My husband lost his job once.
He didn’t have full-time employment for a year.
As a retired sailor, he did have income and our family didn’t worry about starving.
But I immediately went into survival mode and watched every penny with an intensity that made everyone feel uncomfortable.
I couldn’t bear to walk into a store for months afterward; my gut would curl and my heart beat scurried–fear overwhelming everything else.
What would happen to us?
Where to turn?
I poured out my worries and complaints to the Lord from the safety of our puffy-soft brown recliner.
I couldn’t talk about it with my husband, he didn’t need me pouring more emotion into his life as he figured out his working future.
Many times in the early months I fell into despair. I couldn’t comprehend my family in this situation: we were planners, we saved ahead, we didn’t take enormous risks.
And yet there we were, scraping by and having to tell our children that some of the “givens” and promises we’d made couldn’t be fulfilled because we didn’t have the money.
As the months without a full-time job stretched, my husband relaxed into a less-regimented life.
Photo by Ben White on Unsplash
He substitute taught and learned a lot about teaching–including that it wasn’t where he belonged. My husband sailed his catamaran with the children.
He went on every school field trip and spent time with the boy scouts. The church needed help building their offices; he carried his hammer and joined his friends.
Seminary classes began and he could attend. The biggest blessing came when he took his new skills to my father’s house and made it handicapped accessible.
Other than the lack of money, life was rich.
Even at the time and in spite of my anxiety, I knew God was up to something in our lives.
When terror at the future coiled around me and the noose of fear tightened, I chose to give those worries to God, “because they’re too big for me and I trust you.”
I’d also remind God that I hated this experience; I wanted life easy.
Finances got worse before my husband landed a full-time job, but the key to surviving was our belief that nothing in our lives surprised God.
I just had to look at our circumstances through the prism of God’s point of view.
A lost job but a terrific year
Today I remember that year as one of our best years. My husband was free to do the things God called him to do and our family–our greater family– was better for it.
Sometimes the Lord needs to take us out of our “normal” life to give us the opportunity to trust Him more.
A lot of times we think we know what the best solution to our problems is.
But I’ve observed that if we stop and ask God to show us what we need to do at a given time and place, He reveals something bigger and more magnificent than we ever could imagine.
Who would think losing a job could reap such a rich benefit? Click to Tweet
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