We were doing great with our new saving plans, and even found ways to do stuff with friends that wouldn't cost much, if anything. Then we were hit with some pretty rough news.
The VA was cutting John's funding early. That meant no monthly housing allowance that he had been using for rent, bills, and food for the last year and a half. It also meant that the last five weeks of his schooling would not be paid for. We were both very grateful that his school is allowing him to put off paying the remainder until he graduates, but with all the saving we already needed to do, that extra blow really hurt.
Knowing I would have to help with his rent and bills on top of my own. it was easy for my mind to jump straight to thoughts of desperation we all have when something big or scar is thrust into our laps unexpectedly. I'm sure you know the thoughts I'm talking about. They often come in the form of "why" questions.
Why is this happening to me?
Why me?
Why didn't God do something to stop this?
But as quickly as those questions crossed my mind, they blew away. Because I remembered ways God had provided in the past and I knew His nature hadn't changed since then. I knew He would provide again. So, following the advice of my mother (as moms always give the best advice), I began to pray. I didn't pray that He would provide, for I already was sure of this fact. Instead I began thanking Him for what I already knew He would do, but had not yet happened.
While I already had peace about the situation, something about putting my faith into action in this way seemed to solidify my surety that it would be taken care of even more so.
Then, as He often likes to do, God surprised me. The very evening the new hit, I came home to find a piece of mail sitting on the table, addressed to me, from my school. I opened it to find a response to a scholarship I had applied for--one I had been told was for $500. Upon reading the letter, I found that I had not been awarded 500, but $1000!
Already His provision was showing up.
While I may not know how the rest of this mess will be sorted out, my heart cannot help but rejoice in what I know He is doing behind the scenes.
In times like these, I often let the holy Spirit speak to me through music, as He is so good at doing. This time around, he keeps drawing my mind back to The Day That I Found God, off Switchfoot's new album, Where the Light Shines Through.
This noose ain't getting any looser.
I get so fearful about the future.
I feel the shame of my accuser,
But that ain't you.
The accuser, the father of lies, wants nothing more than to distract us from what the Lord is doing in our lives. Do not buy into the lies he throws your was in an attempt to blind you with shame over things you cannot help.
Where is Go out in the darkness?
'Cause the voices in my head ain't talking honest,
Saying maybe you made us then forgot us,
But that ain't you. That ain't you, no!
And all I know is that I still don't know a lot.
I don't know how it ends, I'm in the middle of this plot.
Yeah, I found grace for the man that I am not.
I found out the day I lost myself was the day that I found God.
God didn't forget you. He is working right now, whether we can see it right now or not. We are still in the middle of this story, by the end it will all make sense and we will see all he's done for us along the way. One crisis doesn't mean it's over. For God likes to show up in the place where we've lost everything. Especially ourselves.
I hope that my experience may encourage you to have faith that whatever may be going on in your life or whatever is going on in the world that makes you wonder where God is or what He is doing, that He is working for you constantly, behind the scenes.