"Where God Guides, He provides."

I recently read this on a church sign and thought, "Wow. A church sign that is actually useful and not something silly." In the past month I have come to find that this couldn't be a more true statement.

I have heard several stories of people feeling God calling them to do something, being hit with all kinds of opposition, and God continuing to provide in the most miraculous ways. I had never experienced back to back, continuous provisions before...or at least not in such extremes that I really recognized it as God. This month, however, that is exactly what Scott and I have been experiencing.

We have been talking about moving into a bigger and nicer place than our apartment for almost 2 years now, but always ended up agreeing that it was worth the noise and the size to pay less in rent. We had decided to stay there until we could afford to buy a house. Every time another option came up, it never seemed to be a better deal. Even if it was a nicer place, the rent would be so much more that it would put us further away from affording a house of our own. We finally gave up on the idea of moving, deciding to be content with what we had.

Meanwhile, our pastor's parents, Jeff and Bobbie Williams had been dealing with a problem of their own. They own 14 acres of land. They live in a house on the property and they have another house that Jeff's parents were living in. Both his parents are in nursing homes now. They have been struggling to pay the insurance and taxes on the house and considered renting it out. They were nervous about renting and wanted to make sure it would be someone they trusted.

At the beginning of the month Bobbie brought the house up in our Bible study small group. She said she wanted to rent it out to a nice, young couple and wanted to know if any of us knew of anyone. I didn't immediately think of us because I knew we had already resigned our lease through December. I decided to mention it to Scott anyway and he asked me to email her for more information. After several emails and a trip to the house, we knew it would be perfect! It was only $15 more a month than we were currently paying, water included, and it is twice the size plus so much land! It all seemed perfect except that we had our lease...

We all prayed about it. We felt like it was God's will, but wanted to make sure we weren't imposing our own wills and calling it God's. Scott went by our rental agency and they said they could not let us out of our lease, but we could sublease it. This seemed like a set back. Regardless, I just kept on praying and knew that if God wanted us in that house, He would get us there.

I posted the apartment on the facebook marketplace and within 2 days I found a married couple who needed an inexpensive 6-month lease. It took 7 days total from finding out about the house to having the sublease papers signed! Awesome!

After signing the papers we found out that we had less than 2 weeks to be out of the apartment. The house still had furniture and a lot of the previous tenants' things in it. Our apartment had to be packed and repainted to the original color, and we wanted to put fresh paint on the house as well. In less than 2 weeks!!! But I knew that God wouldn't get us this far and then leave the situation. He made it happen! We were blessed to have Alora staying with us for the week and she was super helpful. The Williams helped out a ton (including Brandon and Susan) and Don and his brother from church moved all the furniture and boxes out in 1 day!

Then came time to move. We had rented a Uhaul but had no one available to help us move. Not only that, but I was supposed to be driving Alora back to Atlanta that same day! It was a blessing that she was able to come 1 week; we were seriously doubtful that she would be allowed to stay a little longer. Randomly, one of Scott's SCUBA friends texted him to see how he was doing. We told him we were moving and he offered to help! So, we had help, and managed to get it all done on Friday night after work!! THEN Alora found out that she could stay an additional week! These were all highly unlikely things, and God provided all of them! Just like that!

We are all moved in now! A lot still needs to be done around the house but we've made HUGE progress. God has truly blessed us and answered many people's prayers. OH--AND we didn't have a washer and dryer. We prayed about it, looked around online, but everything was either broken or way too expensive. Then, one day, we found a couple selling a fully operating set for only $150!! Thank you, Jesus! :)

So, the question now is, can we really afford even a slightly more expensive place, not to mention the extra gas money b/c it's 20 minutes outside of town, AND with me starting school and making less money? Well, we no more considered that when Scott got a call about a job interview for a full time job in the College of Education! He should find out in the next day or two if he got it or not. God has just been working overtime in our lives and we are so thrilled!! :) Not to mention the amazing blessing of having Alora around for 2 weeks! That was totally unexpected and I loved spending time with her. God is SO good! :) And where He guides, He certainly does provide. So, if you feel like God is calling you to something that seems impossible, just remember that everything is possible with God. He wouldn't call you to something and then stop. He's going to keep working to get you where He wants you. You just have to listen and be faithful. I'm so excited to see what He does in our lives next! :)