My Testimony

Last Sunday I was so nervous before church that I tucked my button-up into my boxers. Which turned out not to be so bad because it kept it from doing that thing where it always comes untucked in the back. Anyway, I was nervous because I was asked to speak at church. I think I’ve mentioned that I am horrible at small talk? Well, it is even worse when I am the only one talking and in front of everybody. Smiling and nodding doesn’t work as well in that situation. I know from experience.

To help keep that from happening again, I wrote everything down beforehand and read it without ever looking up. Here it is:

I just want to warn everybody, I have intense fear of public speaking. I get nervous when giving my order in a crowded McDonald’s. So, I am going to get behind this podium and use it as a barrier between you and me. Hopefully, it will help me safe enough to get through this. I have such an intense fear that I actually wrote down everything I want to say and it is quite possible I read every bit word for word, so bear with me.

We just finished the Dave Ramsey class that John led and he asked me to give a testimony about how God is working in our lives through finances.

To get a clear picture of our finances, I think I should start a few years back when we first moved to Henry Co. Like a lot of America, we qualified for a loan that was probably bigger than we could afford but we took it anyway. Since then, we have been pretty much living paycheck to paycheck, with some times being tighter than others. Over the course of the past 3yrs we heard of Dave Ramsey and read his book, Total Money Makeover. We were very much on board with his principles and feel like God used him to shape over ideas on money. Unfortunately, money was so tight we could never get things going.

Around the beginning of this year, Laura Beth and I started praying together nightly that God would do something with our finances. We prayed specifically that we would be able to get out of debt, save, and give abundantly. At that point, about when we started praying that prayer, our expenses started multiplying in crazy ways: Ada had to go to the hospital for a few days because she suddenly started having seizures, I had the flu for about 8 days which caused LB to lose two tutoring students, our car broke down, our HVAC unit went out, our SUV broke down, then our car broke down again, then our SUV broke down again, then John had eye surgery, and throughout all of this LB developed some weird skin condition that involved going to see several doctors and a few specialists. Later, we found out the skin problem was caused by stress.

A few weeks after all of that, we had received our tax refund and were able to pay off a chunk of debt that had accumulated. We thought things were about to get back on track until the next Monday morning when I went into work and found out my company was downsizing and my position was being eliminated so I no longer had a job.

Obviously there was stress and fear, but at this point there is no doubt God is moving in our lives. It’s totally not what we expected. From our perspective, we were thinking a new job with a higher income. Instead? God eliminated our income.

Our prayer was to get out of debt, save, and give and we hope that will eventually happen but more importantly through all of this, God has shown us the truth of this verse in Deuteronomy 8:3 – “He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna which neither you nor your fathers had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.”

And what that means to us is…its just money. I remember a couple years back, we were talking about finances at community group and Matthew (our pastor) said, “Its just money.” I remember thinking, “What is he talking about?” But now I get it, it’s true. If you had asked me a couple years ago what is the worst that could happen financially? I would have said, “I lose my job and we lose the house.” But now, it feels like God is using those very things to answer the prayer LB and I started praying back in March.

Through these circumstances God has shown us that we can certainly live without money. What we can’t live without is Him and His word. God has used these circumstances to show us the truth of His scripture. Psalm 119:71 – “It is good for me that I was afflicted that I might learn your decrees. The law of your mouth is better to me than thousands of gold and silver pieces.”

That was all I had written down. After I finished reading that, I was going to go freestyle and talk about how thankful we are for all of our friends and family and how gracious they’ve all been and how taken care of they’ve made us feel and how God has used them to provide in our lives so much it has literally brought tears to our eyes. But I didn’t.

When I got done, I kind of didn't even look up and just walked back to my seat. My bad.

But seriously, friends and family, thanks. And stuff.