Brown's Daily Word 6/20/17

This is the day the Lord had made we will rejoice and glad in it.  Today is the longest day as the Spring season makes way for the debut of the sweet Summer 2017.  The Lord has showered us with some pleasant and friendly rains.  The gardens and the farms are full of life and laughter.  It is all beautiful.  I drove towards the country settings and scenes yesterday afternoon.  The meadows are studded with spring and summer flowers that are both wild and glorious; the bees at their hives were buzzing sweetly at work.  Our garden is coming along beautifully although it was planted less than a week ago.  Thank you Jesus.

     The Lord blessed us with an extravagant weekend. The Saturday banquet was served to a "Full House".  The banquet was delicious and the fellowship was sweet.  Kudos to our chefs Denny and Lynda.  We had impromptu sharing and laughing and even crying with tears of joy.  Many gave testimonies of the Lord's unfailing faithfulness and never failing mercies.  Some shared how they grew up in a time when there was no central heating and no central air.  Many were born on small farms  and with fewer possessions, yet the life was very rich and beautiful.  Some shared about the centrality of Jesus in their homes and families.  One young woman shared that  a little over a year ago their family lost their house in a fire.  They almost lost some their children.  The Lord miraculously rescued all of them though some children  suffered some severe burns.  The Lord has fully restored them and blessed them with a very spacious house.  They are blessed with six beaiutful children, aged from 11 years to a few months old.  The mom home school their children. She was praising the Lord for His wonders and miracles.

     The Lord blessed us in His House on Sunday, the Lord's day.  The church was full of laughter, praise, prayer, and even tears.  We had some special time to honor the dads who were there.  During the day I heard from all four of our daughters.  Janice shared that they all attended their morning worship, where Micah and Simeon have joined the children's choir   The Children's choir  sang during the morning worship service. After their Father's Day Sunday dinner they went to spend some time at  Walden Pond.  Sunita and Andy took their children the National Zoo in the morning and attended the evening worship service.  Laureen shared that she spent time with her friends and led the worship in the evening at her church in Washington, DC.  Jess shared that she and Lindy took Tom for Father's Day breakfast and attended the morning worship at their church.

     I spent some time visiting in person and over the phone, conversing with a dear friend.  She was sharing that her grandchildren are teenagers now.  She and her husband, who is an Orthopedic surgeon, go to Africa on Medical missions.  This is their thrill and joy during their retirement years.   Another friend was sharing that he and his wife are blessed.  Their lives are centered around their grandchildren.  He and his wife recently spent over a month in the West with some friends visiting seven National Parks.  They came  home "Soul Full". 

     The other day I was visiting a  local man who is a business man and entrepreneur who own several local business concerns - a very successful  man indeed.  After his wife died 11 years ago, he transferred  his businesses to his sons but remained busy in some of his pet projects.  He is 75 yeers and very active and engaged.  He said that he owns two islands in Canada that he uses for vacations destinations. I visited with another neighbor friend who shared that he and his wife are travelling West late this Summer, visiting some farms and ranches in the Midwest.  One of the dairy farms they plan to visit in Indiana milks 32000 cows.  Amazing!  "What a Country!", I said.

We have been hearing from our dear friends who live out of State who send their good wishes and blessings.  One couple shared that they are celebrating their 50 th wedding anniversary this July. She is a a cancer survivor over two decades. Praising the Lord for His healings and restorations.. We had a visit another sweet couple. They love the Lord serve Him joyfully.  He had  an open heart surgery in1999. <. He is stromg and sturdy. They drive to Florida few times a year. They are atr attending a double wedding of their  nieces in Mexico. They have grand children who are in high School They are over 6 feet tall.

 

I love to read Phillip Yancey’s fine book What’s So Amazing About Grace? In an early chapter he comments that grace is the “last great word.” He means that it is one of the last of the “great words” that has retained some of its original meaning: “free and undeserved bounty.” For instance, when we pray, we “say grace” to thank God for our food. We are “grateful” for a kindness done by another person. To show our thanks we offer a “gratuity.” Something that is offered at no cost is said to be “gratis.” And when we have overdue books from the library, we may return them at no charge during a “grace period.”

It is commonly said that Christianity is supremely a religion of grace. And that is certainly true. We sing about grace, we write poems about grace, we name our churches and our children after grace. In Grove City near Grove City College, is Grace United Methodist Church. We have a wonderful saint in our church whose name is Grace.

But for all that, grace is not well understood and often not really believed. We use the word a great deal but rarely think about what it means. It’s probably true that most of us think infrequently about God’s grace. we certainly believe in grace, but outside of the worship services, the word is rarely on our lips.

Yancey points out that part of our problem is in the nature of grace itself. Grace is scandalous. Hard to accept. Hard to believe. Hard to receive. We all have a certain skepticism when a telemarketer tells us, “I’m not trying to sell you anything. I just want to offer you a free trip to Hawaii.” Automatically we wonder, “What’s the catch?” because we have all been taught that “there’s no free lunch.”

Here are a few other notes I jotted down from Yancey’s book: Grace shocks us in what it offers. It is truly not of this world. It frightens us with what it does for sinners. Grace teaches us that God does for others what we would never do for them. We would save the not-so-bad. God starts with prostitutes and then works downward from there. Grace is a gift that costs everything to the giver and nothing to the receiver. It is given to those who don’t deserve it, barely recognize it, and hardly appreciate it.
In Christ.
Brown

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Brown's Daily Word 6/17/17

Honor and Praises to Jesus, the Bright and the morning star.  His light shines on us and His glory fills the earth in all seasons and in all spheres.  Praise Him for this new day.  I woke up early this morning, refreshed and rested, along with the singing birds with their sonnets and melodies.  As woke up I was reminded of the words of Fernando Ortega:

     If the rain clouds come
     Or the cold winds blow,
     And in my heart I know

     This good day day
     It is a gift from you.
     The world is turning in its place
     Because you made it to.
     I lift my voice
     To sing a song of praise
     On this good day.

     Jesus is the divine and ultimate mover and shaker of the universe.  As it is written, "in Him we live  and move and have our being.  We praise the Lord for His manifold blessings and mercies.  Our daughter Sunita flew from Bangkok back to Washington yesterday.  After more than 21 hours in flight she arrived in Washington, DC safe and sound.  She said the conference was was a blessing, as she got to meet some of the leaders and servants from Southeast Asia who are serving Jesus through the work of World Vision.  

     Our son in law Jeremy celebrated his 40 birthday yesterday.  He said that Janice and he took a walk in the woods and went out for lunch and a birthday dinner.  It was a special-day of celebration indeed.  We praise the Lord for Jeremy.  

     We finished planting garden 2017.  We did much of planting on Thursday afternoon.  The Lord sent a drenching rain all night Thursday.  Thanks be to Jesus for our friend who has given us the garden space.  It is surrounded by a panoramic view of the the hills, downs, farms, and fields.  The morning and evening vista is therapeutic.  The garden is surrounded  by sweet corn fields and bee hives that belong to local bee farmer.  We are grateful and thankful.

     Praise the Lord for the life and witness of Wilbur Wesner, who entered the church triumphant this week.  He and his dear wife Prudence were part of the staff  of the Church I served for 25 years. Wilbur and Trudy, who were married for 61 years, were faithful servants of Jesus.  Wilbur was 86 years old when he entered the Church Triumphant.  "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints".

    Praise the Lord for Saturday.  We are gearing up for an evening of feasting and celebration.  We will gather for a banquet this evening at 6:00 PM.  The menu includes Prime Rib and all the trimmings. Praise the Lord for Sunday, when our Nation celebrates Father's Day.  Praise the Lord all fathers.  I praise the Lord for my dad, whose name was Solomon.  He died in 1973 at the age of 48.  My dad was man of deep faith and great courage who was blessed with a magnanimous spirit and heart overflowing with generosity and kindness.  I am honored and blessed to be the father of my beautiful daughters who refresh my heart and challenge my walk with the Lord.  They provoke me to live on the edge for sake of the Kingdom of Jesus our Lord.

     It’s Father’s Day this weekend, and the very first national celebration of this day was on June 19, 1924, by proclamation of President Calvin Coolidge.  It all came about because of the efforts of Sonora Smart Dodd, who was sitting in church in 1909 listening to a Mother’s Day sermon when the idea of Father’s Day first came to mind.  Having been raised by her father after her mother’s death, Sonora wanted her father to know how special he was to her for all his parental sacrifices and for being, in her eyes, so courageous, selfless, and loving.  Through the efforts of this devoted daughter President Coolidge designated the 3rd Sunday of June as “Father’s Day.”  Our nation has been celebrating Father's Day ever since.

     In June 1992, Jim Davidson and Mike Price climbed Mt. Rainier. On the way down, the two climbers fell 80 feet through a snow bridge into a glacial crevasse.  It was a pitch-black, ice-walled crack in the massive glacier that cover Mt. Rainier.  Mike Price died in that tragic event.

     In his book "The Ledge", Jim Davidson tells the story of his miraculous survival and courageous climb out of the crevasse. Throughout the book, Jim reflects back to his childhood and young adult years, describing his relationship with his dad.  As early as Jim can remember, his father had shown what some considered an almost reckless confidence in his son.  Jim worked for his father, painting high, steep-pitched roofs and electrical towers as early as age 12.  The work terrified his mother, but Jim's father kept communicating his belief that Jim could accomplish great things if he pressed through adversity and kept going.

     As Jim stood, bloodied and bruised, on the two-foot-wide snow ledge next to the body of his climbing partner, he heard the encouraging voice of his father.  With minimal gear and no experience in ice climbing at that level, Jim spent the next five hours climbing out, battling fatigue and the crumbling ice and snow that threatened to bury him.  Throughout his ordeal, Jim kept recalling the words of his dad.  Five grueling hours later, thanks to his father's words, Jim climbed out of the crevasse to safety.

     Our success as fathers depends a lot on the words we speak to our children.  Few fathers will ever have the value of their words tested as dramatically as Jim's father.  Sooner or later, the effectiveness of our words will be evident.

     Sometimes the role of a father's words is de-emphasized.  Many insist that what a father says is not nearly as important as what he does.  Certainly there is a measure of truth in this, but we all know how powerful words can be.  Solomon, the wisest man to ever live, wrote in Proverbs, "The tongue has the power of life and death, and those who love it will eat its fruit" (18:21).  Every one of us can probably think of a moment in our lives when someone's words brought us either life or death.  It then stands to reason that the words a father speaks to a son or daughter are especially powerful

Brown's Daily Word 6/15/17

Praise the Lord for another fabulous day in His Kingdom.  It is filled with His promises and paved with his grace, surrounded with His loving kindness and tender mercies.  We were able to face time with Sunita  in Bangkok several times.  The Lord blessed her time with His favor.  She is flying back Washington today, and will be back home tomorrow morning. One of our young friends, Ben, is retiring today from law enforcement services.  I married him with his bride and baptized and confirmed their children, who love the Lord.  One of them is in university and the other one is entering college this fall.  Praise the Lord for the way He endues with talents and gifts that we can use on earth to serve Him and glorify His name.

     I read a story about a rich American businessman who, while vacationing in Mexico, was disturbed to find a fisherman just sitting lazily beside his boat.  "Why aren't you out there fishing?", he asked.  "Because I've caught enough fish for today," said the fisher-man.  "Why don't you catch more fish than you need?", the rich man asked.  "What would I do with them?"  "You could earn more money," came the impatient reply, "and buy a better boat so you could go deeper and catch more fish.  You could purchase better nets, catch even more fish, and make more money.  Soon you'd have a fleet of boats and be rich like me." The fisherman asked, "Then what would I do?"  "You could sit down and enjoy life," said the industrialist.  "What do you think I'm doing now?" the fisherman replied.

     In the Book of Ecclesiastes we read about the quest for life and  pleasure.  Ecclesiastes is an autobigraphical narrative of king Solomon, the wisest king who ever lived.  It is a self disclousre by the wisest king about his hunger, thirst, and daily issues.  The first chapter revealed Solomon as he looked for the meaning of life. Solomon described the search that he was going through.  He was searching for relief from the futility of life through pleasure.  He actually catalogued for us the different ways in which he pursued pleasure.  He pursued possibilities that he investigated: alcohol, comedy, self-motivated building projects, entertainment, servants, music, and sex.  Solomon had everything necessary to carry out his grand experiment.  He had almost unlimited resources, money, and time.

     “So I became great and excelled more than all who were before me in Jerusalem.  Also my wisdom remained with me.  Whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them.    I did not withhold my heart from any pleasure, For my heart rejoiced in all my labor; And this was my reward from all my labor.”  “Then I looked on all the works that my hands had done And on the labor in which I had toiled; And indeed all was vanity and grasping for the wind.”

     Solomon eventually faced up to his situation and his life as it really was, and he found it only transitory and meaningless.  He found no lasting satisfaction.  That is how God designed us in that if we were able to find lasting satisfaction in earthly pleasure, we would never recognize our need for God.  Ecclesiastes is in the Bible, not to make us depressed or discourage us but to drive us back to God.

     According to the Word of the Lord, the invitation is to turn from drinking from the “broken cisterns that can hold no water” unto the Lord, “the fountain of living waters” (Jeremiah 2:23).  The promise given by the Lord is that if one drinks from him, the water that quenches our thirst will go on forever, a spring welling up to eternal life. (John 4:13-14)

     The wonderful good News is: “For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.  For one will hardly die for a righteous man; though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die.  But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:6-8-)  God adopts us as his own.  What Jesus promises is not temporary gratification but lasting joy.  He promises a place with Him, in whose presence is fullness of joy forever.

In Christ,

 Brown 

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