June 20, 2026 | Moments Almanac | Go

Hello and welcome to Moments Almanac for June 20th, 2026. I hope you're having a great day. Today is entitled To the Ends of the Earth. June 20th gives us two stories separated by five years and thousands of miles. One with a missionary's final breath, and the other begins with missionaries stepping onto a distant shore. Together they remind us that God's work is always larger than a single life. On this day in 1880, Samuel Robbins Brown died. Brown was born in Connecticut in 1810. He first sailed to China as a missionary and educator, and then later answered a call to a nation that had only recently opened itself up to the outside world, Japan. In 1859, he arrived there as one of the first American missionaries permitted to live and work in the country. Brown believed education could open doors for the gospel. He taught young Japanese students, translated Christian materials, and he quietly invested in a generation that would help shape modern Japan. He wasn't a famous preacher. He simply went where God sent him and faithfully planted seeds he would never fully see grow. Then five years after Brown's death, another missionary story began. On June 20th, 1885, Moravian missionaries landed in Alaska and established what would then become the Bethel Mission. The Morovians had long been known for their willingness to go where a few others would go. They traveled to the Caribbean, Greenland, Labrador, Africa, and remote corners all over the world, because they believed Christ's command was not merely to make converts, but to make disciples among all peoples. Alaska was rugged, isolated, and challenging, but the Moravians saw not obstacles, they they saw people. And so they went. One missionary's life had ended, another missionary was beginning. That's often how the kingdom of God advances. One generation plants, another waters, and still another gathers the harvest. The work belongs to God. The privilege of participation belongs to us. The words of Acts 1 8 come to mind, you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth. For some the ends of the earth meant Japan, for others it meant Alaska. For most of us it may mean a workplace, a classroom, a neighborhood, or a conversation waiting to happen. The distance matters less than obedience. It reminds us of the verses of Isaac Watts, who wrote, Jesus shall reign where eer the sun does his successive journeys run. His kingdom stretches from shore to shore, till moons shall wax and wane no more. Samuel Brown died on this day in 1880. Morovian missionaries stepped ashore in Alaska on this day in 1885. One life ending, another mission beginning. A reminder that God's story is always bigger than our chapter in it. Well, that's Moments Almanac for June 20th, 2026. Thanks for joining me, and I hope you will come by tomorrow. Until then, take heart. Notice the scattered moments, and share the grace.