I want to brag on our amazing God! He is the most amazing weaver of ideas that I know! I love how He plants little seeds here and there and then yields an overabundant harvest! Are you listening to Him?
At the beginning of the year, we decided we were going to put ourselves on a strict budget and learn to live simply so we could start being better stewards of our monies. Through some of my studying of our Hebrew roots, God was directing us to be “doubly fruitful” in 2023. I was getting fully into learning to budget when along came payday bringing with it a figure in our bank account that was only 1/3 what we were expecting. (There had been a payroll snafu due to a new company health insurance & other company issues that make us go UGH!) The snafu was not going to be fixed so we went into panic mode (not faith mode which SHOULD be our default by now, but I digress). Thankful for this budget we had started, we cinched it in as tightly as we possibly could! We would be able to survive, no problem, but just wouldn’t get to enjoy any bells and whistles these two weeks and wouldn’t be able to start our savings plan as aggressively as we wanted.
If you personally know the Corsars, you know we live by the Shema verse in the Old Testament of loving God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and loving your neighbor as yourself (Deut 6:4-9). We love God deeply, and He causes us to love people deeply. Last week, there was a super cold evening on the horizon and a homeless lady posted on our community page asking for help with a hotel room or some warm items. I prayed for her as I would normally do when I hear of people struggling, but all evening God would not let her leave my mind. Every time I would pray, I just felt a call to action of some sort. I messaged the lady and asked how much the cheapest hotel room was in town because I was going to garner some support and try to get her a room. The cheapest room was going to be $50. I asked Michael if we could swing it in our cinched budget to get this lady off the street for a cold night. I then reminded God that we were on a really tight budget the next two weeks…just in case He had overlooked that. 😜
We got the lady and her husband into a warm room, then I told her I not only cared about her physical needs, but also her spiritual needs. I asked her if her and her husband wanted to join us for church the following day because it would also be followed by a potluck at church and they could get a homecooked meal! They couldn’t pass that up. They came to church with us and were loved on so well by our church body. Everyone even sent the leftover food home with them so they would also have some dinner.
The following night a Winter Storm was coming through our region with freezing rain and snow of several inches, and again God prompted me to action. Snow is my most favorite, peaceful thing, but that’s because I can enjoy it from a warm recliner with a cup of hot tea in my hand. I can’t imagine it would be my favorite thing if I had to exist all day in it and sleep in it at night. My heart broke for all those who struggle, and God gave me an intense heart of gratitude for the things He has given me so abundantly. He reminded us that He blesses us to be a blessing, even though I felt the need to remind Him again that our bank account is sorely lacking funds because I knew what He was prompting us to do again. 😑 I was unable to garner any further financial support for this family, so we cinched extra hard and was able to squeeze out of our budget enough money to put this family in a warm room for the week.
I’m not telling this story for any accolades or anything other than this one reason: Obedience.
Faith and Obedience to be more exact.
God prompted MY heart to leap out in faith as He has been teaching us recently. Live life in a risky space and allow God to fill the gaps. This wasn’t a lesson for others…it was for Michael and Becky. We weren’t able to garner support from others to help this family because it wasn’t their lesson…it was ours. It was a tangible lesson of being doubly fruitful with the risk of running out of money, money that God has given us by the way, to be obedient to a thing He was asking of us that made no sense to our human minds in our current situation.
So today is Wednesday. We get paid Friday, hopefully our full paycheck this time. 😅 And we still have money in the bank. God has said that’s enough on this particular lesson with this particular family. I’m hoping we got an A or at least an E for “effort”. Joking, of course. I’m sure God will do His weaving to help this homeless couple through some other avenue. But, we were obedient and were able to meet their needs for this week. Thank you, Lord, for causing us to plant a seed.
We can’t wait to see what You have for us to learn in February! ;)
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