Meet Baxter!

Meet Baxter Hedgepath. He is Shelly and my new puppy. He is 11 weeks old and weighs about 3 1/2 lbs. A few months ago, Shelly started getting the itch to start looking for a new dog. Many of you know that Tristan died a year ago in February and it took a while for Shelly to get ready for a new dog. If you knew Shelly and Tristan, you knew that they were best friends.

I called Shelly one night while I was in Honduras a few weeks ago and she said that she thought she found a new puppy for us. She said that a woman from Mt. Juliet was going to meet us near the airport the day I arrived from Honduras. We met the lady 30 minutes after I landed, I looked the puppy over and she had all the papers. The next thing I knew, we had a puppy in our car and were heading home.

He is nice to have around...when he is sleeping! Just kidding. Going through the whole training process again is tough but he will get it one day. He starts obedience school tonight at 7 pm at PetSmart in Cool Springs. We have class with him for the next 2 months every Friday night. We will see how intelligent he really is.

I forgot to say that he is a Maltese and very healthy. Tristan had his favorite duck and Baxter has his favorite stuffed giraffe which you can see in the picture above. Many people have heard about Baxter and I wanted to take this chance to introduce him to the world. Enjoy.

Chad

Good Breakfast

I met Will Baxter for breakfast this morning at the Cool Springs Cracker Barrel. We had a great meeting and caught up on the things going on in our lives over the last few months. Will is looking for a job also so we are in the same boat. Unfortunately, his wife, Lacey, just lost her job also so they are a little on edge.

I then ran errands around Nashville and Cool Springs. I came home to finalize my lesson for class tonight and am ready to be encouraged. I really look forward to class every Wednesday night because I think we have a great group of people at BC studying together and encouraging one another.

I have a meeting with Randy Steger tomorrow at Healing Hands International. I am interested in hearing what they need and how I might be able to help them out.

I did not tell you that last Thursday, my niece, Brooklyn (Angie and JJ's baby) celebrated her 1st birthday! We had a great party on Saturday for the special event. She did pretty well making a mess out of her cake.

I am getting better at blogging but I need to add some pictures. I will start that next.

Enjoy your Wednesday night class...or come to BC at 7 pm for my Encouragement class in the basement. You are more than welcome!

Chad

Judas vs. Peter

I am teaching a Wednesday night class at Berry's Chapel this quarter from the book "The Barnabas Factor" by Aubrey Johnson. The book is about encouragement and I am really enjoying the class and participation. We have about 20 in the class.

We just finished the chapter that talks about discouragement. There are 2 common causes of discouragement: misfortunes and mistakes. Misfortunes are things that happen to you and mistakes are things that you cause. Aubrey talked about a great comparison which really made me think.

What was the difference between Judas and Peter. Both denied Jesus in their own way but ended up reacting differently to the guilt and sin of doing it. Judas turned Jesus in to the authorities; Peter denied Jesus repeatedly. Judas hanged himself; Peter went on to be a great preacher for Jesus. What happened that caused the two to take two totally different routes in life after their sin?

Let me encourage you to look back in the Gospels and read the stories of Judas and Peter. Look at their response after their sin. Judas lost hope. He thought that he could not overcome the sin which he committed. Peter dealt with his pain and sin and made the most out of it. He learned from his mistake and changed his life to be different.

How do you deal with sin in your life? Do you believe that you have no hope to get by it and do great things? Do you feel like you need to just lie down and die because you can't handle it anymore? Are there too many things being thrown at you which you feel you cannot handle? It is easy in life to get overwhelmed with the negatives in our lives and think that we cannot make it. It is easy to give up, to throw our hands in the air and forget about it. It is easy to roll over and die.

That is not an encouraging person though. We have a Savior who died for us and gave us life. We have hope because we have a God who is on our side. We can be encouraged by learning from our mistakes and building upon them. How do you deal with your sin? Let's be encouraged. Let's share with one another. Let's put aside our masks and encourage one another in our struggles. There are people in your church who are struggling with the same sin you are. Judas did not utilize his brothers and sisters. Peter pulled them together and built upon them.

Encourage someone today. Share in their struggles.

Chad

Updating

I am going to get back into blogging.

Just want to update you on my job search. I am still talking to several churches and non-profit organizations. The list follows:

Chinese Agape Foundation
Maryville church of Christ
Franklin (KY) church of Christ
Hendersonville church of Christ
Youth Encouragement Services
Healing Hands International
Mt. Juliet church of Christ
Baxter Institute

It seems things are moving better but still very slow. I hope that with the warm weather coming in, things will pick up. It seems everyone has been in hibernation for a few months. I ask for your prayers for my search. Shelly is doing a great job at Kenrose and is the bread winner right now. I am very thankful for her.

We have moved to an apartment in Cool Springs (as of last week). We moved out of Lynn and Hugh's (Shelly's parents) house to get on our own. It has been a good move for us. We greatly appreciated the time with Lynn and Hugh and the generosity they showed us.

I promise to do a better job with our blog. I plan on starting a daily devotional thought tomorrow on this blog. Let me know what you want to study.

Chad