Posted on by Pastor Poet

Invisible…

January 30, 2026

Years ago, during an anniversary program, my wife stood up at the end of the service and jokingly referred to being married to the invisible man.

Ouch.

She spoke of seeing the impact of my presence everywhere—while often not seeing me.

Yikes.

Her words still give me pause today.

She wasn’t wrong. I’ve always worked a lot—behind the scenes, below the radar—pulling strings, holding doors, cleaning up messes, fixing things, filling gaps. Keeping my head down. Helping out. Avoiding attention. Seeing without being seen.

This, I told myself, was faithful ministry. Or at least, that’s what I believed at the time.

“The invisible man,” she said. I understand what she meant. I can’t dismiss the piercing, painful truth in her words.

But I may offer a slightly different perspective.

Invisible? Perhaps. But I am not invisible—though I am often unseen.

There is a difference.

Invisible suggests absence. Unseen suggests presence without recognition.

And somewhere along the way, I’ve learned to be okay with that… sort of.

Unseen… impactful.

Unseen… integral.

Unseen… evident.

I’m okay with that.

But it’s a slippery slope.

Because unseen can become ignored. Unseen becomes unacknowledged. And over time, unseen becomes invisible.

And that matters.

So I have a question for us today:

Who are the unseen yet impactful—the unseen but integral people who have blessed us behind the scenes, simply because?

Who has God used to refresh and encourage us?

Here’s my challenge for us:

Don’t let them become invisible. Don’t allow those who have influenced us, sustained us, and quietly inspired us to fade into obscurity.

Though they may be unseen, do not let them become invisible.

Because invisibility is loneliness. It is the quiet ache of being present, faithful, and forgotten.

No one really wants to be invisible.

So choose to see. Choose to remember.

Although others may be blind to our benefactors, let us not allow them to become invisible to us.

“…for they refreshed my spirit as well as yours. Give recognition to such people.” 1 Corinthians 16:18

Good morning. I love you.

ihs,

just adam

Posted on by Pastor Poet

Keep on Living…

When we lose loved ones it can feel like our worlds have come to an end.  Grief ebbs and flows like waves on a shore, leaving us forever altered but somehow the same.  Our beloveds have left us but are somehow always with us.  We cling to their memory with our feet in the sand hoping that we will meet again.  

What do we do to assuage grief?  

In the words of my dear mother, we gotta ‘keep on living…’

When our love seems to have no place to go, it must find itself in the present.  We gotta keep on living.  We gotta learn how to pour this love into those with whom we remain.   We gotta keep on living.

We mustn’t remain among the tombs.  God has placed souls in our way that will become  welcome receptacles and repositories for the love that feels like it has no place to go. We gotta keep on living.

We can  honor our beloveds by continuing to live and to love.  We continue living as we cling to the gratitude that this love was a gift that we were privileged to receive.  

The poet Tennyson wrote,

“It’s better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all…”

I offer this addendum:  

It’s better to have loved, because love is never lost.  

Certainly love changes, but it is never lost. 

Love just  finds new ways of expressing itself.

Pardon my rambling this morning, as I work through my own grief at the passing of so many that I held so dearly.  This love that feels sometimes like it has no place to go,  I offer it to you.

Now, pass it on.

Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.

1 Corinthians 13:7-8

Good Morning, I love you all!

ihs,

just adam

Posted on by Pastor Poet

When You’ve Been Blessed…

After Adrienne and I exchanged vows before our friends and family, we were blessed by our pastor and then serenaded with the song, ‘When you’ve been blessed,’ originally recorded by Patti Labelle.

That was thirty years ago – it was one of the most important moments of our lives.  I am sure that over the years we’ve side-eyed one another, wondering if it was worth it.  Anyone who’s been married for any length of time has come to this point- if we are honest!

But I am grateful for good counsel.  I am grateful for those who challenged, encouraged, and held us accountable.  I am grateful for those who’ve reminded us that as  our lives were being woven together, as beautiful as this is, that it wasn’t just about us. I am grateful that God kept us when we couldn’t!

God put us together because God loves us, but God wants us to be a blessing to others as well.  We’ve been serving the LORD together for over thirty years – that’s as long as we’ve been together. We’ve shared our time, our talents, our hearts, our home, our energy, our resources, our joys, and our sorrows – we’ve shared our lessons and blessings – we’ve had our share of ups and downs – and yet God’s grace towards us and our deep love for God and one another continues to overflow. We are better than we deserve and somehow have more than enough!

As enamored as we were with one another when we stood at the altar all these years ago – we knew that it was never just about us!  

“When you’ve been blessed… Pass it on!”

…give, and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use it will be measured back to you.”  

Luke 6:38

Good Morning, I love you all!

ihs,

just adam

Posted on by Pastor Poet

What’s on the Inside? (3)

Jesus reserved his harshest words for those who were religious.  Some might wonder why Jesus was so hard on those who appeared to be trying so hard to do the right thing.  Shouldn’t Jesus have congratulated and celebrated them for their piety? 

Instead of praise, Jesus offered a rebuke – what had to be a painful critique!

What’s on the inside?

Sometimes in our spiritual walk, we can get enamored by our own virtues – standing so close to the mirror that we cannot see our own flaws.  Sadly, our myopia causes us to become judgmental and hypocritical.  We get puffed up and sanctimonious, and we forget that it is only by God’s grace that we are not consumed. 

We turn, ‘all have sinned’ to ‘y’all have sinned.’  And we place ourselves in danger of judgment. We are undone with a single question. 

What’s on the inside?

Can you hear the voice of the Spirit today? Has someone offended or frustrated you? Are you ready to curse them and throw them away?  Before you call down fire, take a long slow look in the mirror and ask yourself, ‘What’s on the inside?’

Yes, there are times when anger is appropriate, and righteous indignation is justifiable.  Yes, there are times when wrong needs to be called out and protest is necessary.  There’s a time when a curse seems like the right thing to do, but this is a slippery slope. We may find that we’ve become what we despise!

May God guard our hearts against self-righteousness, and cultivate compassion in our hearts toward others – especially those we think don’t deserve it. 

What’s on the inside?

27 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness.

Matthew 23:27

Good Morning, I love you all!

ihs,

just adam

Posted on by Pastor Poet

Community People…

While things are tense around us, many of us are bracing for what’s next, and fear, anger, and anxiety seems to be the themes of the day – I hope we can guard our hearts against the temptation to isolate.

We’ve got some tough years ahead of us, from which we cannot simply run and hide.  We cannot just wall ourselves off and give ourselves to guarding only our own personal interests and things.  

Let me take that back, we can do these things, but we will cease to be who God created, called, and redeemed us to be!

As Christians in the world, we are the ‘community of called out ones’, entrusted with the Gospel, to witness to the world about the goodness and the grace of a loving God revealed to us through Jesus Christ.  

We must not shrink from this call – not in our words or in our deeds!

The most powerful and most important commandments in Scripture are the commands to love; to love God and to love others as we love ourselves.  These are positive commands that require something of us.  

The Golden Rule says, ‘do unto others as you would have them do unto you…’ This is not the same as ‘don’t do to anyone what you don’t want done to you…’. The former demands community, the latter can occur in isolation.  

In good times and in bad, we are community people!  

While we will all have moments of overwhelm, frustration, and fear – we must not retreat.  Pause if you must, pull back if you need to, but don’t abandon community!  Our faith is lived out in our relationships.  This is the outworking of our witness!

35 By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

John 13:35

Good Morning, I love you all!

ihs,

just adam