"There is not one example in the Bible of God calling someone to do something and then using debt as a tool to accomplish it!"
Whew! What a huge weight off my shoulders! Ever since we got the initial acceptance I've been fretting over ways to come up with the first agency payment and the fee for the home study. Not to mention the sticker shock that our adoption will end up totaling. I always knew that God would provide us with the funds, but I didn't really believe it until I read that last night.
Mark Batterson says in his book The Circle Maker to thank God BEFORE He does a miracle. I've been thanking Him for providing for our future adoption for a while now and we've already seen funds showing up. Adam stumbled across a small retirement account from a job he had a few years ago. We cashed it out and will get a few hundred dollars soon. I threw together a garage sale and made a couple hundred. I've had some extra kids to babysit. I even was handed a fifty dollar bill today!
Adam and I decided that it is time for me to take over the finances. I am really looking forward to it because I'm going to be 28 this year and have never had to pay a bill. I've always had apartments in my roommate's name, so I just paid them. Adam and I got married after my junior year of college so he has always been the one to pay the bills. I've been wanting to do this for a number of years now but never felt confident because we've had such huge financial hardship and I didn't think I could handle it.
We've been through Adams two year unemployment, my astronomical medical bills, the closing of our small business, and student loans that are more than our mortgage. Through it all we have been seriously blessed by friends, family, and strangers which kept our heads above water. But, little by little we are coming out of it. We paid off our credit card debt last year. Adam found a full time job and a part time job. I quit my job to be a stay at home mom and am making more money now by babysitting then I did when I was working. All of this means that we are heading in the right direction.
As I sat down tonight to look over our bills I was thrilled to see that we are in the black and not the red! Adam and I combined work between 100-110 hours a week and we feel so blessed to be able to do so! I guess that is what long term unemployment does to you ;)
Did I mention that Adam starts full time seminary this winter? Yikes! We've got a lot on our plate right now but I've never been more excited to see what God has waiting for us just around the corner.
God’s wisdom is so deep, God’s power so immense, who could take him on and come out in one piece? He moves mountains before they know what’s happened, flips them on their heads on a whim. He gives the earth a good shaking up, rocks it down to its very foundations. He tells the sun, ‘Don’t shine,’ and it doesn’t; he pulls the blinds on the stars. All by himself he stretches out the heavens and strides on the waves of the sea. He designed the Big Dipper and Orion, the Pleiades and Alpha Centauri. We’ll never comprehend all the great things he does; his miracle-surprises can’t be counted. Somehow, though he moves right in front of me, I don’t see him; quietly but surely he’s active, and I miss it. -Job
"Go build that business. Go finish that degree. Go work on you marriage. Whatever it is - Go get to work! But don't forget that God is going to be working harder then you are to bring whatever it is He dreamed for your life to pass." -Terry A. Smith
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