Still Praying...

We are still praying about the house. The real estate agent we'd like to use is out of town until tomorrow evening, so we are able to continue praying without pushing forward in our own will. We still don't sense God saying no. In fact, the more closely we look at things, the more sense it makes to move there. Today I learned that the house is less than 5 miles and 15 minutes from where our church will meet this fall. We'd eventually like to move the church to another area, and that is less than 8 miles and 15 minutes from the house. Chuck's office would only be 3 miles closer, but the commute time would be far less because he would no longer have to travel through a congested tunnel. We were concerned that perhaps Chuck doesn't make enough money for us to buy this house, but our loan officer says we qualify for more than enough. Our monthly budget also says that we can afford it.

When I think about the house, there are a few things that really stand out in my mind. First of all, there's a great big den that's been added on. It would make the perfect room for our Gel Group (small group) to meet in. It would also be a wonderful room for the boys to play in as well as an overflow area for toys. It would also make a nice area for out of town guests to stay in as it's at the back of the house and has a bathroom off of it. We'd still have a living room at the front of the house, too. There's also a great big screened in porch off the back of the house. It would be great for entertaining on and it would also be a nice place for a lot of the boys' outside toys to stay (we already have a TON of toys). The yard is smaller than what we have, but that is good because a big yard is a lot of work for Chuck's bad back. The back yard already has a privacy fence in place and at the very back of the yard instead of privacy fencing there are hedges that are about 10 feet high. The windows are up really high, which makes Chuck happy because it's unlikely that anyone would break in through a window because of how high up they are. Two out of the three bedrooms have new, light colored berber carpeting. The room that we'd put the boys in, though, has a darker carpet. I wouldn't want them on light carpeting.

And finally, one more good thing is that because Chuck just left the military he's entitled to a military move for up to one year after he got out. So, our move would be professionally done. That might not be big to some people, but for Chuck and his bad back, it is precious.

So now I'll list the bad side of moving. We'd have a bigger mortgage payment as well as utility payments. We'd have to go through the stress of moving while planting a church and waiting for an international adoption to finalize. All of that is major big life change, not to mention that Chuck changed careers 2.5 months ago. That is a whole lot of stress and we know it.

So, we keep on praying. We want God's will in this, not our own. He knows what's best for us in this situation. He has a perfect plan, and we want to follow that plan, not our own.