Академический Документы
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Культура Документы
NOVEMBER 2014
VOL. 8 NO 11
Americans have lived in the land of blessing for so many years that many
have begun to think that life owes them all these blessings. If we decide we would
like a candy, and the store is out of them, we find ourselves angry at the store
because we feel its our right to have that candy! Much of America is all about
our rights today. Many of the stores are celebrating Christmas (not Christ) and
completely overlooking Thanksgiving.
STOP! LOOK! LISTEN! Take time to see all the things you have to
be thankful for and remember, they all come from GOD. All good things come
from GOD. Just as we so often take our parents for granted, we often take our
God for granted. Here are some verses that tell us why and how to give thanks to
our God.
Ps 50:14-15
Offer unto God thanksgiving; and pay thy vows unto the most High:
And call upon me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify
me.
Thanksgiving is an OFFERING. It is a gift to be given to those who
deserve praise. This verse includes paying our vows at the same time we offer thanksgiving and it gives us a wonderful promise if we do. When we are in
trouble and call upon Him, He will deliver us and then we will not only be thankful but we will glorify our God. The old saying is Put your money where your
mouth is!
(Continued on page 2)
else?
Ps 116:16-19
O Lord, truly I am thy servant; I am
thy servant, and the son of thine handmaid: thou hast loosed my bonds.
I will offer to thee the sacrifice of
thanksgiving, and will call upon the
name of the Lord.
I will pay my vows unto the Lord now
in the presence of all his people,
In the courts of the Lords house, in the
midst of thee, O Jerusalem. Praise ye
the Lord.
Ps 69:30-32
I will praise the name of God with a song, and will magnify him with thanksgiving.
This also shall please the Lord better than an ox or bullock that hath horns and
hoofs.
The humble shall see this, and be glad: and your heart shall live that seek God.
We can praise our God through our music and magnify Him with our
thanksgiving. Our thankfulness magnifies our God to those who know us. His
presence in our lives becomes more evident to those around us and that pleases
the Lord better than any other offering. This affects the humble and it brings life
to our hearts. Thanksgiving is profitable to both the giver and the receiver.
Ps 95:1-3
O come, let us sing unto the Lord: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our
salvation.
Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto
him with psalms.
For the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods.
How long has it been since you were in the presence of the Lord? Our attitude is very important when we approach our God. It makes all the difference as
to how He responds to our presence. God loves us to come with psalms. Psalms
tell of His greatness and we are to make a joyful noise about it.
Ps 100:3-5
Know ye that the Lord he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves;
we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.
Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful
unto him, and bless his name.
For the Lord is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations.
We are to KNOW that the Lord is God! Many speak it but few know
Him. Know that He made us. We are not self-made people. Know that we are
His sheep and we live in His pasture. We are to come into His courts with thanksgiving and praise, not murmuring and complaining. Bless His name, not curse
His name by a bad attitude. What do we have to be thankful for? He is good
everlasting and His truth endureth to all generations. How dare we not be thankful!
Ps 107:21-22
Oh that men would praise the Lord for his goodness, and for his wonderful works
to the children of men!
And let them sacrifice the sacrifices of thanksgiving, and declare his works with
rejoicing.
Thanksgiving is a sacrifice. We do not have to give live sacrifices as the
Jews did because Jesus is our sacrifice, but we can sacrifice by giving thanks to
God for what He has done. We give up the limelight and put our God in the spotlight when we show a grateful spirit for what He has done for us. Look at your
life and remember all the things God has done for you in your life time. How long
has it been since you declared those things to others. If we are not excited about
what God is and has been doing in our lives, how are we going to excite anyone
Ps 147:7-11
Sing unto the Lord with thanksgiving;
sing praise upon the harp unto our
God:
Who covereth the heaven with clouds,
who prepareth rain for the earth, who
maketh grass to grow upon the mountains.
He giveth to the beast his food, and to
the young ravens which cry.
He delighteth not in the strength of the
horse: he taketh not pleasure in the legs
of a man.
The Lord taketh pleasure in them
that fear him, in those that hope in his
mercy.
God does a wonderful job of
taking care of His creation and He takes
pleasure in them that fear Him and hope
in His mercy. Are we PLEASING the
Lord? Do we fear Him and hope in His
mercy?
----Jerry Brewster
Be
Instructed Before
Leaving Earth
-----Jerry Brewster
Bring your Bible
F
E
M
A
L
E
By
Gloria Brewster
INSPIRATIONS
WE WERE WAITING...
For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring
forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater: So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth:
it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.
Isaiah 55:10,11
Kannauj, Uttar Pradesh, Northern India, 1965 - A missionary plane is dropping boxes of New Testaments over villages
in this region. A young Indian man is on a trail outside of one of these villages when one of the boxes drops directly in front of
him. He opens the box and inside sees many books. He takes the box back to his village and gives away the books to others. He
keeps one for himself and reads it many times. He doesnt know what to do with the information he is reading. Time passes then
and there is very little opportunity to find work in his village so he does what millions of other Indians have done - he moves to
Delhi to find a job. He marries and settles into a densely populated area on the west side of the city...
In October of 2014, I was leading a small team of 5 men from Prestonwood Baptist Church on a short-term mission trip working with IMB missionaries and indigenous church planters in Delhi. Our group was broken into teams of two with a translator. These
indigenous Indian pastors were working to plant churches in unreached areas of Delhi and northern India. They were being mentored
and trained by the IMB staff missionaries. These pastors have planted hundreds of churches and our job was to work closely with the
main church planter. He had identified more than 30 house churches that we would visit during our stay. The homes these churches
were located in represented families that had accepted Christ and had become houses of peace for the communities where they were
located. The model these house churches were designed after can be found in Luke 10 where Jesus sent out 70 of His disciples and
told them to go before Him into villages he was planning to visit. There they were to find a house of peace, a family that receives the
gospel message and then invites their oikos (Gr.) - family and friends - to join them in their decision. The goal would be a church that
is established, made up of baptized believers.
Ben Dickinson, an intern from the North Campus, and I were scheduled to visit several homes of believers that had invited
friends and family that were not believers so that we could share our testimonies and the gospel message with these people in order to
encourage the small house churches that had been started and hopefully lead others to Christ and join their fellowships. When sharing at
these homes, we were to follow a very basic script. One of us would give our testimony, which included three parts: 1. Who we were
before Christ, 2. How we came to know Christ, and 3. What our life has been like after Christ. After one of us would give our testimony,
the other team member would share the gospel message emphasizing the fact that: 1. There is a judgment to come, 2. We must repent
and turn from our sins, 3. Christ died for our sins on the cross and 4. Through His sacrifice and victorious resurrection He paid for our
sins. Then we would invite anyone that had not accepted Christ to pray to receive Him. Depending on the makeup of the house church
we might wrap up with a simple devotion and we would always end in a time of prayer for each of their prayer requests.
We traveled to the west side of Delhi and began winding our way through small side streets to the first home we would visit. For Delhi,
this area was not too bad. Of course, there was open sewer running along many of the buildings that drained to a dirty stream where
piles of trash lined the banks and pigs, dogs and cows rummaged through the trash to find something to eat. The smells were sometimes
overwhelming and clouds of flies chased us as we walked past the stream. These homes were actually small apartments in buildings that
were 5 and 6 stories tall. We walked down a street that was so narrow that only motorcycles could pass. We turned into a doorway that
opened directly to the street. We removed our shoes and as we entered we could see that this home was large compared to others we had
been in. There were actually two rooms and, although the paint was faded and everything looked worn and old, it was clean and there
were already several people that had arrived and were waiting on us to begin. The meeting took place in the bedroom so that some might
sit on the bed. They also brought in some plastic chairs for us to sit on. The rest sat cross-legged on the floor.
(Continued on page 6)
We are waiting!
There were 15-17 people in our first meeting that day. Most of them were women but there were a few young men and two
older men that came in later. Several were believers and part of the home church, but others had not heard of or accepted Christ. At the
end of the presentation five people accepted Christ. One of these was Suvach, the husband of one of the ladies that had already accepted
Christ and was part of this house church. After a time of prayer, our host served everyone some small, crunchy, homemade snacks and
chai tea. Chai tea is uniquely Indian and is a spiced milk tea that is very sweet and served steaming hot in small tea cups. It would be
offensive not to eat and drink with them so we sat and fellowshipped as we drank our tea. Suvach was very interested to speak with us
and invited us to go to his home immediately. He lived only a few blocks away so we walked with him to his home. As we entered, he
left to invite people that lived close by him to join us. Several people began to file into the bedroom where the setup was exactly like the
previous home we just left. One person was an older man probably 70+ years old. He sat down on the floor right in front of Ben and me
and crossed his legs waiting for us to begin. We were sitting on the bed discussing how we were going to coordinate the service. At the
last home, Ben had shared his testimony and I had presented the gospel message. We decided that, this time, I would share my testimony
and Ben would share the gospel message. While we were working out the details Suvach returned and sat next to our translator who had
produced a New Testament translated into Hindi that he was going to leave with this new believer. Our translator was showing Suvach
how to read his new Bible, and had opened it to the book of John. We had prepared our testimonies and gospel presentations before we
ever arrived in India. Because we knew we would be going to many homes we focused on repeating our story at each home. However,
several people here had just heard our pre-canned messages and it didnt seem appropriate to repeat exactly what we had just said. So
I began to pray about what I would say and decided that reading from the first chapter of John would be appropriate. I read John 1:1-5
focusing on the fact the Jesus was God and that in Him was life and the life was the light of men. I shared the fact that my life before
Christ had been dark, that I was focused on pleasing myself, but after I had accepted Christ, His light in my life had transformed me and
that I was a new person because of Him. Ben followed me and he had also decided to revise his gospel message and use the 3rd chapter
of the book of John to share the fact that God had given His Son so that anyone that believed would have eternal life. We learned that
the older man that was sitting directly in front of us was the husband to one of the ladies that had recently accepted Christ in the house
church we had just left. She had asked us to pray for him that he would stop drinking. She told us his name was Rameesh and he was
not a believer. As we were sharing the gospel he was very attentive and when we asked if he believed in Jesus, he began speaking to the
translator. He was pointing to the New Testament and it was obvious that he was telling him something important. The translator turned
to Ben and I and said that Rameesh knew who Jesus was. I asked if he was telling us that he was a believer and the translator said no,
but he said that he recognized our stories and had read the book of John where we had been reading, and knew about Jesus! As Rameesh
spoke to the translator he was very animated and was gesturing up to the sky and then pointing to the ground. Ben and I couldnt tell
what was going on, then the translator told us the story...
In 1965, Rameesh was living in Kannauj, a small village in northern India 350 kilometers from Delhi. He was traveling down
a trail close to the village one day when a box fell out of the sky right in front of him. He looked up and saw a plane above him that was
dropping several boxes. He opened the box and saw that there were many books in the box. He gathered them up and took them back
into the village and gave the books to others in the village. He kept one of the books himself and read it many times. As the translator
was telling Rameesh story it was obvious that the book he had read was a New Testament. When we read from the book of John during
my testimony and Bens gospel presentation, he remembered that this was what he had read before.
We asked him if he had ever known what to do with this information and he said that We were waiting for someone to come
and tell us what to do. Now you are here to tell me. We were the first people to explain to him what the message of this book was and
what he should do about it. 49 years after he had received a New Testament dropped into his village 350 kilometers from where we were
in Delhi, that day - October 28th, 2014 - Rameesh became a believer.
The year those New Testaments were dropped, I was 4 years old. Ben would not be born for another 25 years. Until 2 years
ago, I was a small business owner and had never been on an international short-term mission trip. Then God called me to full-time ministry and gave me the opportunity to not only go on a short-term mission trip, but to lead teams each year to places like India, Uganda,
Mexico and other countries. Ben, at 24 years old, was a 2nd year seminary student at Southwestern. This was his first international mission trip. God ordained that both of us would travel 8200 miles to a small room in a very poor section of a city of over 20 million people.
We would meet Rameeshs wife and pray for Rameesh to stop drinking. Then we would be invited to another home and Rameesh would
come to this meeting. God would impress on both Ben and myself to speak out of the gospel of John, a portion of the New Testament
that Rameesh remembered reading many years before.
What would have happened if Ben would have decided that he was too busy to take some time off from seminary and go to
India for 10 days?
Would Rameesh have come to Christ if I had not decided to leave my business and follow a calling of fulltime ministry that led
to me taking this team to India?
What if Suvach had not attended our first service and accepted Christ?
What if he had not invited us to go to his home?
We had already scheduled a different house church to go to next. What if we had said Thank you, but we have to keep our
schedule, they are waiting for us at the next home?
In Christ,
Tom Brewster
President
Engage Hope Ministries
UPDATE: Saturday, November 1, I was carried to the hospital in an ambulance. I have congestive heart failure. I was once again one
breathe away from death, but the grace of God pulled me through one more
time. I truly believe that we cannot die until the Lord says so. I have an enlarged heart and I will have to work diligently to keep fluid off my lungs and
body from here on in. I am weak, but on my feet. I can do as I please I just
cant do it as fast as I did and because of little strength I have to gird up my
lions in order to do things. Please dont feel sorry for me, my spirit hasnt
been injured and Im as happy as if I had good sense. We are so thankful for
our family and friends that showed such love for us during this time. Bro.
Matt was with me every day. It feels good to have a pastor instead of being
the pastor.
We were not able to attend to the paper during my stay at the hospital, so
once again its a little late. That is, it is late to us. I am amazed at how God times
our days to fit His agenda. I will think I am late with my Bible reading and when
I get back to it I find it is just want I needed for that day. We send out 1700 papers
a month and we know that many never read it, but for the one who did and were
blessed by it, that is the reason we do it.
We are at our limit with the amount of papers we can print. For some time
we have been praying for equipment that we could do our own printing. Legacy
printing has done a wonderful job for us but in order to increase the amount each
month we need to print it ourselves. The Connors have a printing ministry and
would gladly print for us but they do not have the equipment to do the colored
pictures. Please pray for us that the Lord would provide a way if this is what He
would want us to do. If you have an email and would prefer to receive the
paper by e-mail please let us know. This would help with the cost of mail.
Many of our readers do not have e-mail and we are glad to mail their papers.
My self personally, I like to sit and cuddle with my reading and I cant do
that with electronics! We have a website that you can read from and it is
listed at the bottom of the page.
Letters: Just a note to say how much I have missed you at GBC. It is so good to
hear how God is blessing your retirement and meeting your needs. Ive found my
retirement years to be some of my best ever and a time of spiritual growth for me.
I read in Tidbits about the man in prison who was asking for printed material to
read. The Lord has been speaking to me about hoarding all the Tidbits and I feel
He is now leading me to share these with this prisoner. K. Brough We have miss
edyou at GBC, so glad you are doing well serving the Lord. Tungs I continue to
pray for you, your health, and your ministry of Tid Bits. Shewflet Please send
me a copy of Bible reading for the year. I have misplaced my copy. We are 91 and
87 and Don retired from preaching at age 90 this year. D. & M. Bennett Thank
you for the CD & DVD. I loved them. I watched and cried. It made me homesick.
B. Mayhew Thank you for the CD. We really enjoyed it and will enjoy it again &
again. Hopes Please send me the CD of the Brewsters & Sharon. Have known
them many years. Miss them. Loved hearing him preach and her teach. Bove
Tid Bits of Wisdom is a non-profit work and operates through the Wonderful Word
Publishers, whose founders were Bro. Dick and Mrs. Rose Cimino. The Tid Bits of
Wisdom is published by Bro. Jerry and Mrs. Gloria Brewster. The tract ministry is
operated by Mrs. Connie Cimino. All gifts are tax deductible. Tid Bits of Wisdoms
web site is tidbitswww.com. Our email is tidbitswww@aol.com. Phone: 214-2935252
Non-Profit Organ.
U.S. Postage
Permit 697
DeSoto, Texas 75115
SPANISH TRACTS
Ps 100:4
Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his
courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless
his name.
KJV
CMCimino@yahoo.com
TID BITS OF WISDOM
Bro. Jerry & Gloria Brewster
1801 Old Hickory Trail
DeSoto, Texas 75115
E-mail TidBitsWWW@aol.
com
Website: tidbitswww.com
214-293-5252