Promise

Oral Lee Brown is an Oakland, CA. woman. Wait you don’t know who Oral Lee Brown is, do you? Well, let me tell you something about her so you will know who she is. Oral Lee Brown grew up poor and struggling in Mississippi in 1987. She decided to informally adopt the first grade class at nearby Brookfield Elementary School and they became her babies. She made a promise to those first graders at Brookfield that she would give them all a free college educations.  Brown isn't the only person to send kids to college, but what makes her story unique is the personal sacrifice. She was making just $45,000 a year when she first started and she put $10,000 of it into a trust fund every year for her kids. In 1999 came one of her happiest moments -- 19 of the 23 students graduated from high school, Not everyone from Brookfield is a success story. Some dropped out of school; one girl was murdered but Miss Brown made good on her promise. You know, I like you have been promised something that never happened. The first promise I can remember as a young boy was the one my uncle made. He asked if I had a swing set at our house and I told him no! He then told me that he would have his men come to our home and install one the next day. I tell you I was excited; all day at school the next day the excitement was almost unbearable. When I finally got home I ran to the back yard and what did my little eyes behold…. no swing set and my heart dropped. Oh, my uncle’s men must not have arrived yet they will be here later; but later came and no men. You guessed it no swing set.  When I asked my mother about it she said a word I had never heard before; no it wasn’t one of those words. She told me that my uncle was “drunk” when he told me that and he didn’t have any men that could do anything or would do anything like that. My first broken promise and there have been many others since that day. While thinking about promises there is one in the book of John chapter 14 and in verse 2 and 3 we read about this promise given by our Lord Jesus Christ.  John 14:2  In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. John 14:3  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. Jesus makes a promise not only to His disciples but also to you and I that He Himself is going to prepare a place and that He would personally come and take us to where He is. Then the Apostle Paul tells us more 1Thessalonians 4:16  For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: 1Thessalonians 4:17  Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Then in the book of the Revelation we read this  Revelation 4:1 After this I looked, and, behold, a door was opened in heaven: and the first voice which I heard was as it were of a trumpet talking with me; which said, Come up hither, My uncle may not have made good on his promise but you can rest assure the Lord Jesus will make good on His promise. Are you ready and are you looking for Him. As the late Dr. M. R. DeHaan, who wrote much on the second coming of our Lord used to say “Perhaps Today?”