Well, I said I would chronicle the highs and the lows. We had a bit of an unexpected blow yesterday, quite out of the blue. The contract that we were getting was suddenly just taken away. The quote had been asked for, accepted...we were just awaiting the paperwork. But the boss-guy said no, too expensive, just like that. He basically wanted the work done, for free. My husband said there was just no way he could have done it for less without losing his shirt. He's tired of working for free!
It's interesting when these things happen...it's inevitably when we are about to sit down as a family for our morning prayer/Bible time. RM isn't usually there for that as he's, generally speaking, already "at work" in his office in the shop, so it's usually just the kids and me. This time he was on the road and gave me a call to let me know what had happened.
I always take those calls as calls to prayer. We all sat down and I told the kids what had happened. They knew we were really counting on that contract. It would have bought the garage doors we needed. In our minds it was already spent! But I told them, "What do you think our choices are here? We can either panic and think, 'Oh no! God doesn't know what He's doing!' or we can thank Him, choose faith and wait to see what He's up to, how He'll provide in a different way at a different time." They agreed and the following prayers were amazing as they thanked God for how He was working even though the contract had been taken away.
RM came home and jokingly told me I read the Bible too much, especially the parts about "But if not"! In this case it meant, "We know you will provide what we need, like the garage doors, but if not, we'll trust that you know better and that maybe we don't need them right now!" He had known that yes, the garage doors, were a necessity, but at the same time, the ones that are in there now, as bad as they are at keeping snow, cold, and wind out, still are there at least and that he could get by if necessary. This time the "but if not" part of the verse actually happened! Poor Renaissance Man.
It didn't take long though for him to see the free time that had opened up for him. He still does have work, quite a bit actually. This gives him the ability to focus on what he still has to finish. Plus the farming season is just around the corner, so he'll be able to prep for that as well without getting too side-tracked. I really think losing the contract was a blessing in disguise.
Good things happened, too, though yesterday. We did make a hay delivery that paid really well and covered a whole lot of expenses we had. One of my friends asked me, "So does your husband do more engineering work now or farming?" It was an interesting question as I started to realize it really is about half and half now. His day yesterday was spent doing mostly engineering work in the morning and then he came home, put on his work overalls, grabbed the boys, went out and filled the trailer with hay and then off to make the hay delivery. He loves it though as it is keeping him active, even in the dead of winter with minus minus temperatures!
I had been reading in Genesis yesterday and usually when I read about Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, I always think "favour" - they were badly behaved sometimes and yet God showed them favour, but then when I read yesterday about how Jacob was being chased down by his father-in-law, Laban, he basically chewed out Laban and described to him how his past twenty years had gone. It seems he had a slow burn going on as he retells his time with Laban, I started to wonder if I understood what favour really meant.
"These twenty years I have been with you. Your ewes and your females goats have not miscarried, and I have not eaten the rams of your flocks. What was torn by wild beasts I did not bring to you. I bore the loss of it myself. From my hand you required it, whether stolen by day or stolen by night. There I was: by day the heat consumed me, and the cold by night, and my sleep fled from my eyes. These twenty years I have been in your house. I served you fourteen years for your two daughters, and six years for your locks, and you have changed my wages ten times. If the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac, had not been on my side, surely now you would have sent me away empty-handed. God saw my affliction and the labour of my hands and rebuked you last night." (Gen. 31:38-42)
But what really struck me was Jacob's twenty years and how he looked back on it - didn't sound like it was a walk in the park after all - he lost animals to wild beasts and had to take the loss himself. He had to work in extreme heat and extreme cold. He was often sleepless. He had to work like a dog just to be married to Laban's daughters. He suffered from inconsistent pay constantly and an inconsistent, unfair boss. Jacob, himself, describes this time as his "affliction" and how it was "labour", i.e., work! Yet, he was favoured? That didn't sound like favour!
Hmmmm....reading that section reminded me a lot like the past twenty years of our life, too! We'll be celebrating our twentieth anniversary, so I read this section with great interest as Jacob recalled his twenty year period with Laban. I've been recalling our past twenty years, too. I could have written a very similar series of verses! We've had losses, worked in difficult situations, extreme heat and cold is actually a normal part of our life and sleepless nights happen around here quite regularly. Inconsistent pay? - for sure. Affliction? Yup. But Jacob saw it as favour. He said God had been on his side!
Perhaps I don't understand what favour really is! Perhaps favour doesn't just mean getting what you want when you want it or having a life of ease with no problems. Favour, in Jacob's case, and even in our case, simply means God was there through everything, even in the trials. He still had to work hard. Yes, God blessed his work, but he still suffered losses. It seems he even "lost contracts", so to speak, or at least he worked for a difficult man in very trying circumstances.
In our twenty years, I remember trials, but I know "If the God of my father...had not been on my side..." we never would have made it. Describing and remembering the trials is actually a recounting of God's favour! Trials=favour! Strange, but true. It's in the looking back, specifically at the trials, that I see Him most in my life. Don't get me wrong, there were many many times where we experienced God in just plain and simple times of blessing - where all went well with the world, too. Those were rich times of God's mercy and I see how He was there in the good times, too, of course.
The bottom line? Jacob was shown favour all during that time of twenty years even though his description of it didn't seem very favoured. I, too, have been shown favour these past twenty years, specifically in the low times. I have a new perspective on what favour looks like! It includes trials and lots of them. Perhaps that is not what the dictionary would say favour is, but I don't live by the dictionary's standard.....
Favour has just been redefined.....
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