A Fight to the Death

"God always provided for us, but we rarely saw miracles.  For the most part, we had to do the things necessary to make certain that our children were fed and clothed."

That's another quote from Joyce's book.  We've actually seen quite a few miracles, I'd have to say, but we've still had to do the necessary things to make certain our children are clothed and fed.  Joyce wrote that her towels and sheets became threadbare and that their house badly needed repairs, but they had a roof over their heads, food was on the table and their homeschool was always in session. That's our situation in a sentence.  My furniture never had holes until the four year old was born.  Now I have two, what used to be nice, sitting chairs with matching ottomans, that look like I picked them up from a homeless shelter and brought them home.  I'm not one of those moms that lets their children jump on furniture, but this little guy reinvented mischief - every time I turned my head, he was leading a whole troop of kids in a circle around the family room, going from couch to chair to stool, at leaps that defied gravity.  He got in trouble every time, but he weighed the cost and figured it was worth it.  Bring a two year old into the mix and now the little hole that started is now a huge tear with stuffing coming out of it.  It seems to get worse with every day!  I find myself apologizing everytime someone comes over about my awful furniture.  But we have a place to sit!  They are still very comfortable and the truth is, we kind of did get them from a type of homeless shelter!  They came from a store that sells furniture that no longer has a home!  This store sells furniture from hotels that is always updating their look - don't laugh, a lot of our furniture came from this place - it was actually in a casino, I think, at one point!  Ah well.....it has received a lot of use.  We won't mind replacing it with "new" hotel furniture at some point.

My children love music, but even that isn't working right now.  Once again, a lot of wear and tear on the outdated stereo has taken its toll.  We never even got any of the new gadgets that are out there. We've been using the same stereo for what seems like our whole marriage.  It worked until all the kids figured out how to use it - perhaps it was poor stewardship, I don't know, but now the stereo won't let us take out cds or put in new ones.  I think it's ironic that the last cd that is in there is a Scripture memory cd for the little kids - perfect.  It's the one we need most anyway!  We used to play music on the computer, but you guessed it, for some reason, that isn't working anymore either, so now my desperate children stand around my phone, which doesn't play music very loudly, but better than nothing, and listen to my itty bitty little phone!  My husband is secretly happy about this, but my kids always joke about moving in with another family from the church where they can eat sugar and listen to music!  They better be careful what they wish for!

To top it all off, yesterday we had our first bout of frozen pipes.  We had hoped to finish all the siding, insulation and landscaping to stop the wind this summer, and we made progress, but nowhere near what we needed to do, so yesterday morning, I came down, was ready to jump in the shower, and the water just dripped to a halt - I was dumbfounded.  I stood in the bathroom and yelled out a "NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!  THIS ISN'T HAPPENING!!!!!!!!"  I thought the whole house would have heard me, but they all kept sleeping in their cozy beds.  I wanted to cry.  It's only mid-November!  We may have 5 more months of this!  I felt sick.  Sick for my husband, knowing what a brutal winter we had last year, sorry for myself, knowing I could barely keep my house warm and most of all, dread.....all the feelings from last year came back in that split second of watching the water drip to a halt - awful.

But then, a turning point - the defining moment with Christ, remember?  I knew  in that split second it was a test of whether I would trust Him.  It's like He was asking me in that awful moment if I was serious about the very thing I had just written about as this frozen pipe experience was literally seconds after I'd just written about trusting Him, having no fear anymore, no matter what came my way.  I decided to trust.  I went up and told my husband what was going on.  He couldn't believe it himself, but like a trooper, he got up, went out into the blasting wind and cold, and within a few minutes had the pipes thawed.  No small miracle.  I appreciated my warm shower that morning and even the coffee in my cup.

Don't you see?  This choice I made kept my spirit calm and took away the dread.  The dread I felt last year was worse than the cold.  This year, I just want to enjoy winter and look to the One who will get me through it.  I've heard it's going to be worse than last year.  I think Satan is the new weather forecaster as it's all hearsay, but even if it's true - who cares?  I'm going to live somehow through it!

All day long we waited for the cheque.  When we've been in this situation before, RM used to say things like, "It's not good, P.  Things aren't good."  Those words, unknowingly to him, also used to send me into a tailspin of fear and panic.  Yesterday I knew he was feeling it.  I heard him say a few things along those same lines that typically made me fall apart inside, but I remained strong.  The cheque didn't come.  I knew it wasn't going to come...not yet, anyway.   I knew God wanted me to stay calm and all day long, I practiced.  I practiced like my daughter practices piano - over and over again, I wouldn't let myself go where Satan wanted me to go.  I decided I would see what Ann Voskamp had to say - I hadn't looked at her calendar sitting on my counter for awhile - sometimes I flip it over, other days I forget.  I decided to flip it and see what amazing thing I would read.  I wasn't disappointed.  She had taken Habakkuk 3:18, one of my favourite verses in the Bible, and rewrote it, as if she were in my kitchen, at that very moment in my life,

"Though my marriage tree may not bud and though my crop of children my fail and my work produce little yield, though there is no money in the bank and no dream left in the heart, though others may choose different ways to live their one life, till my last heaving breath, I WILL FIGHT TO THE DEATH FOR THIS: I WILL TAKE JOY."

I had a great day yesterday.  It really didn't matter if my furniture was ripped or if there was no music in the stereo.  Even the fact that my water pipes got frozen and could have been today, too, but gloriously they weren't, didn't take away from my good day.  Even if the cheque still doesn't come, nothing can take joy from me as long as I choose to not let it be taken.  This is fantastic news for my family!  If their mom and wife stays content in all situations, so will they!  Swann agreed and wrote, "We learned to be content with our lives and grateful that God always supplied our needs. "  That's what we are learning, too, amongst so many things - contentment, waiting on God to supply our needs and then seeing all that we have in the process.  I've never seen water from a tap with such gratitude!  That's why these things are so good for us to go through - we need to stop taking things like water from a tap for granted!  It's so great that we have water from a tap!!!!!

Life is still full of laughter, too - for the second time in a week, my husband has had to take the toilet right off the floor to find out what toy is stuck in the pipe - first, it was about 3 Hot Wheels and most recently a hair clip - just enough to make it stop working.  A great lesson in plumbing for the older boys!  I've got my hands full with the four year old, now training his accomplice, the two year old. So funny.  Thankfully, there is no jail for toddlers as both of mine would be in for life already.

What does the day hold?  Who knows, but I can handle it, by God's grace, I will "fight to the death for this:  I will take joy."