C
CradleJourney
Guest
Yes. Mostly through my husband’s work situation. He is in skilled trades and will work for a contractor until a job is done and then is laid off. Those lay-offs can last just an hour or two (before being told they have another job for him, or he gets a response from a different contractor that another job is starting) - or they can last days, weeks, or months (especially if the economy is in difficulty and business put their orders to the contractors who employ him on hold).
So there no job security. Any job can last for any length of time (sometimes hours, sometimes years) and the gaps can be of any length. Not exactly something that’s easy to budget. We do our best to make prudent judgements for saving excess from overtime hours to cover weeks of short or no work, but, as I suspect you well know, with six kids, there’s always stuff coming up that’s unexpected.
But God has been there with us through every up and every down. He’s always gotten called back to work before things got dire. We’ve struggled with our debt and our bills but have never been at the very end of our funds.
I specifically remember one occasion. He’d been off work for a couple months. Unemployment was keeping us fed and my work was keeping the lights on, but the kids’ shoes were getting mighty worn. (Often were graced by generous gifts of hand-me-downs for clothes so that usually wasn’t ever an issue - but shoes…that’s something that almost always needs bought new). We were both getting a more than a little stressed about the situation wondering what we’d do if money from somewhere didn’t start coming in soon.
I was sitting on the porch talking to my MIL about it and said that I didn’t care if he got called to work out of town (not a welcome, but not an uncommon occurrence though it puts quite a strain on me as the still here parent) - but I was just praying to God he’d get a call. And no sooner had I said it, then, he did indeed get a phone call on his cell right then and there - for a job several hundred miles away - and could he be packed and ready to go in 3 hours? Now some may say coincidence but to me it was a direct response to my statement of faith that God was in control and I was willing to relinquish all the details to Him.
We try hard to save. Husband does good work and keeps in regular contact with many contractors as well as with his union rep to make sure his name is out there anytime he’s laid off. I work a part-time job now that the kids are big so we know we’ll have that small, steady income source to help stretch things over lean times. We do our part - but we also have seen over the past 20 years have many times we’ve received just the help we needed exactly when we needed it - which is why I remind myself to simply do my best and trust in God. We don’t always get it right - we’ve made bad money decisions and had to learn from them - but no matter what, it still always comes out okay in the end as we keep relying on God to help guide us.
I think it’s wrong to ask for help if you haven’t done everything possible to solve the problems yourself, but it’s also not wrong to accept gifts that are offered - from hand-me downs, to someone treating the kids to something. It’s not wrong to volunteer in exchange for discounts / free sports seasons.
I do feel wrong - and have refused - offers of help though that were offered to solve problems we didn’t feel we had. Example - we have no real flooring in our bedroom (destroyed in a flood many years ago). By choice, we’ve put our money over the years into kid activities and experiences rather than replace the flooring. That’s our choice, so when a close friend found out about the floor and was horrified by it and wanted to pay to replace it, we said no. That would not have been right to us to accept their hard earned money to fix something we could have fixed if we made different choices with our funds. On the other hand, shortly after the flood, we did accept a gift (not loan) of money from our parents so we could replace lower the kitchen cabinets that were also destroyed. We bought as inexpensive but still durable ones as we could find and hubby did all the installation himself to keep costs down. We needed the help and they were generous enough to offer it - but we only accepted enough to meet our main need. (Six kids - kitchen cabinets so you can have a working sink and counter-top to prepare food is a need - and not something that could be done without very easily for very long. Bedroom flooring instead of pieces of remnant carpeting over the slab foundation is a choice.)
And that’s what I’ve learned - to trust God, to ignore what society tells me is necessary, but instead really reflect and decide for what the children really need, and to own responsibility for both bad and good choices we make. To accept gifts graciously and thankfully if they come along, while not expecting them to. Not to envy what others have but celebrate our own successes as they come. To be patient. To be humble. And to be willing to ask for help when really needed and accept either a positive or negative answer with grace. And to know that if I keep trying, keep thinking, keep working at it - between God, my kids, and my spouse, we can solve any problem that comes up one way or another.
Hope my story and experiences are of some help.
Sincerely,
CJ
We both had money we (or others) wanted allocated to home improvement, but God had other plans.