Cattle

I saw a news story this morning that referred to the death and last will of the infamous Leona Hemsley. This extremely wealthy hotel baroness was often referred to as the "Queen of Mean" and was known not only for her tyrannical behaviour but also for her extreme frugality. I am assuming it is partly due to her...let's just say it...cheap nature that when she died at the age of 87 she left behind a 2.7 billion dollar estate.

As hard as it is for most of us to imagine having that amount of money, it is even more difficult to comprehend what Mrs. Hemsley did with so much of it. Upon her death, 12 million dollars was bequeathed to her beloved maltise named Trouble. Yes, 12 million dollars left to a dog. Luckily, some common sense did later come into play when a judge reduced Trouble's inheritance from 12 million dollars to a measly 2 million dollars. This will allow $100,000 a year for his upkeep and security. You may think that $100,000 a year for security sounds a bit lavish, but considering two grandchildren were completely left out of the will for not naming any of there children after Mrs. Hemsley's late husband, I could imagine there are at least a few people who would be happy to see this dog in a not so great state.

Like the two grandchildren not included in the will, the majority of us common folk get up daily and go to work with the general understanding that we will probably never have millions of dollars at our disposal, and for most of us this is okay. We understand what the story above proves once again. The point that money cannot buy happiness or in this instance sanity.
However, I think we would all agree that there are times in our lives when having a couple extra million lying around would be very helpful.

One facet of the adoption that instantly created some anxiousness on the part of Leslie and myself was that of the monetary requirements it has. My inner dialogue over the past few months has consisted a lot of, "Where in the world are we going to come up with this kind of money?!" as well as reminding myself that all of us believers have been adopted into a family where our father owns the cattle on a thousand hills. So with this in mind we immediately began praying that God would sell a few of those cattle and drop some needed money into our laps. We both felt that the adoption path was one that God was leading us on and so it would only make sense for Him to give us all the resources, especially monetarily, that we needed to walk it. We told ourselves that we would proceed on with the adoption and not let money be a reason we slow down or wait. We would be wise with our resources and trust God to provide as He had so many times in the past.

This worked out great at first. Our first preliminary application had to be turned in with a small $50 fee. We wrote the check, put it in the mail, and waited to see what God would do. We were reassured that we were doing the right thing when that afternoon as our mailman picked up our check he left for us a $42.00 check in its place. "So this is how this is going to work," we thought. We will save and send in the money and God is going to give it back that day! Awesome!

Several weeks later, it was time to again send in a payment, this time much larger with our formal application. Due to the amount we looked carefully at our budget and made cuts where necessary. We wrote out the check, put it in the mailbox, and said to ourselves, "I can't wait to see what we are going to get today!" As we imagined our mailman did leave us a nice little surprise. This time, however, it was not a check but instead a surprise bill we were not expecting for almost the exact same amount we had just mailed off. Being human, I immediately went into a, "This is not how this was suppose to work" attitude. The door of doubt which I thought had been closed in me was immediately blown off of its hinges with the simple opening of an envelope. Looking back, I can't help but think of God often times shaking His head and laughing at how quickly our humanness can show through.

I did finally come to my senses and continued to reiterate to myself that God was still in control despite our present circumstances. In a way, I felt like a modern day Israelite wandering in the desert. Sure, He parts the Red Sea and sends down manna from heaven, but I still loose faith and grumble at the next encountered obstacle. So we continued to walk with our head hung a little lower and feeling slightly guilty for so quickly abandoning trust. Lucky for us, God still loves us, and I bet He even anticipates our feelings of frustration and abandonment.

At the end of last week, we found ourselves ready to move forward with the completion of more paperwork. This also required another payment, which just happens to be the largest to date. Leslie and I debated about when we felt financially okay about sending it in and continued to pray that God would send another one of those money cows over from His hills to help if possible.

And just when we needed it, He did.

This week God unexpectedly sent us exactly half the amount due with our next step. Through two different events in the span of four days He sent more cattle than we could have ever imagined. To say we were overcome with excitement at God's gift is an understatement. Instantly, something that seemed huge and difficult was transformed into smaller, manageable task.

Again this week, I have been made aware that trusting God is another important part of our journey. True, it is much harder some days than other, but it is always possible. If you're like me and most other people, I assume, you want to be shown the whole map of where you are going up front, before you leave. Of course, God doesn't always, and I dare say most of the time doesn't, work that way. Instead He shows us one step at a time. Not revealing to us what awaits around the corner, good or bad, until the last minute. In my heart, I know it is probably better this way. If we did know what lay ahead, some of us would probably never move.

I believe it is important to have anchor events in your life. Specific situations where God came through at just the right time. An event you can point to and remember during those times when it is just a little harder to trust. This past week has definitely become one of what I hope are many anchor events for our journey.

Who knows what will happen next? I don't, and, as of right now, I'm okay with that. Ask me again in a few days and you will probably get a much different, more frazzled answer. Chances are we will never stumble into 12 million dollars like Mrs. Hemsley's dog, but what I do know is that God's provision is always enough and always exactly what we need.