God is Good

I remember as a child there was an MC Hammer song in which he sang, “you gotta pray just to make it today.”  And he was right.

Those of you who have been following know that things have been… tight, to say the least for Mark & me over the course of these last few months.  By the Grace of God and monthly financial support from his father, some money from my mother and some from his, we’ve managed to scrape up rent, car insurance, and enough petrol to do the very basics.  Oh, and we’ve managed to make sure we’ve had enough food to keep us from starving.  The cats eat better than we do.

But through it all we’ve been praying, ceaselessly, as was commanded to us by God.  It’s always easy to pray when we need things, much harder, at times, to remember to pray when things are going as they should.  And, as I’ve been saying, all it takes is a little bit of faith.

Last week Mark & I went to the church to get some prayer and it was good.  It’s always nice when the pastor spends some time to get to know you, to pray for you and then invite you to prayer that evening.  We did and we got even more prayer.  We left feeling… blessed.  If you’ve ever had anyone pray for you then you know how we felt.

But still… the bad news kept coming.  Mark’s housing benefits were being suspended.  We had no money to pay the rent next month.  They needed certain information from me to determine if Mark is still eligible for housing.  No.  They think we (because of my student loans) make too much money to be eligible.  And they want every penny they’ve given him over the course of the last 9 months back.  We have a few months before they’re going to start asking us to pay it back.

And then we get even more news that it might be the case that his job seeker’s is going to disappear.  A few posts ago I detailed how much it’s going to cost us to have the basics and we were getting about £200 less than what we needed to pay everything we need for the month.  His father’s been giving us some money every month and that’s helped  more than we could ever say.

But we’re still not sure where the money for the rent for July is going to come from, we don’t now where the money for the insurance is going to come from.  So we prayed, and we prayed and we kept our eyes on the Lord and we had faith.  Even when it seemed as if God was not listening, we kept our faith.

After all, He brought us thus this far, hasn’t He?  And if we lost faith in God, then we’re really in trouble.  And I am amazed at the level of faith displayed by Mark.  For someone who was never raised a Christian, his faith in the Lord is awe inspiring.  And that faith in the Lord is not without cause.

A few days ago we get a call from Dad who tells us that he’s sending Mark some money for the rent.  We began to cry.  It’s going to cost him some, but he and Mom are going to help us with the rent for July.  Mark & I are determined, no matter what they say, to pay them back.  So we thanked God for such a blessing.

And then his In Training advisor calls him to let him know he’s set Mark up with an interview for a company that makes cleansers of various sorts for various companies.  And we praised God for the possibility of such a job.  It’s factory work and it might not be inspiring but it’s work and it is a blessing.  And if this is where the Lord can do His work through Mark, then so be it.  We shall go where the Lord leads us.

And then the other day his Uncle calls and says that he and his son want to help us out.  They were willing to come down on a Friday to give us the money.  I cannot begin to describe the tears of humility and joy that we then shed at such an offer.  This is his uncle and his cousin who are helping us out in this time of need.  Who does that?  His family, that’s who.  Mark & I are firm that we will pay back, somehow, this generosity.

And so we thanked the Lord.

So now the Lord has provided us rent for a month and car insurance for the next couple of months.  And all through the generosity of his family.

August is but a month away and though we hadn’t thought about what we were going to do for rent, we are focusing on the here and now.  I have been fully confident that the Lord has a plan for Mark and that plan includes some sort of an income.

This morning Mark’s phone rings.  I hear him talking and instantly my heart clenches, I grow tense.  Over the last few months anything coming through the post or anyone calling has been a reason for concern.  Instead, it’s his uncle.  His aunt & uncle had been talking last night and they have a house that belonged to her mother just sitting empty that they are offering us the use of for as long as we might need it.  Mark immediately told his uncle that we’d take care of it, maintain it, do whatever fixing needing done.  And we told him we’d come down on Friday to take a look at it to see if we’d like it.  (I’m willing to take this sight unseen.  Talk about a god-send)

While at his interview thing today, Mark was told that he’s been scheduled to work today, tomorrow and Friday at this cake factory place where he worked a couple of shifts.  He has been trying to call to get more shifts but they’ve not returned any calls for work.  4 shifts is a little over 30 hours a week.  He only needs to work about 30h/week to pay all our most basic bills.  So we are going to pray that they have work for him every single day.

And now we need to call back his uncle and let him know we can’t come Friday and if he gets work Saturday then we’ll come on Sunday… right after church.

God is good

All the time

All the time

God is good