Daily Challenges

I am a little discouraged today. Daily life is (still) really challenging. We are VERY thankful for God's faithfulness to us during my husband's unemployment, and VERY thankful that he now has a job. God has been so gracious, and our friends, family, and church family have been so supportive. Truly, the blessings have been, and continue to be, rich and many. But the reality is that my husband getting a job was not the "end" of our journey.

Since his employment:

We have gone around and around in circles with our lender over how to pay back what we owe on our mortgage. We think it's getting worked out and then something changes. That is all still up in the air and we are uncertain about our future in this house.

Our furnace broke beyond repair and we are still in the process of figuring out how to pay for a new one.

Our dishwasher stopped working. Well, it works, but the door that holds the soap in doesn't latch shut so the soap all spills out right away and the dishes don't get clean. Since I was having to re-wash them all anyway, I just stopped using the dishwasher. This means that there are ALWAYS dirty dishes cluttering my kitchen. Always. There usually were some before, but now the piles are bigger.

The broiler in our oven stopped working and now I fear the oven may be going as well. Last Friday it took twice as long for our homemade pizzas to cook, meaning we didn't eat until 7:30! It's hard to plan dinner time when I don't know what time dinner will actually be done.

My dryer is working inefficiently. I am having to dry each load twice.

The struts on my husband's vehicle desperately need to be replaced. He nearly goes airborne over small bumps and something (the tailpipe?) is constantly being hit against the pavement.

We have a set of bad water valves that makes for constant dripping outside, causing our water bill to be high. We thought we'd fixed it ourselves, but it didn't "take".


None of these things is a terribly big deal, but happening all at the same time is a little overwhelming, and the fact that so many appliances are on the fritz makes my daily life at home more challenging. Please pray that my husband and I can keep our eyes on Jesus, that our actions and responses to these problems will glorify the Lord, and that He will help us prioritize what is most important to have fixed first (and provide the funds!). Also, please pray that I would not whine about the appliances but do the extra work with a cheerful heart. I know this would be a great example to my children and a great encouragement to my husband. I just don't feel that cheerful about it. Lord, please give me the grace to choose joy.

Col 3:23 ~ Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men.

Phil 4:13 ~ I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

James 1:2 ~ Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverence.

James 1:12 ~ Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial.

John 14:1 ~ Do not let your hearts be troubled.

2 Cor 4:17, 18 ~ For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

Col 3:1, 2 ~ Set your hearts on things above.....set your minds on things above, and not on earthly things.

Amen, Lord. Amen.