Wow. We have been so overwhelmed by people’s responses to our April 8 post, “To Change a Life”. Since that post, we have received pledges from several new monthly contributors to help regularly support the Children’s Home, as well as several large one-time donations to help us through the remainder of this year. We are humbled and blessed by your response to the needs here, and the sacrifices being made on behalf of the children here in Kitale. THANK YOU from the bottom of our hearts!! You are all an inspiration to us.
About a month ago, God began impressing upon our hearts the need to practice what we preach. We realized that we couldn’t ask any of you to sacrifice if we weren’t also willing to sacrifice to help the children. We began looking at our budget to see where we could cut down in order to divert more of our budget to helping the children. Our biggest expense is our housing, so we decided to start there. To be honest, I was very resistant to praying and asking God for His guidance as to how we should change our living situation to be able to help the children more. It was nagging at me day and night and I found myself very irritable and unable to sleep. What it came down to was fear. I was afraid to ask God where He was leading us, for fear that it may be to a much more “rustic” lifestyle...and what if it even included a lack of running water or electricity?!?! I was also fearful that He would lead us to a place where we couldn’t keep our rottweilers. I know they are “just dogs”, but honestly, we really love them!
I don’t know why I am such a worrier, especially since God has proven Himself to us time and time again. And this time was no different. Before I even handed over my fears, He started revealing a new and wonderful plan for our living arrangement. Long story short, today we put a deposit on a new house that we will move into on May 25, just in time to finish up our current lease which ends May 31. The rent is lower than our current rent, and it is on a shared compound, which reduces our cost for the night watchman, which is shared between all the tenants. It has a small little private yard, that the landlord said we could fence and keep our rotties! We still needed to find a home for our German Shepherd who needs to RUN miles and miles every day....but God provided for that, too. A friend called last week looking for a dog needing a home. Lindy will be going this weekend to another large compound, with a couple who loves dogs and is also getting a new puppy to keep her company. Because we are going from a two acre property to a “postage stamp” yard, we no longer have need for a full time grounds keeper, eliminating that cost as well. With this move, we will cut down our housing expenses by 40%! AND I will still have electricity and running water! In fact, we are actually gaining space in our kitchen, dining room, and living room...all the spaces we use most to host people for dinners, art class, Sunday afternoon worship, etc.
I feel like God Himself is wooing us...as if He hasn’t done enough already by providing a way for our salvation. God is Good. ALL the time.
