The other day I purposed to focus as much of my day on God as possible. I opened YouTube and pulled up my PC3 set list. For a time I was completely wrapped up in worship. Then I started thinking on my one word for this year, content. A thought about our house came to mind and the questions formed from there.
What if this is it? What if this is where God wants us to stay? What if this is where we live until the end of our days? And the kicker of them all... could I be content if we remained here? To go even deeper... what if today I started living as if this was it? In approaching my daily tasks, what would I do differently if I had the mindset that this is our forever home?
Some of you know the situation we are in with our house, it's a tangled web to say the least LOL and has thus far proved nearly impossible to get out of. Kind of like a fun house where you think you have found a way out only to realize it's just a mirage.
A few years ago we thought we had finally found way out from under it. Everything was falling into place nicely. We found a company that kind of worked like a car dealer LOL Our current place is a manufactured home and we were going to buy land and put a custom built modular on it, they were allowing us to "trade in" our current home in order to get the new one. Granted, we were going to have to roll over some of what we owed on our current home into the new mortgage, but it was a way out, finally a light at the end of a long dark tunnel. We picked out the home and all the fixins for the inside, and found a nice piece of land in Hampstead. While I was excited about cutting the ties connected to our home and having a brand new place of our own, I was also becoming very anxious. The cost of bundling everything together to get into the new home began to weigh on my shoulders. As many times as I prayed about moving forward with the purchase and hoped to have peace about it, it never came.
When folks say that God's timing is perfect, they ain't lying LOL I was heavy burdened because I knew the reality of our finances and while we could afford the new mortgage payment, it would have put us right to the wire financially with no room to budge. And if you know me, you know I like to have a little wiggle room in case of emergency. All Chris could see though was the light at the end of the tunnel and he had blinders on to everything else. I can't blame him, as the house had been a burden for him before I even came into the picture. It was then that my prayer became "God, if this is not what you want for us, if this is not in our best interest, then I need you to reveal that in whatever way you feel necessary."
Fade to 2014, a Thursday afternoon close to the end of September. I'm sitting on the couch watching some TV as I still have a couple more hours until Chris gets home from work. I hear his truck coming up the driveway and I find this rather odd as he shouldn't be home for another 2 hours. My first thought is that he's sick and they sent him home. I open the front door and see him looking at me as he gets out of his truck, shaking his head. "Are you ok?" I ask, to which he replies, "I'm sorry sweetheart." Now I'm perplexed. "Sorry for what?" I say and he responds, "I got laid off today." Want to know how perfect God's timing is? The VERY next day we were scheduled to sign the contract to purchase the land we were going to build our house on. Never in my life have a felt so relieved for my husband to tell me he got laid off.
I am so thankful that God intervened. As much as we wanted that new place, I knew in my heart that we weren't seeing the big picture; we were only seeing the here and now. What a blessing to know that God's promises are true; that He knows what is best for us; that He holds our future in His hands. There were 3 rounds of layoffs that year, he was fortunate to make it through the first two. It wasn't long after the third round when they let him and a few others go, that they closed up shop completely. With our human, earthly eyes, we couldn't have seen that. But God did and He protected us.
So I return to the question... what if this is where we are meant to remain? For 5 and a half years we have lived with the mindset that we will find a way out. What if God just wants us to be content where we are? When you get down to it, our home meets all our basic needs and that's really all that matters. I also think maybe, just maybe, if we become completely content where we are and stop focusing on "what's next", then if this isn't where we are meant to be that God will show us the next step when the time is right.
We live in a day and age where there is no satisfaction; where everyone just wants more. How heavenly it would be to just be content; grateful for what is, right here and right now and have faith in what will be. To truly be in this world but not of it because we have Christ in us and He is all we need.
Go forth and be blessed y'all :)
Brandy
