PART 3/4
TAP TO LISTEN
After a full day of prayer on Friday and a long day of baseball on Saturday we got a call Saturday night that a family was flying in town and wanted to see the house Sunday morning if possible. I replied absolutely! The house was semi-clean so I just mopped the hardwoods once everyone went to bed and planned to do a quick vacuum run through the house the following morning before we left the house. I woke up to a white film on the hardwoods from the mop and a vacuum that wouldn’t start. As frustrated as I was, I knew there was something in this. What was God teaching me in this? I wasn’t sure at the time, but as I mopped again and swept I felt a sense of calm saying, “trust me.” I knew this was all part of His plan. The house wasn’t perfect when we locked it up and loaded up the boys and the dogs for the family to come by and see it. We drove to the park and all I wanted to do was to sit in my car and rest my brain. The boys played on the playground while Matt, the dogs and I sat in silence watching the boys with the Masters playing on his phone. I sat with the key to our house clinched in my hand. We had to take our house keypad off our front door just the day before this showing so we could have a physical key for the realtor to show the house. As I sat in silence and held the keys praying, I looked down to notice the number 34 sat in the middle of the key. Not something I had slowed down to notice until this moment of being in prayer.
I didn’t pray for the family to buy our house, but I prayed for this family. Whatever God had for them, that is what I prayed to be revealed and if they were our buyers that would be a cherry on top. My shift in prayer for them instead of an outcome for us brought me a peace that I and my nervous system needed most. We stayed at the park for twenty minutes and headed back towards our house. Before we even got home, I had missed a few calls from our realtor and once I drove up into our driveway, Matt got the call that these were our buyers. They were making a full ask, cash offer. I couldn’t get into the house before my eyes just overflowed with gratitude tears. God was moving mountains and revealing Himself to all of us in big ways and in all circumstances. What looked and felt like a hopeless showing, God reminded me nothing is perfect and that He goes before us and makes all things new. He shows us in the hopeless moments and in the hope filled moment that He is our hope. “Show me your ways, Lord, teach me your paths. Guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long.” Psalm 25:4-5
We stood in the kitchen that we had redone just a year ago, celebrating this offer but still being cautious of this market that wasn’t in our favor. Nothing can stop God from making our paths straight and clear, especially not messy floors and a broken vacuum. God sent that family to our home. God had the plan and opened all the doors for it to happen. The following week was the inspection. We had just finished all the projects on the house. Another step of what felt like God opening up doors I didn’t see happening. Knowing fully that all houses have hidden issues, we felt good about the projects we had completed knowing it was a well loved house with imperfections and all. It was the night before the inspection, the sun went down and we noticed the bedrooms felt extra hot. Well, here we are the night before the inspector was to show up at 9am and our AC unit for the bedrooms in our house was dead. My nervous system was back on fire. Again through every moment I ask, what is God teaching us in this? There had to be something, but goodness it felt very defeating in the moment. I ran to God’s Word reminding me again and again that when I feel weary and burdened that I could trust He will give me rest. Matthew 11:28
The inspector arrived right on time at 9 am while the AC repairman that was scheduled to arrive at 8 am to look at our unit before the inspector arrived decided to get to our house around 2 pm. Again so much frustration was built up inside of me. Not much was going smoothly, but I knew it was all much bigger than what appeared to our eyes. I rested in knowing God was at work within us, refining us and leading us to fully depend on Him. I surrendered again and again and again. The AC unit got fixed. The inspection went as well as an inspection can go and we were on schedule for closing. The closing date was scheduled for May 16th.
We started looking online at homes to buy in Alabama. We know the area well so felt comfortable with the realtor and what area we wanted to live in. Our first idea was to buy some land, but it fell through. I never had a peace about the first property we were wanting to buy and as it fell through, I knew God had a better plan. Then a few days later, we found a piece of land that looked very familiar. We had built a house in 2007 on a piece of land and this property that came on the market was the land directly beside the house that we built as a married couple, before we had children. It was the house that God uprooted me and Matt from, in 2011, and started our moving journey. The land was on the lake and it had everything that we wanted for a build. We made an offer and it was accepted. It felt like a full circle move where God took us away from where we once were and who we once were to move us around and to reveal Himself and His creation to us. God showed us parts of this country and allowed us to meet so many wonderful people along the way that we otherwise wouldn’t have ever been able to do if we wouldn’t have obeyed and listened to His voice. Even when we didn’t realize it, He was pruning us and preparing us for a return we never saw coming. Not a coincidence that this being our seventh move, was back to where it all began for us. He renewed our hearts and our minds through every step, and now He is replanting us back to our southern roots where our earthly story all began. It was definitely a fully circle moment that Only God could have orchestrated.
My nervous system hadn’t calmed down just yet and my cortisol levels are probably still elevated, but there is a peace within my soul that I know is from God. That peace, His peace that surpasses all understanding while He guards my heart and my mind in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 4.7) I never want to be fully comfortable and complacent in life because that is when it is much easier to lose sight of how much we need Jesus. I don’t long for the comfortable bubble because I know God builds something much deeper in us that can’t be built in comfort, but I wouldn’t mind if God gave me a little lighter mental load for some time.. During all of this my brain seemed to bounce back and forth between our AZ to-do list and our AL to-do list. As soon as I would mark one thing off of one, four more seemed to pile up on the other one.
I stood somewhere between these to-do lists for a few weeks, not wanting to get ahead of myself, but more importantly knowing I couldn’t get ahead of God’s plan. I trusted God fully and knew He would show us the way. I was walking into all of this with teary eyes, but trying to keep my eyes wide open so I wouldn’t miss all that God was teaching and revealing to us. One item on the AL list was to finish up registration and payment for the boys new school they would all be going to in the fall. Their first school bill sat on my computer and this was a new line in our budget that brought a little bit of unknown. As I opened it up my immediate thought was to God. I know He opened all of these doors for our family to join this school and I also knew He would provide through all of this. As I allowed this earthly human nature, worldly feeling of nervousness to creep in I was quickly reminded to focus on God and His ways, trusting Him fully. Without even thinking, I prayed and walked up our stairs to gather the cash I had collected over the last few months of selling items within our house that we didn’t need to move with us. I had taken some cash out for birthday parties, barista tips, teacher gifts, donations and more but thought I would put the rest in the bank because I didn’t want to keep the cash at home. As I finished counting the cash, it took me a minute to write the number down on the deposit slip before I noticed the amount that was left to put in the bank was the exact amount of money I needed for their first month of school. Not even one dollar off, but the very exact random number that was needed. It stopped me in my tracks and took my breath away. I felt God’s living and active Word awaken within me as I was praying for God’s provision. “Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow or reap or gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?” Matthew 6:26 That was God showing up and reminding me again and again to trust Him and that He will provide according to His will for our lives.
Just two days later after the cash number matched up perfectly with the school amount we needed to pay, Shepherd randomly asked me how many miles it is from our house in AZ to our land where we are building in AL. I of course do not know, so we looked it up together. The exact same number popped up again. There it was staring back at me on the gps, the same exact random number for their school payment that God had just given me so much peace around. There are no coincidences with God, it’s all His plan and He was revealing Himself to all of us over and over again.
God’s plan for our lives is much bigger than our our dreams and plans could ever be. It is amazing once we can fully surrender to His ways how He shows up and reveals Himself in every detail of our lives.
To be continued.
All glory to God.
“God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.” Psalm 46.1
Family photo by Christine Johnson