Our daily bread

I must admit that uur sweet little house was a bit of an impulse buy.

We were planning on living in our one-bedroom apartment for at least another year or so, when through a few twists and turns, we found ourselves realizing that we probably COULD afford a house sooner rather than later.

We looked online. We drove around. We looked at a house that looked like it would be really cool....and it was really gross. Like, GROSS. This process took us all of, oh, a week. The day we looked at the gross house, my mom was with us. Matt had made a little list of houses he had seen for sale on one end of town, so the three of us toot-tooted around the south-side streets of Holland. Every one of them I ix-nayed. And then we drove by this one.


And to me it just said, "Hi." And I said, "Matt, I LOVE that house!" It was For Sale by Owner. We saw it the next day, loved it, and made an offer. And that was that.

If you've ever watched "Property Virgins" on HGTV, you'll know that Sandra says that's a big no-no. Oh well, we were property virgins and now we have a sweet little house.

I love our house. But there are things I do wish were different. I wish we had one more bedroom. At the time, I thought, "Fab! A room for us and one for a kid!" and now I think, "Fab. A room for us, one for a kid, but where does anyone else sleep?" A second bathroom - even just a half bath - would be divine. The stairs up to our room (the whole upper half-story) are very steep, and I have horrible visions of a three-year-old trying to find me in the middle of the night and climbing up those stairs. I think, how on earth will we fit more than one or two kids in our house? What if we want to adopt? How do we save to adopt and save for a bigger house at the same time? Augh!!! Why didn't we think about this when we were looking for a house?

BUT - our house is exactly what we need for right now. Our daily bread. Not too much, not too little. Our mortgage payment is way less than we ever paid for rent. It's comfortable and a breath of fresh air at the end of the day.

But what would I do if I had a big house? (And "big" is a relative term: anything larger than 1090 sq. ft. with three bedrooms and two bathrooms would be "big").

I would sure have a lot more to clean. Minus.

We could entertain more people. Plus.

Our utilities would cost more. Minus.

We'd probably have something bigger than a one-butt bathroom. Plus.

Our house payment would be higher. Minus.

We could fill it with more kids (bio, adopt, foster, etc). Plus.

God laid it on our hearts about a month ago to think about what we would do should something happen to one of our friends, who is a single mom. The answer was a no-brainer: we would take in her kids. Funny thing (coincidence? I think not!), our friend approached Matt recently to broach that very subject. So Matt and I were talking about it last night and trying to figure out what we would do if we suddenly had these kids...I mean, we have this teeny house. How would we give everyone the privacy they need and keep them comfortable? Our conclusion was that if God were to allow that to happen, He would provide for us in only a way that He can. And we have to trust Him on that.

He would give us our daily bread. We might need a little more bread for that "day," and He would provide it.

I was driving to see a dear elderly woman from our church today and pick up her grocery list on my way to the store. On the way there, one of those thoughts pricked at my mind that come up from time to time: I would be twenty weeks this Saturday. As much as I try to put out of my mind where I would be if I were still pregnant, for some reason my mental calendar keeps peeling away the days and the weeks. Everyone knows twenty weeks is a milestone. And I thought, "Man, if things were different, I would be looking forward to that twenty week ultrasound next week, probably."

But things are not different. They are as they are. And I started to cry and pray and thank God that He knows way more about my life than I do. A couple of dear girls with whom I work struggled with infertility for YEARS...and both of them remind me that there is NOTHING that I can do to thwart God's plans (they both have beautiful children now, but the roads they walked while waiting for their children were arduous and washed with tears). There's nothing I can do to speed up or hold back the course of my life that God has ordained. I am so grateful for that. Anyway, I was wiping my tears with my mittens and thanking God in advance for however He would choose to bless us, and I felt a still, small voice inside. Not an audible one, not an overtly obvious one...but a small voice nonetheless.

I am going to fill your house with children.

I pictured our teeny little house, filled with children. Ones that we've had, ones we've adopted, ones we've taken in...and it looked marvelous!! And I thought, why on EARTH would I complain about our small house if it were filled with children? What a grand problem to have!

And I realized even then that He would give us our daily bread. If He can make a few tiny loaves of bread be more than enough for a crowd of 5000 to pig out on, He can make our house more than enough for those He will place inside it. Matt and I would love to have a family, and someday I'm certain we will, but that may look so different from what we even picture. Will we someday have a big house filled with children? I sure hope so. Maybe that's why He led us to our current little impulse-buy...so that He will have the opportunity to glorify Himself again by providing for us in circumstances that we would not have expected. I can't wait to see what the daily bread will be that He give us!