~Our Car Miracle

Those of you who have known us for very long know that until the past year or so, Joshua and I have always driven older vehicles. I inherited my parents 1993 Ford Tempo during my senior year of highschool, and 4 years later, we "upgraded" to a 1998 Dodge Neon. We had a car payment for less than a year, and we obviously were not riding in style, but we avoided a lot of debt. On the other hand, we also were not able to travel very far after we had owned the Neon for about 2 years. Literally... it broke down *every* time we attempted to travel more than 30-40 miles away. No joke.

While I wasn't pining after shiny new vehicles, it did bother me that we had to rent a car everytime we wanted to visit family in MA or go on vacation. I would look around at all my friends and peers with newer, reliable, cute cars, and sometimes it downright annoyed me. That's exactly how I was feeling one Spring afternoon in 2009. I was going about my normal daily routines, all while complaining in my head about the world's injustices (please tell me I'm not the only one who does this!!). I was praying (but really just whining) about how it wasn't fair that we'd been faithful with our money, always tithed, etc. etc. and yet we were "stuck" with beater cars. Why weren't we blessed with some amazing deal or given a car like so many other people we knew or heard about. Whine, whine, whine... when all of a sudden, I literally heard God (in my head - not audible) interrupt my complaint... stopped me mid-word. He said, "What is it that you want?? Just ask me! I'll give it to you!" Well that left me dumbfounded for a few seconds. What a novel thought... instead of crabbing about it, I could ask. And that's exactly what I did. I described to Him what I wanted: a safe, reliable small SUV - big enough to be safer than a car, but small enough that I could park it without causing an accident. In a non-ugly color.

Fast forward to a little over a year later. Joshua was undergoing radiation treatment, and I had to rely on rides from my parents or friends back and forth between ME and MA. Or Angel Flight, which is an amazing non-profit company that flies patients (free!) for medical treatment. I was extremely blessed by this, but I also held onto my promise from God. With more treatments and regular MRI's in our future, we desperately needed a reliable vehicle more than ever. And to add insult to injury, the A/C in the Neon stopped working... that summer seemed even hotter than normal!

In September 2010 our amazing and *extremely* generous church family, The Rock Church, organized and hosted a community yard sale to raise money for our medical bills, etc. That's a whole other incredible story for another time... but in the end, we were given a large sum of money, in addition to other funds that came from surprising places (I promise I'll share that in another blog). We were *incredibly* blessed to be able to PAY OFF our medical bills, set a specified amount aside for future bills, and still have funds left over to purchase a more reliable vehicle.

So there we were at Van Syckle, lured in by advertisements of a huge weekend sale. We met with a salesman about our age who agreed to show us some cars in our price range. They were all decent and okay... and then he brought us to the last one. A Kia Sportage - a cute little SUV with all the safety bells and whistles that made my little heart go pitter-pat. Believe me when I tell you that electronics and horsepower hold little appeal with me... but give me four wheel drive, airbags surrounding me, and electronic stability control, and I'm a happy girl! Not to mention, it even had A/C and cruise control, and while this is just the norm for most American drivers, those were features I'd been long deprived of! :)

We test drove the car, knowing it was waaayyy out of our price range. Knowing it was *exactly* what we wanted, yet likely unattainable. But God knew. And He had us exactly where he wanted us. Joshua ended up having a seizure in the parking lot... and if any of you ever doubted my love for him, you should have been there to see my *real* leather Coach handbag plummet into a mud puddle in my haste to catch him. Just sayin'! Anyway, it turns out the salesman has a history of brain tumors in his family, and he understood what we were going through. To this day, we are now friends with he and his wife. And the car? It was priced at about $11,000 more than what we had to spend. But a few hours later... after a lot of bargaining and even more prayer, it was ours. We had to finance about $5000, but within 6 months we owned it free and clear. Exactly what I wanted. Exactly what I asked God for on that Spring day a year and a half before then. God knew what was coming. He knew what we'd go through and how much we'd need reliable transportation. He chose to go above and beyond that and blessed us exponentially. He's cool like that.