Pastor Weekly - 10/1/25
Hello ICC Family!
Be thankful in all circumstances,
for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.
1 Thessalonians 5:18
for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.
1 Thessalonians 5:18
I am thankful today that we did not have to weather Hurricane Imelda that was barreling down on us at the end of last week. The models turned out to be wrong and the storm made a hard right and stayed out at sea. Instead, we just had to deal with several days of gray skies and spitting rain. It could have been much worse, and again… I am thankful.
It was much more difficult to be thankful last night without any internet. Between the AT&T fiber breakdown and living in Crowfield which is a dead zone for most cell phones, I felt like one of my limbs had been severed. I wanted to check when the service would be restored, but my wireless signal wasn’t strong enough to open the app. I thought this would be a great time to call and catch up with family. But the only calling we do is through Wi-Fi, so that was out. Watching television (all streaming) - nope. Working on several projects for the church… again, I needed to be online. Playing Connections with Laurel didn’t work either. After one night of being cut off from the rest of the world, and cut off from almost every source of entertainment, communication, shopping, news, and even work (you could not receive this newsletter without the internet), it is glaringly apparent and even frightening how dependent on the internet I have become. I will be adding it to my fasting list.
But the brief experience has also given me the benefit of being thankful for the time to read. And go to bed early. I am now more aware of my dependence on the internet and can be more thankful for it than ever. I have obviously been taking it for granted.
Most of all it has once again been a reminder to just be thankful that God is in control, and all of life is a blessing from him. I have written about the nights without power in Thailand and how my family would lay on the cold tile floor to try to cool off without any air conditioning in the stifling heat. When we lived in China, it was water that would be shut off every now and then, to the point that we had huge 5-gallon containers stored around the apartment to flush the toilets and wash hands with. In some ways I miss those disruptions, because they revealed our dependency and forced us to be creative and change our way of thinking. It’s like when whatever you had planned for dinner falls through - you don’t have an ingredient you need, or maybe it gets overcooked or even burned. And so you end up eating cereal or popcorn or ice cream instead. Despair turns to thanksgiving quickly.
Someday each of us will experience much greater disruption and disappointment than a burned meal or an internet outage. When that happens, having been thankful in the seemingly little setbacks will have been preparation for how to be thankful during that big one - when the hurricane ends up being a direct hit, or when a devastating prognosis is received. A firm foundation will be in place such that you never wonder or doubt that God is in control and loves you!
Blessings to you!
And know that I am praying for you!
Pastor Aaron
It was much more difficult to be thankful last night without any internet. Between the AT&T fiber breakdown and living in Crowfield which is a dead zone for most cell phones, I felt like one of my limbs had been severed. I wanted to check when the service would be restored, but my wireless signal wasn’t strong enough to open the app. I thought this would be a great time to call and catch up with family. But the only calling we do is through Wi-Fi, so that was out. Watching television (all streaming) - nope. Working on several projects for the church… again, I needed to be online. Playing Connections with Laurel didn’t work either. After one night of being cut off from the rest of the world, and cut off from almost every source of entertainment, communication, shopping, news, and even work (you could not receive this newsletter without the internet), it is glaringly apparent and even frightening how dependent on the internet I have become. I will be adding it to my fasting list.
But the brief experience has also given me the benefit of being thankful for the time to read. And go to bed early. I am now more aware of my dependence on the internet and can be more thankful for it than ever. I have obviously been taking it for granted.
Most of all it has once again been a reminder to just be thankful that God is in control, and all of life is a blessing from him. I have written about the nights without power in Thailand and how my family would lay on the cold tile floor to try to cool off without any air conditioning in the stifling heat. When we lived in China, it was water that would be shut off every now and then, to the point that we had huge 5-gallon containers stored around the apartment to flush the toilets and wash hands with. In some ways I miss those disruptions, because they revealed our dependency and forced us to be creative and change our way of thinking. It’s like when whatever you had planned for dinner falls through - you don’t have an ingredient you need, or maybe it gets overcooked or even burned. And so you end up eating cereal or popcorn or ice cream instead. Despair turns to thanksgiving quickly.
Someday each of us will experience much greater disruption and disappointment than a burned meal or an internet outage. When that happens, having been thankful in the seemingly little setbacks will have been preparation for how to be thankful during that big one - when the hurricane ends up being a direct hit, or when a devastating prognosis is received. A firm foundation will be in place such that you never wonder or doubt that God is in control and loves you!
Blessings to you!
And know that I am praying for you!
Pastor Aaron
Posted in Pastor Weekly