Deborah’s great-grandmother writes of the impact of the salvation of her father:

My Father could not keep the good news, so a short time after he would take the train back every Sunday (after the morning service) to Martins Bay, and then walked to the hill country and preached to his own people and friends. Later on he preached in town in the market place, and opened a mission for the colored people where there was a settlement back of George St Belleville.

 We visited all these places when we visited Barbados on our 30th wedding anniversary.

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Deborah’s great-grandmother recalls her mother preaching the gospel to her on the island of Barbados. She writes:

“Some of my Mothers favorite verses were:

Perfect love casteth out fear.

Godliness with contentment is great gain.

Having food and raiment therewith be content.

Let the words of my mouth, and the mediation of my heart be acceptable in Thy sight, Oh Lord, my strength and my redeemer.

As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.

How well I remember how she used to sit and tell us children of God’s simple plan of salvation!”

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Deborah’s great-grandmother writes in her diary, “my Father, Robert Thomas Lanahan Gibson (Linnie), born March 14th, 1838 in Barbados, West Indies, Below the Cliff. He married Anna Lorinthia Edwards, born Jan 21st, 1843 in Barbados, West Indies, Below the Cliff. They married Oct 11th, 1863 at St Margarets Chapel, Below the Cliff. They had 10 children.”

Robert and Anna (Deborah’s great-great-grandparents)	Tom and Carol (Deborah’s parents)

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My friend Craig Houston wrote this to me regarding our celebration of the gospel coming to Deborah’s family:

“The Grace of God is truly amazing in that He moves in the hearts of His people to bring the gospel to the regions beyond, and people there are impacted by the good news, and then they take that glorious truth of the gospel to yet another country and people. Fast forward to the two centuries, and a descendent of those converts is a preacher’s wife in NC. Praise God!”

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Brethren missionaries came here and encountered Deborah’s family near the end of the 19th century. They preached the gospel to Deborah’s great, great grandparents. According to the diary of their daughter, Lorinthia, they brought the message of salvation by grace alone, eternal security, and the final judgment. God’s kingdom was expanding as Jesus promised His disciples in the parable of the mustard seed and the leaven in Matthew 13. The gospel came to Deborah’s family through ordinary people. They had the leaven of the gospel in their souls, giving them urgings to leave their homelands to sow the seeds of the kingdom of heaven in other places. I am so grateful for these missionaries.

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Today, January 23, 2012, is our 30th wedding anniversary. As an anniversary present, I am taking Deborah to the place where the gospel first came to her mother’s side of the family. We are scheduled to arrive this afternoon. We are going to celebrate the power of the gospel. We will be visiting the place they lived when they were married and converted, and the places they evangelized and lived. This is a gospel-celebrating wedding anniversary.

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Ephesians 5:21-23 says, “Submitting to one another in the fear of God. Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church; and He is the Savior of the body.”

Marriage may be reformed and lives transformed if men and women would but get a picture of the gospel in their marriage.

This past Sunday, I preached a message at Mount Zion Bible Church (home of Chapel Library) on Ephesians 5:21-23. Studying this passage is a humbling, revealing, and, Lord willing, transforming task.

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This is a message I gave last year, during our roadtrip across the United States. Often family-integrated churches misconstrue the reasons we worship together as families in the first place. These misunderstandings lead to what I call “infections” in family-integrated churches. (more…)

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We just finished a wonderful family conference at Mt. Zion Bible Church (home of Chapel Library) in Pensacola, FL.

The NCFIC interns and five brethren from the country of Malawi joined us at this conference.

You can listen to some of the messages by following the links below:

• Too Busy – Real Priorities (Scott Brown)
• Handling Young Infants/Young Children (Deborah Brown)
• Fathers/Husbands and Church Working Together (Scott Brown)
• Planting a New Testament Church and Q&A (Scott Brown/Jason Dohm)

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