Candy Bars and Quotations

Well, one more week down, and God's faithfulness is still carrying us through this difficult transition. I still don't have a job. I've got a few prospects, but nothing solid just yet. We were relieved last week when the house sold (we still have to pass inspection tomorrow), but we do have the minor concern of finding a place to stay after we close on this house on January 9. That seems to also mean that I'll have to have a job by then, since most mortgage approvals or rental contracts tend to hinge on that sticky little matter of employment. That leaves us a little more than three weeks to sort that out, and we'll be in Washington, DC and Pittsburgh for one of those weeks.

So to recap: I've been unemployed for five weeks, and in another three weeks we'll be out of a place to stay. "How exactly does that spell God's faithfulness?" you might ask. Many more ways than I could possibly recount in this blog, but I'll focus on a few little "candy bars". Let me explain. A "candy bar" is a concept that was explained to us by our new friends, Brian and Amy, when we were staying with them last week in Dallas. Amy said that when you face a long difficulty like this, one of the ways that the Lord encourages our faith is by giving us little things to chew on while we are on the journey. "Kind of like finding a candy bar on a long hike when you're starving" she said. "It's not the whole meal, but it's something to tide you over."

I should back up and explain a little bit of their story. These are some of the finest people that you would ever want to know in a time like this, or any other time for that matter. About six months ago they were facing a transition that was very similar to ours in a lot of ways, but different in a couple of very significant ways. The most significant of those ways were that 1) it took a full 8 months for their house to sell, and 2) they have 8 children--that's right. 8 children. 8 months in transition. Amazing. Oh, and for two weeks during the transition they lived in their travel trailer with their 8 kids so that they could all be together while Brian was job hunting. Heroic doesn't even begin to describe what they are to us right now.

At one point they were really tapped on money, which wouldn't take long with 10 mouths to feed, and Brian was facing another difficult day job prospecting. As he was leaving his favorite internet café (an invaluable tool for the prospector), he looked on the ground next to his driver's side door and found two crisp 100-dollar bills, abandoned and looking for shelter. I don't need to tell you that these were two orphans that he was glad to take in. Thus the idea of the "candy bar" from God was born.

Brian did eventually find work, and the Lord has continued to miraculously provide for them. This doesn't mean that their struggles are over, but it also doesn't keep them from encouraging this small family during its light and momentary troubles. It is important to point out that they invited Cheryl and the kids down for the weekend because they didn't want us to be apart during the ice storm. And despite the fact that they have 10 people in a four bedroom house, they gave us two bedrooms and one bathroom, leaving two bedrooms for the 10 of them. That means that our kids stayed in a room with three beds while their kids slept on the floor. And they did it joyfully.

Back to our story, then. One of the things that has been a struggle is for Cheryl and I to find time to go out together. So even amid the financial concerns, we decided to give it a try last night. Neither one of us had a particular hankering for food, so we settled on Ted's Café Escondido on the South Side of town. Two facts are important here. First, we almost never go there. In fact, I don't know that we've been there by ourselves in the last year, if ever. Second, we don't know many people on the South Side of town. Why are these facts important, you ask? Because when it came time to pay the bill, the waiter informed us that our bill had already been paid. When we pressed him to tell us who paid it, he just said that his manager told him that it was taken care of. When we stood up to leave we scanned the restaurant, but we didn't see anyone that we recognized. We left the restaurant with our bellies full of some excellent Mexican food, but what we will remember for a long time after that is the "candy bar" that we got after the meal.

One more thing. After the meal we went to Mardel Christian Book Store to look around for a few minutes. While Cheryl browsed for a few last-minute deals on gifts, I wandered over to my new favorite section, the Puritan Classics. What I picked up was a collection of sermons by the great Puritan preacher and theologian, Johnathan Edwards, entitled Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. History buffs will know this as the title of his most famous sermon and catalyst of the Great Awakening in North America. What most don't know (including me until last night) is that eight years later he was fired from the same pulpit where he preached that sermon over his Biblical stand for closed Christian communion. This left him unemployed with eleven children and a wife and no employment prospects. The book begins with this story, including the following excerpt from a letter that he wrote to a friend three days after leaving his employment unceremoniously:

"I am now, as it were, thrown upon the wide ocean of the world, and know not what will become of me and my...family...We are in the hands of God and I bless him. I am not anxious concerning his disposal of us."

Needless to say, my faith was challenged, and my mind was full. After all, that was my second candy bar in one night.

Soli Deo Gloria!