God Shows Up

Many of you know our struggles with Steve being unemployed for the last...well...forever, it seems.  And most of you know my story that I was called (very clearly, in fact) to go on a mission journey to South Africa shortly after Steve lost his job.  You can read about that amazing story here and here.  Then, before leaving for South Africa, God called us to adopt.  I know it was a God calling because before, Steve had absolutely no interest in adding to our family.

In the years (yes, 2 1/2 and counting) in which Steve has been out of a job, we have been asked by God to do many BIG things.  Many things that cost A LOT of money.  But today, I'm here to talk about how God has shown up in those leaps of faith...

2 1/2 years ago, we were DEEP in debt.  We were barely making ends meet and we had tons of credit card debt...some from bad financial decisions, but some also from bumps in our financial road that we weren't adequately prepared for.  When my dad passed away, I inherited enough money to pay that debt off and we were set!  We were about to be livin' the good life!  We didn't even get a one month taste of the good life because it was a month later when Steve lost his job.  Back then, if you would have told me we would be where we are today, I would have laughed (shout out to Sarah of the OT times!).  Because there would have been no way, short of a miracle, we could have made it on just my salary for this long.

But here we are.  Almost ready to bring Kylie home and so far, all of the adoption paid for in CASH.  Some cash we had saved (albeit for Jenna's college fund!), much of it donated, lots of it fundraised, the rest of it earned.

Mid-last week, we had over 100 adoption t-shirts left.  We only bought 150 to start, so having the majority of that left was pretty sad.  Since that time, my niece Beth (the daughter of Deanne, my SIL traveling with me to China) sold EIGHT shirts to folks in her little physician's office.  EIGHT!  Friday night, Steve took the whole bin to the bowling alley where my SIL and many of her closest friends bowl on a church league.  Steve came in with nearly $200 worth of t-shirts sold there.  Sunday, my sweet neighbor, Aimee, took a bunch of shirts to her church and sold 13 of them there.  And the kicker was that Aimee was saddened she didn't sell more!  SELL MORE?!?!  Holy cow?  Saturday night, a few other adoptive families and I held a craft night fundraiser (more to come as soon as I hijack pics of the night from my friend Elizabeth), and I walked away with another chunk of change (remember, "chunk" is all in the eye of the beholder!) and since my Facebook post last week, I've gotten about 10 order for t-shirts as well.  5 on my desk to send out today!

All that to say, in the last...3 days...we've been blessed with nearly $1000 more to get us to Kylie!  The airline tickets are bought.  And they went on a credit card.  Unfortunately, that was the only way to pay for them in the short amount of time we have.  But I know that God shows up sometimes at the 11th hour when we know there is NO other way for things to happen.  So I hope God is just getting started.  He might not will it that this adoption be completely paid for without more sacrifice on our part.  I paid more than 1/2 of my mission journey to South Africa.  And yes, it hurt.  Financially, we didn't have it, but we found it eventually and paid it off at the last minute. 

But while I'm here...I want to remember His provisions in our lives.  God is just getting started.  I hope you'll stick around to see Him finish this out. 

Oh, and if you want a t-shirt, we do have some left.  There are no more SMALLS.  We have a handful of Mediums and plenty of Large and XL.  I have 1-3XL left and maybe 1 or 2 of the 2XLs.  Click here to learn how to get one and be a part of Kylie's story.

By the way, if you purchased a t-shirt and can take a picture of you wearing it, do that and send it to me.  I'll post them on my blog over the next few weeks.  My friend Elizabeth is doing this over on her blog and I sure wish I thought of it sooner!  She's a smart cookie!