Year end

Sorry that the pace of my jobs in December has made time for this blog difficult. Taking a challenge to read through the Bible "chronologically" this year will likely change the shape of future entries, but stay tuned. Below is our family "Christmas letter" - a kind of "state of the family" letter for friends and extended family. God Bless! More soon.

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Dear Family & Friends,

With the end of 2011, we look back at the blessings and challenges thanking the Lord for all He has done. Andy still works full-time with Gaylord Opryland through the nights and part-time at Publix Supermarket in the afternoons. Sharon is enjoying being a stay-at-home mom to David and the new opportunity to truly be a homemaker in our new home. While we had looked for a house in 2010, we began searching with determination again in late summer. We grew a lot in the process and looked through a lot of very nice houses here in Middle Tennessee. Any home (even if you're building it from the foundation up I've heard) has pluses and minuses, and so we looked at a lot of area properties in our price range. In the process, we trusted that the Lord had a home in mind for us and we found encouragement seeking His guiding hand from the promise of scripture:

“For I know the plans that I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart.” (Jeremiah 29:11-13 NASB)

We found one that seemed to have everything we needed, and began packing up to move in August. It is a beautiful home in a great established neighborhood. We received down payment assistance through a program for first-time home buyers through THDA, but a rescheduling of a class required by the program caused our closing to be delayed from Sept. 28^th until late on Sept. 29^th (which actually meant we didn't get the key until Sept. 30^th). We had everything arranged to have help, rental truck and time away from work for Andy based upon moving the evening of closing and the entire following day. It caused hassles with missing an additional night of work and spending a night at Sharon's parents' home with nearly all of our things locked in a moving van. But it all worked out and we got every­thing moved in with help from our First Baptist Church Gallatin family and coworkers from Publix.

So not only was October a big month with both Sharon’s and Andy’s birthday, but it was the beginning of the adventure of home ownership. We knew from the beginning that we were going to be taking some time to move the back yard fences out to the property lines, but added more work as we found out about some plumbing issues that needed urgent attention. There is no maintenance man to call like at the apartments; it had to be addressed, so it was up to us. Not having any real maintenance know-how ourselves, Sharon’s father, Ron Hoffman, was invaluable in getting the problems fixed. Mom & Dad Hoffman also surprised us with housewarming / birthday gifts of a storage shed, additional fencing and screen doors (with assembly assistance – Dad with labor, tools, and expertise & Mom with loving care for David and wonderful food).

Not everything on the upgrade and repairs list is complete (though I fear no fifty-year-old home ever has maintenance “complete”), but with furniture finding places, opportunity for Sharon and David to meet some of our new neighbors during trick-or-treat, and most of the household items finding places other than boxes, the house was beginning to feel like home. And just in time to prepare for Carl Jentes to fly down from Ohio for Thanksgiving with us in our guestroom. We thought it important to have Dad come to get to spend time with his family (especially his grandson) in this, the first full year without Pat. Though she is greatly missed, we know she moved to her Father’s house and we will be together again. As we look forward to our first full year in our new home and the joys of planting flowers and a garden in the rebirth that is Spring, we know that her joy is complete now in her new home that her walk with her Lord is can now be side-by-side and unclouded by pain.

We are so blessed to have a great church home at First Baptist Church Gallatin where Sharon teaches the “Walkers” Sunday School class and Andy assists with the audio/visual production team. I cannot imagine being able to make it without the support of a local church body through which we have received so many blessings “coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17 NASB). Please remember this Christmas that it is His gift at Christmas (becoming one of us to do for us what we could not do to restore our relationship to the Father) that brings true joy and life without end.

In His Service and Only By His Grace,

Andy, Sharon & David Jentes

Daily Butter 12/15: Calling

My little addition to Our Daily Bread (12/15/11):

Be in agreement with one another. Do not be proud; instead, associate with the humble. Do not be wise in your own estimation.

(Romans 12:16 HCSB)

I’ve been silent for the past few days because of pressures at work and its affect on my attitude inhibiting my heart to dig in to the Word. But several times in recent days as work has weighed on me that I wonder why not look toward full-time ministry. While I know it would also weigh on a person in many ways, there is such a joy I find in growing to know Him more by finding new things or fresh perspectives in His Word and trying to put that into words to share. But the statement at the end of this verse that the New Living Translation translated “And don't think you know it all!” reminds me again why I have not looked toward full-time ministry: it’s not about me. Yes, I have an education from a Christian college that included some Bible and theology classes. Yes, I’ve had brothers and sisters in the faith tell me I have a talent for it. Yes, I think I might be fairly good at it. BUT I will not be starting “The First Church of Andy,” so it’s not my choice.  While I do think I could be good at it, I KNOW I can’t do it. He could use me and empower me, but I have yet to hear a definite call from Him that He has chosen me for that purpose. I will continue to serve in the best ways I know how and seek opportunities to use my talents in His church. Pray for me that I will continue to serve faithfully and be a light in whatever position I am in. Pray also that My heart will stay tender so it may see His guiding hand as it leads and hear His still small voice if He does call.

- Andy Jentes

Daily Butter 12/7: The Gift of Remembrance

My apologies for the lapse in my writing – the effects of heavy demands from employers for my time over this weekend had me reeling. I'm just now getting back to "normal" sleep/meal patterns.

My little addition to Our Daily Bread (12/7/11): 

For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes. (1 Corinthians 11:26 HCSB)

My generation (with war experience only of Desert Shield, Storm and 9/11 aftermath) may not grasp the importance this day has held for this nation for nearly two-thirds of a century. Though it is with limited understanding of the cost, I salute those who willingly and/or dutifully risked and gave everything in service to this nation. It bothers me that failure to set aside time to remember things like the momentous happenings of 12/7/1941 has led to entitlement and self-focused attitudes for those my age and younger. It is imperative that we remember the cost of freedom, for if we disrespect and forget the price paid by past generations, we will doom our children to repay the price (with decades of inflation).

I agree with what Randy Kilgore said in today's ODB about Christ instituting "the Eucharist" (while not the common Protestant term, I like it because it "is derived from Greek "εὐχαριστία" (transliterated as "eucharistia"), which means thankfulness, gratitude, giving of thanks" according to Wikipedia). But I feel it was not only a way to institute of remembrance, it was a teaching tool. Remember that Christ stated "Don't assume that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill." (Matt 5:17 HCSB) As Christians, we sometimes forget that the bread and cup were at the table set for Christ and his disciples to eat the Passover Feast. Just as sailors saluting at the rail sailing into Pearl Harbor act as bridge between the past and present, this table was similar for a Jew. Christ not only made a remembrance ritual for us now in future generations looking back, but He did so by tying it to the remembrance of redemption that had been in place for generations in Israel. Just as they were reminded of the miraculous salvation of the Jewish people from slavery in Egypt through the blood of an unblemished lamb, Christ showed his disciples precisely what He was doing: Fulfilling all that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had been doing throughout history. As we come into Christmas and the time we remember His incarnation, let's not forget that God provided His perfect, unblemished Lamb (in a livestock shed welcomed by shepherds) to pay the debt once for all that we might also be saved from slavery.

This is what I saw, so I would echo the challenge from today's ODB:

Action Suggestion:

Read with fresh eyes the detailed instructions Scripture

offers for the Lord's Supper in 1 Corinthians 11, and

experience anew its power in your spiritual journey.

- Andy Jentes

Daily Butter 12/3: Perspective

My little addition to Our Daily Bread (12/3/11):

If that's how God clothes the grass, which is in the field today and is thrown into the furnace tomorrow, how much more will He do for you — you of little faith? Don't keep striving for what you should eat and what you should drink, and don't be anxious.

(Luke 12:28-29 HCSB)

I love what Joe Stowell wrote in today’s ODB about the temporary nature of all these “important” things over which we get so uptight. Just last night before coming to work I had a conversation with my wife how much I miss just getting to spend time with my family. With the time demands of the two jobs just trying to “make ends meet” and the little bit of time I am at home spent on the biological necessities of sleep, eating, and hygiene doesn’t leave much.

I can’t count how many times I’ve read these words of Christ (either in Luke’s account here or from Matthew’s chapter), but still the urgency of this world’s pressures get us “conformed to this age” (Romans 12:2) of just getting by. The words “you of little faith” at the end of verse twenty-eight hit hard. Do I live like I believe Christ meant what he said?

 

- Andy Jentes

Daily Butter 12/2: Inconceivable

My little addition to Our Daily Bread (12/2/11):

The LORD is righteous in all His ways

and gracious in all His acts.

(Psalm 145:17 HCSB)

I just can’t grasp this verse. I have a feeling I’m going to have to put it with the mystery of Jesus Christ can be fully man and fully God or how there can be but one God yet three persons. I know it’s true that God is righteous and just in all things, but “it’s a God thing” to be able to be gracious at the same time. In my customer service positions, extending grace usually means “bending the rules” rather than staying true to the “letter of the law.” Yet I know this is not the case with Him, because if God was ever going to “fudge a little” it would have been when the Son prayed repeatedly for another way other than His death and burial to save us (Matt 26:36-46). He is righteous and yet He made a way to meet the demands of righteousness to extend grace to pay my consequence at great expense. I still can’t really understand that kind of love, but to His praise and glory I will be giving Him my thanks for eternity.

 - Andy Jentes