I should not make promises about posting on this blog. I said the day before that I would post a great story yesterday, and it just didn't happen. Have you ever tried to write a blog with a colicky baby? Have you ever tried to do anything with a colicky baby? If so, then you will forgive me. If not, and you are resistant to forgiving me, then will you come hold my baby so I can write? And do my dishes? And my laundry? And cook? And take care of the 2 other kids I have under the age of 5? Please? PLEASE??? Actually, my husband sensed my very close walk with insanity yesterday and cleaned the house and did some laundry. If you knew his utter hatred for laundry you would know what a big deal this is. He also suggested we get Papa John's pizza for dinner. I sang "To God be the Glory" and when he looked at me strangely, I said "that means, yes". Not that I could actually eat the pizza. I'm sure if I had that would have filled our house with screams at a decibel that would rival a room full of tween girls who were just told Justin Bieber was on his way to marry them all. But, I did not have to cook or clean up after, so pizza for everyone else was fantastic for me.Back to the point. I spend a lot of time on this blog talking about crazy and mostly stressful things. The truth be told, though, I love my life. I am not sure I could love it more, honestly. Missionary life is hard, but it is amazing, and every time I think about having a "normal" suburban life, I have an anxiety attack. I am pretty sure that is a physical response God put in my body, so I would not turn back, and I am glad He did! Anyway, I want to tell some of the great and amazing things He has done for us since we started this journey!
JM and I lived in Alabama after we graduated. He was the youth and children's minister at a church and I taught high school Spanish. We knew that God was calling us to be missionaries, but I had a pretty significant student loan debt (thank you Mississippi College) and missionaries cannot have debt. A friend of ours who started a mission organization called us one day to ask if we would be the first foreign missionaries his organization would send overseas. We said "we'll pray about it", mostly as a way to blow him off because we really did not want to go to the country he wanted to send us to. Well, as it turns out, we prayed and felt like we were supposed to go. We called and told him we would go, but we have this student loan debt. He said not to worry about it- God would take care of it. And He did. A few weeks later some of our best friends called us to go out to dinner. They were our former neighbors who had moved away, so we were very excited to get to see them and spend time with them. After dinner we went to Starbucks because we wanted the night to end on a delightfully caffeinated note. At that Starbucks, they handed us a check for $15,000 which was almost exactly the amount we owed on the student loan. There h"happened" to be some missionaries from the same country we were going to sitting at the table behind us. They heard the whole thing and wanted to encourage us and tell us how much it encouraged them. Pretty cool.
You see when we first met this incredible couple, we told them about our calling and desire to be missionaries, and that we were waiting for our debt to be paid before we could go. What we didn't know was that when they heard that story, they began to pray that they could be the ones to help us pay off the loan!!! They actually prayed for God to give them money- not for themselves, but for someone else. God answered that prayer when they sold their house. No, they are not wealthy people with that kind of money to throw around. They fixed up a house and gave us the majority of the profit when it sold, and then lived in a rented trailer for the next two years because of it. Two servants who love Lord and desire to be used by Him. I wish I could write in here the countless ways this story has impacted people. It has most definitely impacted us. We learned that God will always provide for His work. We learned that it is a joy to live on faith. (How exciting would it have been, if this story was just that we worked for 5 years and gradually paid it off? Not very.) We also learned what it meant to be part of the Body of Christ and to repeat a few or those verses from yesterday-
"All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need."
Here they are with their oldest son. I didn't post their names because A) I didn't get their permission and B) I do not want them to be victims of some internet stalker or scammer because of me.
There is a lot more to this story that I would love to share with you. I won't promise when I will share it, so as not to repeat yesterday's experience, but I promise the next time my baby stops crying I will share it. See you in 2015.