God's Story

A God Story:

I remember a pastor speaking on obedience and stating that if we let God work He will get the glory and we get the story. Well, He has given us a story!!! I am getting ready to come home for two weeks to meet my new twin niece and nephew and reconnect with friends. I have been saying, “God, I know I’m suppose to come back to Costa Rica but I need help being excited about coming back.”

Life has been so hard. I have felt alone, drained, isolated, physically unhealthy, and no way to fix it without a car and more time. I have been seeking God and asking for a solution. Well, instead, the house septic tank is overflowing and it is flowing into my shower, the teams cars are breaking down, and the list keeps going. Times when I thought I could get to the beach for a few moments of me time, either it started to rain or there was no transportation. My church that I went to in Spanish was just not exactly my beliefs and my church in English just didn’t quite fit me. Nothing was working and it has just been difficult…..

BUT…I always love the buts in a story. It is the time when things turn around. The time when God takes the difficult things and makes them beautiful. I love it when He takes the impossible and makes some incredible!!

So, about two weeks ago, I was sitting asking God to show me Himself. I wanted something grand and big. I wanted some dolphin to jump out of the water or something cool. Well, I saw nothing. After a while of sitting, I felt God say “hold out your hands”. I did but I kinda complained saying “I do this all the time there is nothing special or different or grandious about this”. Well, the next day, I felt God had drawn me into a special time with Him. I was listening to a sermon and the pastor stated “there was a woman who felt God had told her to hold out her hands and that in return God was going to fill them up and that when the blessings came she couldn’t grab the blessings but to leave the hands open.”

Well, He is filling them up! Ever since I have come to Costa Rica, I have heard of this church in a beach town. I have wanted to try it out. I have made plans to go there but they never worked out. Before I ever saw it, I thought it would be cool to live there. Well, God worked it out that, my teammate, Holly and I got to finally try it out for the first time last Sunday. It is both in English and Spanish. When we arrived we felt like we had made it home. It is a church on the beach. A church working with youth. A church doing outreach in the community with focus on organic farming and eating healthy. We both were like this is where we are to move. Yet, the prices for houses in a beach neighborhood and safer neighborhood are way more than our little budget could allow. To find a house, get approval and to get a house for a good price is impossible.

So, this is where the story gets good! On Monday, Holly and I looked in the neighborhoods around the church and found houses 3x what we are currently paying. Nothing was working out. Well, on Tuesday, she got a phone call about a beautiful house in a great neighborhood for less than what we are paying now. But, now we had to get Child Protective Services and the Health Department approval. Well, guess who decided to pay the shelter a visit on Thursday? Child Protective Services. She immediately loved the house and gave instant approval. Not only that but she stated that Seed of Hope is the newest shelter of hundreds in Costa Rica and we are one of the best in the country. The next battle was the health department. For the current shelter we are living in, they made us build an extra bathroom and jump through a ton of hoops. Yet on Thursday, they looked at the house and said they would waive the need for another bathroom that would cost thousands!! God gave us a house in 3 days!!! But nope, the story doesn’t stop there. On Friday morning, we were praising God and having a great worship time together as a team. We get a phone call. We have a bigger home in the same neighborhood for the same price. What???….yep! Another house above and beyond what we could have hoped for! So today, we got a new shelter for the girls and a missionary house. Everyone on the team is moving to the beach town! So now, instead of being spread out and isolated, God has given us community. God has done incredibly more! 

He blessed, He moved, He worked!!! 

This is His story!!