As always, thank you Holy Spirit for guiding me to start this blog. Forgive me when I forget to write, and thank you for the grace on my life to not be condemned about it. I praise you for this season, for each new day you bring with new lessons, and for the ability to live life free in your love. I pray every person reading these words feels your passionate love, knows they are valued and have purpose, and learn to be led by your Spirit daily. Thank you for choosing us, and for wanting an intimate relationship with us. You never cease to amaze me, amen.
I’ve started typing this post multiple times over the last few months but haven’t found the right words. We’ve been in a crazy season of transition, and one that’s felt both chaotic and incredible at the same time. Chaotic because we’re selling our home of two years, and incredible because we’re purchasing a new build in our twenties. Crazy, right? No. Not crazy when the Lord is in the middle of it. But I haven’t always been able to see the incredible side of it. In fact, reality is that up until a couple of weeks ago my perspective was somewhat negative in nature. It was definitely doubtful, and lacked hope. But some incredible things happened that changed that…
We started off the New Year EXTREMELY sick. J.T. came down with some sort of sinus crud that left him coughing for almost two months, and somehow I contracted some type of cold that either developed into a flu or COVID, and because it dragged on I then developed a sinus infection. The sinus infection lasted two months, and in the middle of fighting it I caught a stomach bug, pink eye, and some other nasty side effects of all the crud. Thankfully, Judah miraculously didn’t catch a thing. But let me tell you, about a month into this mess I just knew it wasn’t normal. I knew I was in spiritual warfare. I’d not been sick like this in YEARS, and the weighted frustration and discouragement that came with the constant sickness felt like a form of oppression. Fortunately about two months into being sick I finally realized this, and reached out for additional help from the elders of our church, and took care of the spiritual aspect of it, and my body began to heal as a part of that. Needless to say, I’d had no energy to give myself to any outside hobbies or responsibilities as I was completely exhausted to the point of not even feeling like getting off the couch to play with Judah.
Shortly after recovering, J.T. and I decided to begin the journey of house hunting after a home in our neighborhood randomly went up for sale. It was the only one that had come about in months that was the square footage we’d been thinking we’d need to upgrade, but we’d held off because we just weren’t sure this was the timing. We visited the house, and immediately knew it wasn’t for us, but since we’d been pre approved for a loan again, and had all the paperwork done, we figured we might as well take advantage of it and start looking. And off we went. (Talk about not slowing down, huh?) The market in Bham is insane currently (well nationally, probably also) and we quickly realized that everything in our price range around our neighborhood and where we thought we wanted to be was not updated. Like at all. Like these houses needed serious work…This coupled with the fact that J.T. and I couldn’t agree on any of the homes we saw led to some serious frustration. I even remember at the worst point J.T. exasperatedly telling me “This is the most IMPOSSIBLE thing we’ve ever attempted!” And it did feel like it. But something struck me when he made that statement.
The Word over our church at the beginning of this year was that 2022 would be the year that “the impossible became possible”. After two months of looking, and not agreeing on anything, we were feeling it was pretty impossible. I started asking the Lord what we were missing. And something came to me. In the last year we’d asked the Lord to show us where He wanted us to be in terms of location around Birmingham. J.T. and I took a day to pray individually, then came back together to see what each other had come up with. The answer? Leeds, AL.
We’d been looking for houses in everywhere but Leeds, AL. As this reality struck me, I remembered that there was a newly constructed community going into Leeds, and immediately went to look for it. All I could find was a site of a house that was coming soon, still in construction, and $5,000 less than our max budget. I called my realtor, who’d already been putting a list of homes together for us and asked her to add it in for the next Saturday that we’d been planning to go view multiple homes. We ended up viewing all of the homes, and the Leeds one second to last. We walked through the final home, J.T. and I turned to each other as we were about to exit and said, “Leeds.” And that was that.
Now, the God part of this is not only that he provided a home for us, but that we were the ONLY ones to put an offer on that house and immediately have it accepted. In the current market people are fighting for homes and getting outbid left and right. We walked in, told them we wanted it, and they simply asked, “What finishes would you like?” and that was that! ON TOP OF THAT: we were the only lot in the subdivision backing up to a wooded area on two sides of the home (for privacy purposes this was perfect. But what really did it for me is that the Lord knew the desires of my heart. He knew I’d been dreaming of a fresh, new build that had never been lived in. A blank canvas to create our home in, and a safe, new environment to start our next chapter in. He also knew that I hoped to have a young couple purchase the home to start their own family in, and that it would be as much a blessing to them as it had been to us. We received three offers on our precious little home, and the best one (and the one we accepted) was from a young, pregnant couple seeking a home to bring their firstborn into.
The Lord knew everything I’d been asking and believing for, and provided them and more. The couple purchasing our home? The child of a celebrity MLB player who just HAPPENED to be on a show that J.T. has watched since he was in college and has admired for years. The offer we accepted? Well over asking price. I could go on and on with more intricate testimonies to God blessing us over and over again, but this post would never end if I did so. The Lord knew the desires of my heart that I believed were impossible to fulfill, and made them possible. If you’ll let him, he wants to do the same for you. You’re his child, he’s your daddy, and he wants to take better care of you than you can even fathom for yourself. He’s worth trusting and believing, and my life is living proof of that.
All my love, Abbey
Spirit Filled Mama 