Grace in a Recession, Pt. 2

Here’s the conclusion of Kathy’s story…..

I began a study of the Israelites exodus from Egypt. When I read of their grumbling and complaining I saw myself. I began to see them in a different light; they weren’t whining and complaining about trivialities, a single sentence of hardship would often represent months and years of real trial. At each of these trials they were forgetting that God had always been faithful to provide for their needs. I was like them.  In the midst of trial I found myself forgetting God’s faithfulness and focused instead on my circumstances. I was in constant need of being pointed back to God.

The 40 year journey in the wilderness wasn’t just the long way to the Promised Land; it was the best way for them. The same is true for me. Each obstacle, challenge, disappointment, victory is only the “wilderness” to me. My loving Father is making it a bountiful garden.

It became critical that Steve find a job. He prepared a resume and sent it out everywhere, but we received only one response. That led to an eventual job offer in Washington D.C..  Steve felt sure this was God’s plan, and I felt sure that I needed to trust my husband...we prepared to move.

We had decided to settle in Gaithersburg but finding a place to live proved immensely challenging. Our credit was in very bad shape at this point and nobody would rent to us. But God – those are our favorite two words – had a plan. We closed the door on the beautiful house we’d sold and loaded the last few things into our car. We were literally leaving for Gaithersburg in 30 minutes with no place to live when the phone rang.  A landlady had agreed to take a chance on us.

The next day we met the landlady to sign the lease and see the house for the first time.  It was a townhouse, much, much smaller than the single-family house we had been forced to sell, but I was freshly aware of God’s kindness to me.  I had secretly desired an open, light-filled kitchen but felt it would be presumptuous to pray for it, after all God had already done for us.  However, when we walked to the back of the house, there she was waiting in a sunlit, spacious kitchen/dining space. My eyes filled with tears as I considered the very personal message of God’s intricate concern for me.

Psalm 119:37 has become my prayer through this long season, “Turn my life from worthless gain, and give me life in your ways.” God is faithful to answer it.

Our Father has been kind and faithful each step of this journey. We still need to be frugal with our spending, I have taken a job supervising newspaper delivery (which enables me to continue to care for our daughter), and some days I still want to go “home” to Roanoke, but we can wholeheartedly say that the boundary lines have fallen for us in pleasant places. We are very blessed! Our worldly loss has been great gain.