God is good!

 I feel the strongest urge to blog about this, but I'm a bit at a loss for words to describe what I'm feeling. For the past 3 years, we have teetered on the brink of financial destruction. Our faith has been stretched and tested beyond what we ever thought we could endure. We suffered several LARGE financial blows which should have been the end of it for the kind of couple who lived paycheck to paycheck with NOTHING for a rainy day. Instead by the grace of God and generous people, we have survived through this season.

I can hardly even begin to list the things that have been birthed in us...increased faith in God, stronger committment to each other...coming face to face with many of our deepest darkest fears has brought much pain but many good things into our lives.

We have been praying and praying for God to save us from this situation. We were not sure what to do about it. We had already cut out every single non-essential thing from our lives. I was working as many hours as I could (this summer topping out at 40 nearly every week because overtime has not been authorized at all this summer). John grubbing for side jobs and working himself into the ground, but still we are in DEEP doodoo.

Over the weekend we were in another VERY deep valley. SEVERAL bills are so past due that we're being threatened with disconnection of our Time Warner services (which are necessary for me to work from home), cell phones, etc... We are behind on every single thing and our refrigerator has been bare most of the summer. I started blogging again last week, and I really truly determined in my heart this time I was going to do this trial right. I was not going to lose my hope that God would get us through. I was going to hang on through it all and KEEP ON TRUSTING.

On Sunday I tithed. I was terrified to do it....it wasn't much, but still I have NO idea how I'm going to pay Time Warner on Monday so putting even a little in the offering was very scary.

I think it was on Friday that it occurred to me...maybe John should look for a second job. Not a part-time job...not a side job...but a REAL full-time second job. I mentioned it to John and all of a sudden he was like a man on a mission. He spent much of the weekend on the internet looking for a second shift position. On Monday he called about 4 temp services and one company that had a posting for a 2nd shift grinder. We were VERY excited about the grinding position. It was at a company in Franklin...barely 3 miles from our house. By the end of work day on Monday, he had scheduled an interview for Tuesday. He went to his interview on Tuesday and HE GOT THE JOB!!!! He starts 7/30; will be working from 3:30 p.m. to midnight M-F!!!

While this will bring many hardships our way: we won't see John during the week, he won't get much sleep, he will be working 77.5 hours every week. Those things are barely registering as a blip on the screen...we are ECSTATIC that we will finally have enough income to pay our bills. It will take a few months to get caught up, but then we should actually be able to make some progress towards climbing out of some of the debt we are drowing in. I guess we are just FULLY aware of the difficulty level of what we are embarking on, but we just really can't imagine that it will be any more difficult than it has been to continually fear we won't be able to pay the energy bill in time to avoid having the power cut off or constantly deal with collection agencies or having to tell our children over and over again, "We just don't have the money for ______"

I was a little nervous to blog about this. It's so raw and honest and revealing. However, SO many of you have read my blog over the past years and have been faithfully praying for us...I could not keep from you this news: Your prayers have been answered! We are being delivered!

This entire situation seems so saturated with God....the idea popping into my head, John being SO driven to find something, it all coming together so quickly, the position being just 3 miles from our house....

On Monday I asked a dear friend if I could just vent to her my deepest most honest feelings about this situation to her...after I spewed it all out one of the things she said was,

Your desperation for provision is warranted- time to rally the troops! You need a breakthrough!!!! You have every right to petition for one, too!
God sees you. I don't understand what He's up to, but He sees you! GOD- PLEASE MOVE! I'm asking for Your Fatherly rescue of your child! Please God!

I feel so strongly and amazingly that He has finally rescued us, and while I truly and honestly told Him I didn't care how He rescued us as long as He did rescue us, I for one am just TICKLED that He is going to rescue us through our own hard work and not through a handout. When John walked in that front door after getting this job, his whole countenance, the way he was holding his shoulders, everything about him was just strong again...not defeated...not worried... for so long he has tried to stand up under the emasculation of not being able to provide for his family and now I can already see how good he feels about the fact that God is going to use HIM to get us out of this mess. So while I would have never told God how to fix this, I am SO eternally gratefully that He chose to use John to rescue us.

I guess the way I started this blog (I'm a bit at a loss for words) is kinda funny now that it's turned into a novel. I wasn't at a loss for words to tell you what happened just at a loss to describe what I'm feeling: I am grateful, nervous, excited, relieved, peaceful, victorious...idk I just can't get the perfect word...

I am so glad I am God's and I am so glad He is mine. He truly has lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand (Psalm 40:2)