Brown's Daily Word 11/10/15

Praise the Lord  for this new day.  We will rejoice and be glad in it.  A small team of short term missionaries have gone to the area where I was born.  Another team will be traveling there towards the middle of the month. They re all from the Southern tier New York.  They will be working with children, encouraging local pastors and leaders, and coming alongside many who are laboring in the  Kingdom of our Lord and Savior.  I would like to share a portion from the Morning Prayer, "A Diary of Private Prayer", by  John Bailie.  "O God without me, forbid that I should look today upon the work of Thy hand, and give no thought to Thee, the Maker.  Let the Heavens declare Thy glory, to me,  and the hills Thy majesty.  Let every fleeting loveliness I see speak to me of a loveliness that does not fade.  Let the beauty of the earth, be to me a sacrament of the beauty of holiness made manifest in Jesus Christ my Lord." 

    As we watch the news and read the news papers we get glimpses of a world that has gone insane.  Day by day we witness that some of the foundations of the civilization are crumbling.  Godlessness and the lawlessness are rampant.  Men of evil intent and depravity are on the move, destroying and decimating nations and people.  Innocent and powerless people have become soft targets of terrorism and violence.  Christians around the world are facing torture and persecution.  In the midst of all this, though to some it does not make any sense, we turn our eyes unto Jesus.  The Bible says, “Everyone born of God overcomes the world.  This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith” (1 John 5:4).  It goes on to say, “We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin; the one who was born of God keeps him safe, and the evil one cannot harm him” (1 John 5:18).  All this is from God, for Jesus said, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble.  But take heart!  I have overcome the world” (John 16:33).

 

    In the third century, Cyprian wrote to his friend, Donatus: “This seems a cheerful world, Donatus, when I view it from this fair garden under the shadow of these vines. But if I climbed some great mountain and looked out over the wide lands, you know very well what I would see. Brigands on the high road, pirates on the seas, in the amphitheaters men murdered to please the applauding crowds, under all roofs, misery and selfishness. It is really a bad world, Donatus, an incredibly bad world. Yet in the midst of it, I have found a quiet and holy people. They have discovered a joy which is a thousand times better than any pleasure of this sinful life. They are despised and persecuted, but they care not. They have overcome the world. These people, Donatus, are the Christians. . . and I am one of them.”  While trials are not things we want to think about, it is absolutely vital that we are prepared.  Maybe it will never happen in our lifetime — may God let it be so!  But we cannot deceive ourselves into thinking that the biblical cautions about persecution don’t apply to us.  It was Jesus who said, “Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven".  Mathew 5

  In Christ.

   Brown

 

    https://youtu.be/TZrxNZibe_I

Brown's Daily Word 11/9/15

Praise the Lord for this month of November.  The Lord blessed us with a beautiful day in His house yesterday.  We are gearing up for a great Thanksgiving Season of giving and receiving, sharing and investing.  The Advent season of the church begins on the last Sunday of this month.  What a way to celebrate and recount  His blessings and all His benefits and, best of all, His tender mercies.  We are planning to host the St. Petersburg Men's Ensemble in live concert.  The group consisting of gifted and very talented musicians hailing from St. Petersburgh, Russia will be with us, presenting their concert on Friday, December 4 at 6:00 PM at the Marathon United Methodist Church, Marathon NY.  Those of you who ,live in the region, please mark your calendars.  Please join us for an evening of great classical Russian Christian music along with some Russian Folk music.

    We are excited that we get to celebrate the Thanksgiving season once again and one more time.  Thanks be to be Jesus our Lord.  There is a theme in the Bible that appears in several different places, and one of them is written in Thessalonians, "Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus" (1 Thess. 5:16-18).  "Make music from your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Eph. 5:19-20).  "And be thankful.  Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts.  And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him (Colossians 3:15-17).

    One of the Christian doxologies is based on Ephesians 1:1-3- Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly placesin Christ, 4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love,5having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, 6to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved. 7In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace 8which He made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence, 9having made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Himself, 10that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth—in Him. 11In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will."

    We  cannot manufacture gratitude by willpower, even though a lot of people try to do this.  In the Biblical sense, ingratitude is the opposite of gratitude. Ingratitude is not a psychological problem.  It's not just an impoverishment of  emotional experience.  It's a sin.  Paul says it's the hallmark of a life that rebels against the Lord., "For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile."  Romans 1.  In other words, they perceived themselves to be entitled, to be owed. They didn't see themselves as grateful receivers of grace every moment. 

    I love the prayer from the Book of Common Prayer which teaches us that we owe our ultimate gratitude for God's ultimate gift.  It says, "Almighty God, Father of all mercies …" all the benefits, all mercies, "… we your unworthy servants …" (a phrase which grates in our culture.  We don't want to use it, but if I think of myself as the entitled master, I'll never be grateful.  I'll miss out on God's desire for my life. I'm a creature and I'm a sinner.) "… we your unworthy servants do give you most humble and hearty thanks. We bless you for our creation, our preservation, all the blessings of this life, but above all, for your inestimable love in the redemption of our world by our Lord Jesus Christ."  In other words, more gratitude will not come from more acquisitions, but from more awareness of God's presence and God's goodness. 

In Christ.

Brown

https://youtu.be/twWjeH81krk

Brown's Daily Word 11/6/15

Praise the Lord for the Harvest and Thanksgiving season.  The Lord of the harvest always lavishes upon us a bountiful harvest of blessings, seen and unseen, earthly and heavenly, mundane and majestic, earthy and ethereal.   We are so blessed to live in a land of such bountiful blessings.  The stores and market places are stocking up all the new produce and harvest items as they get ready for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  We live in a country where the people of the Lord open their hearts and their hands to strangers, as well as to neighbors, with gladsome spirit. 

 

    I was talking to a woman a few days ago who shared with me that on the farm where she lives with her family they raise turkeys. . . big ones.  Last year they cooked for the family Thanksgiving banquet a turkey that weighed 60 pounds.  WOW!  A few years ago one of our farmer friends raised turkeys for us and we cooked a turkey that dressed out at over 40 pounds.  It is all of His blessing and grace.

 

    He blessed us with a wonderful Wednesday Evening gathering this week.  The day was a very warm, almost summer-like, day.  Yesterday, Thursday, was another wonderful gift from the Lord.  It was sunny, warm, and balmy.

 

    Praise the Lord for children and grandchildren.  Jesus loves them dearly and deeply.  I have been thinking of our oldest granddaughter, Micah, who celebrated her 10th birthday this week. She loves to embroider, sew, and knit like her mom and her grandmom.  She loves Indian foods and she is learning to cook.  She tells her friends that she is 1/4 Indian.  She told me that she is going to go to fiddle camp.  She has been playing fiddle for less than a year, but is already "jamming" with other instrumentalists from time to time.

 

    Yesterday we had Release time at the church where the children from the public school come to learn about Jesus.  It was thrilling. The children were very courteous and eager to learn and wanted to listen and share.  The children make me feel young and invigorated.  It was great experience. The kids are smart, courteous, and inquisitive.  We praise the Lord for each one of them. 

 

    Since it is getting dark earlier and earlier, Alice and I have changed our walking route for a season.  In the evening Alice and I walked around the "Village Green" and the "Town Park" near the Civic Center.  People were out and about , enjoying another summer-like day.  We saw young boys and girls playing soccer on the soccer fields and young parents walking with their young ones, enjoying another good day in God' Kingdom.  Flocks of Canadian geese were hovering over the river banks and ponds, singing melodious sonnets, praising the Lord for another day. 

 

    As we all begin our pilgrimmage towards Thanksgiving season and day let's look at a verse from 1 Thessalonians.  Be joyful always; pray continually;  Give  thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus” (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18).  Writing over one hundred years ago, Professor James Denney of Scotland called these three commands “the standing orders of the gospel.” They are “standing orders” because they always apply to every Christian in every situation.  In the Greek it is very clear because these imperatives are all in the present tense.  You could translate it, “continually rejoice, continually pray, and continually give thanks.”  This is a great challenge for all of us. 

 

    Most of us would have no problem if the text said, “Rejoice sometimes”, “Pray occasionally”, “Give thanks when you feel like it."  We are invited, we are challenged,  and we are given a command, “Always.”  "Continually.”  “In all circumstances.”  This suggests that the real impact of the gospel will be seen when we don’t feel joyful, when we don’t want to pray, and when we can’t think of a reason to be thankful.  These simple commands reveal the true life-changing power of Jesus Christ.  When he enters a life, he changes it from the inside out so that we have both the power and the desire to rejoice, to pray, and give thanks even in the worst moments of life.

 

    We know from our childhood and our days in Sunday school that the shortest verse in the Bible is, "Jesus wept" (John 11:35).  However, this is only the shortest verse in the English version.  When we look at the Greek text we see that the shortest verse is, "Rejoice always".  When the angel told the shepherds about the birth of Jesus he called it, "good news of great joy that will be for all people" (Luke 2:10).

 

    Years ago we used to sing a gospel song that began with the words, “We have heard the joyful sound.  Jesus saves!  Jesus saves!”  Whenever the gospel is preached, it is a “joyful sound” to those that hear it.  If the gospel is truly good news, then we ought to rejoice and be glad.  The  evidence  of the gospel’s power for most people will be what they see in us. 

 

    Jesus said, These things I have spoken to  you, that my joy may be in you" (John 15:11).  Jeremiah wrote, "From them shall proceed the voice of thanksgiving and the sound of those who make merry and I will multiply them and they will not be diminished" (Jeremiah 30:19).  Let us consider what this means when we gather for worship this coming Sunday In His House.  "Majesty, worship His majesty"

In Christ,

  Brown

https://youtu.be/PnWKehsOXu8