This is a post that has been working its way through my mind on and off for many months
one that I had NO intention of writing today
To be honest with you, part of me has been avoiding it as I know that critical minds exist and its so easy to judge and criticize when the situation is not yours...however I also know that God has told me that it doesn't matter WHAT anyone says or thinks about me b.c it has been through his permission that I have this story to tell
Its been through his unfailing love for Bill and I and his desire to see us grow and "let go" that I have this story to tell
It is through His desire to show us EXACTLY what he is capable of and
EXACTLY how much He NEVER leaves our side and
no matter HOW scary a situation looks or
how much it may seem that the only place we had to go was rock bottom.....
He ALWAYS knew what he was doing
And that when He says that He can work all things for good...that it is TRUE!
So, with that, I want to tell you about the journey of financial strife Bill and I have journeyed on and off over the past many years
When we had been married for not even a year, we bought our first semi
We were so excited as this was Bills DREAM...we wanted to do it before we had kids since we knew he would have to be over the road (meaning gone several nights a week)
We didn't have much debt going into it as we hadn't lived long enough to accrue anything!
Despite Bills thorough research on what type of truck to purchase and how to go about the financing of it....a long story short, we ended up owing double what we paid for it due to icky financing
On top of that, his pay checks weren't regular and we had no idea how to scale back our lifestyle to fit into these on again off again checks
On top of that we had decided it would be a good idea to put his fuel on credit card vs. him carrying cash (I honestly don't think they had check cards yet...if they did, we just didn't think about it)
Fuel in a semi when it was just over $1/gallon was about $600/WEEK...
shortly after he bought the truck the gas prices started to rise, bringing his fuel bill closer to $800+/WEEK
Needless to say, this adds up on a credit card fast
Although we paid big chunks on it regularly we never got it paid down to zero...leaving us with a $25,0000 credit card bill after a few years of owning the truck
On top of that, we had break downs after break downs, which we added to other credit cards
When we finally sold the truck (literally b.c it broke down again and we had ZERO resources to fix it) we left this little stint in our lives owing $45,0000....AFTER we sold everything
A year after we sold our truck and we said we would NEVER own another truck again, we REALLY felt like we were suppose to buy another one
Stupid? Probably, but it ended up being a really good thing for several hundred reasons...but I will fast forward and say the biggest thing this second time around did was show us how to do it RIGHT (meaning we paid for fuel with cash, 99% of breakdowns with cash and even though we had to over haul the motor two times in 2 years equaling $40,oooo total, we still got out owing nothing)
Bill no longer felt like a failure
When we decided to sell it, it had nothing to do with money (although money was still tight)
And we got out owing ZERO on it
However, even though we did it right this time , money was still tight
mostly b.c it was sporadic. I figured out once that our household only got paid 7-8 months out of the year from his business (which was, of course, the main source of income)
Why am I telling you all of this?
Well, despite doing it right the second time, we had not financially recovered from the first time around
But...this is just the beginning of the story
This sets the scene as to HOW God has shown himself to us....but to prevent this from being any longer, I will continue in another post
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