13 years...10 moves...to God be the glory!!

When David and I got engaged, we talked about buying a house and living in it for the rest of our lives. Well...that's not exactly what has happened. In fact, we have lived in 9 different places (soon to be 10!) during our 13 1/2 years of marriage. But honestly, I have not regretted even one of those moves--they were all clearly directed, motivated and provided for by our incredible, loving God!



I'm not going to give you the details of every one of our moves, but I will give you a few of the highlights from the past few moves.

1. One of our most signifcant moves took place early in 2000. We had been looking for a community of believers to share our lives with. But honestly, we had given up looking within the Church, because there didn't seem to be that many people who shared our value on community. So, instead, we opted to look for a community-living situation and to find a good church to supplement that community. We felt a strong pull to a co-housing community (http://www.cohousing.org/) that was about 60 miles from where we were currently living. We visited the community, but there were no houses/townhomes available in our price range. On the way home, we prayed and told God that we had 2 weeks. If one of the townhomes was not available within that timeframe we would have to look for another option. When we got home that evening, we had a message on our answering machine saying that someone had changed their mind about one of the townhomes and we would be able to purchase it if we were interested! Truly a miracle of God!! I have to add here that through one of the people living at the co-housing community, we visited a church in which there is a tremendous emphasis on living as a community of believers (think early church here). So, through the co-housing community, we actually found a church community. God answered the desire of our hearts!!
2. Our next move (we have stayed in the same city since that last move, because God had already answered our prayers about a church community) was also truly miraculous. Although I can't share the details, I can say that we had to move due to some issues with the adoption of one of our children. It was a very quick move and we did not see the place that we were moving into before we actually moved in. For 9 months we lived with 6 people in a tiny, tiny apartment. It was great for bonding and we were truly grateful for that time.
3. We were contemplating renewing our lease at the apartment because, as I said, it was a great place for bonding, etc. The only problem was that we didn't have a yard and we lived above another family (with 4 kids that can be stressful!). Then one day an aquaintance stopped by to give us something and asked if we would be interested in renting a little house that he had. They had been praying for renters and the house would be available the very same day that our lease was up (God has such great timing!).
4. We lived in that house for 1 1/2 years, but then we started tutoring kids from our church. The house was very small (1000 square feet) and there was no room for a classroom. We planned on buying a house, but at the very last minute the loan agent told us that we would have to have an adjustable rate mortgage. We didn't feel comfortable with this. But now, our friend/landlord had already found someone to move into our house, all our boxes were packed and we had 3 days to find a place. There are a number of families from our church who live in the same general neighborhood. We started to look for a house in that neighborhood. A friend from church told us about a house and we called the owner. This was ONE DAY before we had to move. I looked at the house and it was perfect for what we needed. I asked if we could move in the next day. Our very shocked new landlord said "yes" even though he wasn't planning on renting it for another month or two.
5. So now we get to our current situation. We've lived in this house for two years and were praying about renewing our lease. David off-handedly told me that he thought that we should renew our lease unless God gave us a house on a particular cul-de-sac where 3 other families from our church live. Well, guess what?! God is giving us a house on that cul-de-sac. It wasn't even for sale, but one of our church friends thought that the man who owned it might want to sell (this was without our even telling them about David's prayer!), and he does!! We'll be moving in a week-and-a-half, and we couldn't be more sure that God's hand is definitely in it. He is so good!!!