God at work

... through blogs.

When we lived in Phoenix, I met a wonderful neighbor whom I am honored to call my friend. We actually briefly met on the street before Mark and I moved when we were visiting and home hunting. She told us how great the neighborhood was, etc. It turned out we didn't buy the house across the street from her, but around the bend instead. When we moved in, she knocked on our door and was greeted by a crazy St. Bernard and a tired lady who had been unpacking all day and probably looked disheveled (ok, I'm sure I looked worse than disheveled). I didn't even invite her in! She, not knowing if we were church-going people, invited me to a neighborhood women's bible study that was just starting up. Jesica led the Precepts Bible Study (Having A Real Relationship With God) and it was amazing! This was my first experience with a Precept study and let me say that it truly is an awesome way to dig (and I mean dig deep) into God's word. 

Ok, so you get the idea... Jesica is a special friend whom I treasure. I'm still learning from her. She posts some very meaningful entries on her blog and  is always raw and honest with where she is in the moment. If you have a minute, would you mind praying for her now? She has an undiagnosed health issue she is battling and we are praying her doctor's will find the reason behind a brain lesion recently found in an MRI. 

I guess I wasn't done yet. ;) Now that you've "met" Jesica and prayed for her I'll get to the main story I wanted to share. 

Our current renters have a lease that expires at the end of May. We really didn't want to hire a realtor again to find new tenants because of the extra cost and rent prices seems to drop every year as it is. We planned to post an ad on Craigslist to generate some interest. We were still in the planning process for advertising when I visited Jesica's blog. I read an entry and went to leave a comment when I noticed a comment from someone else. I don't know why, but I clicked on the gal's link and checked out her blog. I read a few entries when BAM she wrote, "Okay, so we found out this weekend that we have to move out for sure at the end of May or June because our landlord..." Whoa! I thought, "Why not?", and left a comment asking if they had found a new rental yet and that I was a friend of Jes's and we own a rental home in the neighborhood. I left her my email and thought if she contacts me cool.

She did, she emailed me that day! I will spare you all of the details, but within 4 days they visited the house and a week later we sent them a lease and they returned it with all the deposits we require.  This may not seem like a big deal to you reading this, but let me say this is such an answered prayer for us! First, our neighborhood is over-saturated with foreclosures and rental homes are in abundance. Second, we have been praying for trustworthy, honest tenants since we are so many miles away. What we found out, was that this family had also been praying for Christian landlords who are honest and forthright, as well. 

We are flying out next weekend to get the house ready for their move-in and are looking forward to meeting the new caretakers of our Phoenix house. They have three children and are due with their fourth in just a few weeks. It's funny because when we bought that house we bought it with the intentions of it being large enough to house a family with a few kids. (We thought we'd be there awhile.) Well, now it's happening. Our house is going to be filled with a family of 6! 

See, the Lord works mysteriously... even online. :) 

"Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows." -- James 1:17