed in the hope that it will someday bear a harvest of souls for the Kingdom.”

    The world has its stars and God has His.  Many Christians are martyred in the world today.  It is open season on faithful and joyful, defenseless Christians.When I think of Jim and Elizabeth Elliott, my mind runs to Hebrews 11:35-38 and its list of believers who suffered for their faith.  “Others were tortured and refused to be released . . . Some faced jeers and flogging, while still others were chained and put in prison.  They were sawed in two; they were put to death by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated.”  And then this wonderful phrase, “The world was not worthy of them.” 

In Christ,
Pastor Brown
https://youtu.be/zHnmy0A9qTY

Brown's Daily Word 6/15/15

    Praise the Lord  for this new day.  He blessed us with a bountiful weekend.  Sunita and her family spent the weekend in the gorgeous Shenandoah Mountains at a retreat center with friends.  Laureen had one of her Grove City College friends for the weekend in Washington.  On Friday she had the opportunity to worship on the mall (near the Smithsonian and the Washington Monument) with Kari Jobe, Mercy Me, and others.  Janice and her family spent the whole weekend in beautiful Boston.  She texted that Ada Asked her mommy,"I am sad.  Why?  Birds can fly, I cant."  Janice said also that the children were tired out spending the weekend in the favorite places in Boston.  Jessy called and shared that she and Tom were busy, making the house ready for arrival of the little baby.  The Lord blessed us with a wonderful and a very blessed day in His house yesterday.  Alice preached at Wesley and I preached at Union Center.  The Lord visited us.  We sensed His very presence.  It rained torrentially in the evening and almost all night.  They posted flash flood warnings for the area.  Alice said that as a child she had heard about monsoon rains of India.  She had never seen in her life until she went there.  She said, "After you moved the States the monsoons followed you here."  I said thank you Jesus, I love monsoons.  They remind us of the showers of blessings of Jesus.

    I am pausing and pondering on our Lord's majesty and might as I look back in my life serving the Lord and walking with Him.  You are all part of that blessing and grace of the Lord. 
    Our Loving Lord often puts us in situations where we are doomed to failure in order to force us to depend totally on him so that when the miracle comes, he alone gets the credit.  This is a divine strategy repeated many times in the Bible and in our own experience.  We often find ourselves in desperate straits with no way out, no good options, and no human way of remedying our situation.  God allows this to happen so that we will cry out to him.  When the deliverance comes, we are obliged to give the Lord the total credit.
    All too often we conclude that some thing can’t be done, and so we don’t bother trying to do it.  If Moses had taken that attitude, the Jews would still be in Egypt.  If Joshua had felt that way, he would have merely marched around Jericho.  If David had adopted that opinion, Goliath would still be terrorizing the Israelites.  You never know in advance what God may do so don’t rule out the possibility of a mighty miracle coming your way.
    God asks us to do the impossible and then he gives whatever we need to obey his command.  Erwin Lutzer, of the Moody Church in Chicago, points that Jesus often told people to do impossible things.  To a lame man he said, “Rise, pick up your bed, and walk.”  To a dead man, he cried out, “Lazarus, come forth.”  There is a true sense in which every command of God is totally impossible for us to obey. We always lack what we need to obey God’s commands, but God is faithful to give us whatever we need when we ask him.  What God demands, He supplies.  He “bids us fly and gives us wings.”
    When we offer our meager resources to God, we discover that the impossible  really is not impossible.  Years ago I ran across a quote from J. Hudson Taylor, a great man of faith whose missionary efforts helped open China to the gospel.  Time and again he saw God do amazing things in the face of hopeless circumstances and murderous hostility against him.  Reflecting on his experiences, he remarked that “there are three stages in any work attempted for God: Impossible, Difficult, Done.”  I am very encouraged by that because there are many moments when we all seem to be stuck in the “impossible” stage of life. Cheer up, we never know but our impossibility may simply be “Stage 1” of a mighty miracle Jesus  will perform on our behalf.
 What a Christ we serve!
In Him,
  Pastor Brown

https://youtu.be/KsoOG2mYegk

Brown's Daily Word 6/12/15

     Praise the Lord for this Fantastic Friday as our friends in UK would say.  The heat wave is on.  It will be about 90today..  Praise the Lord for the cool breeze of morning.  Though summer officially starts next week the sweet summer has already arrived in the midst of spring season.  The local farmers are harvesting strawberries.  I was looking at some of the fruit trees in our yard.  The pear trees are loaded.  The peach trees are also luxuriant.  The plum trees are also full of fruit though green still.  The cherry trees have some fruit too.  We can also buy all kinds fruits and vegetables in the super markets and the farm stands.

    I was talking to a dear brother the other day  who shared with me that his son and grandson are going to the state of Georgia hunting for wild boars.  I was excited to  hear about that because my dad back in village in Orissa hunted for wild boars.  They roamed the hills and the fields there, and usually came out from hiding during the monsoon season.  My dad was a smart and brave hunter.  Another brother was sharing that he was going to Canada hunting for moose in the Autumn season.  Praise the Lord for the way He replenishes the earth, with bounty and beauty. Praise the Lord Sunday is coming.  Let us plan to be in the Lord's house this coming Sunday  to worship, to serve, and witness.  May Jesus Christ be praised.
    It was Helen Keller who said, “Life is either a daring adventure, or it is nothing at all.”  Those words would ring true no matter who said them, but coming from someone who lived a life like Helen Keller, they merit special consideration.  Although as a child she was blind, deaf and unable to speak, she somehow found a way out of the darkness and into the world around her.  Her story is one of the great miracles of the twentieth century.  Millions of people have drawn inspiration from her example. 
    A life of faith is inherently a life of risk.  When we go back to the Bible and take a look at the men and women who did great things for God we find that they were, almost without exception, risk-takers who weren’t afraid to lay it all on the line for God.  Consider these examples . . .
    Noah built an ark in a dry and dusty land.
    Abraham left Ur of the Chaldees, the land of his fathers, to go to the Promised Land.
    Moses led the people of God out of Egypt.
    Joshua marched around the walls of Jericho.
    David defeated Goliath.
    Elijah faced down the prophets of Baal.
    Esther risked everything to save her people.
    Daniel refused to defile himself with the king’s food.
    Nehemiah led the Jews to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem.
    As we read the Bible, again and again we discover that the men and women who accomplished great things for God weren’t content to accept the status quo.  They thought that more could be done if only someone would lead the way.  When no one else stepped forward, they themselves volunteered.  
    This is only right and proper because the life of faith is inherently a life of risk. If we  are unwilling to take a chance, we can never discover what living by faith is all about.  If we have to have all the answers before we make a decision, if we are afraid to take a step unless we know things will work out to our advantage, faith will always be a mystery to us.  We are called and challenged to walk, not by sight but by faith.  Jesus will be always there... 
In Him,
Brown
https://youtu.be/VAJ4y48MLXM