Tuesday, May 5, 2009

We're so grateful!!

I want to share my testimony for what has happened to us in the last couple weeks and the major turn around the Lord made! Bud and I are so excited, blessed and forever grateful to him and his promises!
As you may know, Bud and I were both laid off just a week of each other the end of January. It has been a struggle trying to make ends meet and even trying to receive our unemployment benefits. We've had to borrow money from our parents every month in order to have food in our kitchen, to meet our rent, or to put gas in our cars. I thankfully got my job back, but it was only part time and the money I was receiving for that was now taking the place of my unemployment benefits that I was no longer getting.
This past month has probably been the worse. We were only receiving around $1300 for the whole month and we had our car insurance that was double what it normally is because we had to catch up on it and it was the end of the policy. We had NO idea how we were going to afford rent, my car payment, or gas and to top it all off, we had nothing in our fridge to eat and needed some bare necessities fast! I have been praying this whole time that something would come through for Bud so that we would be OK and we could stop asking for money from our parents who also are having a little bit of a hard time. I continued to pay our tithing (or what I thought was our tithing) through this time of struggle because I knew we would only be blessed in the long run. Nothing ever happened though.
A few weeks back, I can remember 3 people stressing the act of paying tithing and giving back to the Lord just 10%. I really started to feel like it was being directed towards me and it forced me to really calculate how much I was actually paying (since I never really figured it out before, I just kind of guessed). I sat in church and figured it out. To my surprise, I was way off! I immediately prayed to my Father in heaven and apologized for what I had been doing. I wrote a check for my tithing in the correct amount, knowing that it would come out and we would be that much short on things. But I felt so good about it and knew it was the right thing. It was as if a weight had lifted off my shoulders and I heard the Lord say, "Thank you. You heard me"! I grew so much closer to him just in the moment.
About a week later was I think when Bud text one of our Pastors asking her to pray for us because we were in the worse spot yet. We literally had no money and didn't know what to do. Both Bud and I spent our precious moments with the Lord, crying and asking for help. That very next day he got a job! That was last Wednesday. He has worked a total of 3 whole days plus OT. He will gets paid every week and his check that he'll bring home on Thursday will be double, if not more what I get paid in 2 weeks. I also received two checks from unemployment in the mail last night too!
We were concerned at first whether this job was just going to be temporary or not, but everyone says they love him and he's such a hard worker. The boss really likes him and is already wanting to give him a raise. He is already treating him like he's a lead guy too, he's having keys made for him and putting him in charge of some of the lead work. It's such a huge blessing to us! I have been to grateful to my Father in heaven. This is only the work of him! He made this happen and it brings tears to my eyes.He really does hear our prayers and I have a whole knew faith on giving my tithing! Praise be to him and his glorious work and promises!

2 comments:

Charla Ann said...

What faith! That is awesome Brittany! Thanks for the story, it strengthens my testimony. The Lord really is amazing. :)

David and Kendra Nielson said...

Glad to hear things are getting better. That 10% can be a struggle sometimes but will always be worth it in the end.