Man can I admit to that saying now. Money is one thing that can stress me out quicker than anything in this life and that includes my children on days they are particularly fussy. As the scripture says “the borrower is servant to the lender” and in our case that couldn’t be more true. Josh and I have struggled more than we care to admit over the past few years. It’s a situation where you live and learn but in our case we are wondering if we’ll make it out alive! We should have saved more when we were making better money and had no children, we should never have accrued so much credit card debt, we should have looked into our options when it came to student loans (which are one of our sorest issues right now) and we should have planned ahead better than we ever did. Now we finally have the children we always wanted and we can’t always provide for them in the ways that we’d like. Sure they always have food and milk, clothes on their backs, a nice warm house to sleep in, beds to sleep in, etc. But sometimes we’ve had to ask/borrow from my parents or my grandma and that just eats me up inside.
When I was a child/teenager I worked to help pay for those things that I wanted or needed. I paid for my first car, I paid for my insurance, I put the gas in, etc. I used to pride myself on having things so together. For being only 20 years old when we bought our first home (never did I imagine that 8 years and 2 kids later we’d still be in that same house) and for never having a late notice that wasn’t by accident or anything shut off. I saw my friends go through issues in this area, not being able to afford to buy a home, having cell phones, cable, internet, lights, etc turned off….and I could never imagine going through that. Now I’m getting letters and calls from the mortgage company asking if our home is still being resided in and if we need help saving it from foreclosure. Oh, what a heavy heart this gives me. How did we end up here? How do we get out of this darkness and back into the light? Is there a purpose behind this entire struggle?
Sure I have great plans of savings and paying off debt but how do I get there if we are consistently behind from month to month. We always have more month left at the end of our money which carries us into the next month which in turn causes us to pay yet one (or two or three) more thing(s) behind and so the cycle flows in our house. Our monthly debt is seriously $1000 less than what we bring in on average per month. And with this $1000 we are supposed to get groceries each week (with two kids in diapers), get gas in our vehicles to get us back and forth to work, to tithe off the top our 10% first fruits, pay a babysitter to watch our kids so that we can both go to work…….do you see where the math just doesn’t add up? We are always in need of more and yet to earn more seems to require us to spend more. This is why I get so discouraged sometimes. I just want what is best for my family, how do we do that and still get by without the income to pay the bills in full each month? We can’t qualify for a loan to get us caught up because we are behind on our payments, not to mention our debt to income ratio is already far above what they are willing to lend to. We can’t ask anyone else for money knowing that while we intend to pay them back, with our debt and struggle it would take quite some time.
Lord, I know it’s a selfish request but please help us out here. Know that our intentions are good and pure. It’s you that we serve in this life, it shouldn’t be our debt. But until we find a means of getting out of our debt we continue to be a servant to the lender. The evil lender has us until their control and they are taking from us what we’d rather give to you, rather save for the future, for our children, and so much more. We give you thanks and praise for always providing for our needs but now, as much as I hate to say it, we need more than just that. We need some extra. You’ve given us extra lately and we’ve paid things off we’ve felt some burden lifted in a time where we needed it and we thank you. We didn’t squander that extra on frivolous things; we spent in where it was needed – on hospital bills. Now we need it to catch up our mortgage, to get us caught up on the month so we can start the next month fresh and on top of things. Lord, we need your guidance on how to lessen our spending. We already have done so by quite some bit but it doesn’t seem to be enough. I know that the other option is for Josh or I to get a second job but that takes us away from each other and the children in a time of life when I feel they need us most. However, if this is your will for our lives than show us, give us the sign or the nudge and we’ll go. Lord, let us be a testimony for you in yet one more way where we can lift our hands and say “only by the grace of God have we made it through this fire.” It’s in your name that we pray, expecting great things, AMEN!
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