“It’s ALL About Love!”

Dear Friends in Christ:

You hear these words often at Abiding Love. You experience it in the relationships you have with the people here. Our community knows that our mission is to show and share the Abiding Love of God during the week in our Children’s Center and Food Pantry ministries.

Enclosed in the paper newsletter is an article from the Marbridge Messenger publication. (Online viewers may find the article at: www.marbridge.org/e-chronicle/Jonathan.htm ). It features one of the members of Abiding Love that we all know. His name is Jonathan “Jon” Mettke, the son of Amelia and Paul Mettke. Jon is a very special messenger of God’s love. There isn’t a Sunday when he is here with us that I don’t hear him tell me or someone else: “I LOVE YOU!”
Jon now is a resident of Marbridge, a 177-acre ranch, south of Austin in the community of Manchaca. Marbridge provides a safe, loving residence where adults with cognitive challenges can achieve their full potential.

For many years, I served as one of the “chaplains” at Marbridge, conducting Sunday afternoon worship services in their Chapel of Love. Many of you have attended their annual Christmas Program in that beautiful chapel.

If you look closely at Jon’s High School graduation picture, you will see a necklace that he is wearing. It is the symbol of our Lutheran Camp Chrysalis in Kerrville. It contains a butterfly, a symbol of the Resurrection, and the Chi Rho, the Greek letters for “Ch” and “R” in the name Christ. Jon will never forget the “new life” that he experienced when attending a week of camp as a teen.

Jesus loves you, Jon, and so do we— very much!

May each of us never underestimate the great blessing we give to one another when we say: “I love you!”

—Pastor David Fetter