I Think I Should Apologize
Some of you may not care, but some of you might.
“…you do not know what tomorrow will bring…you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.” James 4:14
We all have them. We typically enjoy them. We pursue them and seek to guard them, but, ultimately, they are out of our control. They’re called plans.
For those of you who have been following this newsletter, you became accustomed to receiving articles from me every Tuesday. For those who would read them as well as those who would simply delete them, these newsletters remained a normal visitor to your inbox.
Until they stopped.
My plan was to keep these consistent. In fact, consistency was something I took a certain amount of pride in. Some of that might have been appropriate and some of that a little less so. Either way, my aim was to keep these weekly and I did so for 72 weeks.
However, there is an antagonist we all deal with in each of our stories. This adversary follows us each and every day and there is no getting away from it. That adversary? Life.
Life is relentless. It never stops. It’s always there whether we are awake or asleep. And while I’ll be the first to trumpet the beauties contained in this life - movies being one of those - life is also filled with many challenges, difficulties, and sorrows.
Any of you reading this know the challenges of life only increase as the years accumulate and I’m not getting any younger. Suffice it to say, this newsletter had to be one of the items I removed from my plate to remain more faithful in other areas of life as it became more burdensome. So, my apologies for making your inbox a little less crowded on Tuesdays.
The Future of Family Movie Night
With all of that being said, I truly hope I can return to your inbox many/most/all Tuesdays. At the same time, life will continue to happen and God only knows what’s around the corner. In light of that, I should say, like James, “If the Lord wills” I will continue to send you newsletters.
I would be disingenuous if I didn’t mention that my confidence to create weekly newsletters has waned a bit. While I hope I can and I want to try, my bandwidth isn’t what it previously was. My drive and desire for FMN hasn’t completely returned. I just want to be honest with you about that.
You see, while I took several months away from this newsletter it only grew. In fact, I just eclipsed 1,000 subscribers and that’s pretty exciting. Additionally, I have a few people who actually pay for these articles, which is humbling. Therefore, I feel a certain amount of responsibility to keep these going. I don’t have any anxiety over it. Maybe it’s more accurate to say that the feeling I have is one of ‘calling’.
God has placed a call on each and every one of his children. Your calling is why you get out of bed every morning. It’s what moves you forward. It may be your occupation, it may be something different - it’s not always something you’re paid for.
For the Christian, our first call is to bear witness to God wherever we are. To share his goodness with others. This is part of why I write Family Movie Night. I want others to see that there isn’t one square inch of creation that God is not Lord over.1 He reigns over the cinema.
If the Lord wills, I’m going to try and continue to do that. However, I am just a vapor that’s here today and gone tomorrow, so what do I know?
I’m borrowing this thought from Abraham Kuyper.
We love you Brother! Just write when you’re able.
No problems.
Sometimes God changes the nature of our calling.
I know this first hand due to health issues.
The ministries I was devoted to, I could no longer maintain.
God was calling me to reinvent myself. To go forward; the past was the past.
So, in prayer, I leaned into what “God’s next” was for me.
God will reveal His next for you, also.
Many blessings.