The Aftermath of Ike

Hello everyone,

Well, a few hours ago, power was restored here at my house. So I send this out to anyone who is able to read and respond. I hope you’ll get in touch with me. I have been very, very concerned and prayerful for each of you, wanting to know how you did in (and after) this storm.

As for me and mine, we fared pretty well. We lost power, but thank God for this wonderful weather! Who needs AC, anyway? We lost a little bit of our fence, and thanks to the power loss, we’ll start from scratch in our fridge and deep freeze, but we’re blessed to have come through relatively unscathed.

As for the church, the news is good there, too. There was no major damage as far as I know of. The steeple is bent. A couple of signs got blown down. There were some water leaks in the Family Life Center, in the hallway outside the choir room, and in the children’s building. There may be other stuff that we’ll be able to see when power is restored, but that’s all we’ve been able to find.

The news isn’t so good for a sister church. I heard from a fellow minister that SW Central Church of Christ suffered major storm damage. Keep those folks in your prayers. If you have time and the ability to volunteer to help them, your help would be appreciated.

On that note, I hope and pray that each of us will have opportunities in these trying times to help out our neighbors, to show the love of Christ. I hope also that we’re taking the time to check in on some of our elderly and homebound members. I have definitely been praying for them. It’s been frustrating for me…With no church on Sunday, spotty cell phone coverage and no power, I feel paralyzed ministry-wise. But I keep praying, and I know God is taking good care of each of you. Again, report in when you can.

As for our upcoming schedule, we’ve made the decision to go ahead and cancel Wednesday night activities. Sunday morning, we WILL offer a worship service at 10:30. We’re exploring the best way to pull that off if power doesn’t come back online this week, but we’ll praise and preach, even if it has to be in the dark. I don’t know about you, but I just need to be among God’s people. As far as Bible study goes, we’ll make that decision soon.
Even in a difficult time, there are so many ways we see God’s goodness, faithfulness and love. But I’ll talk more about that Sunday. Hope I see you there.