today’s the day

We’ve been praying for a while that Chris would find a new job that could support our family. The past six years, his career has taken a backseat so that he could stay home and take care of our babies. He’s done it all: working evenings, working late nights, working part-time, and working full time when I’m home from school over the summer and breaks.

His bosses at the small, family-owned company he has been with for years have been so supportive and accommodating as we learned how to survive as a family that wanted to put our kids first. We didn’t want to get rich during those days with one main income (mine); we just needed enough to make sure our bills were paid, we could fill our bellies, and that nobody went naked. God heard those prayers and he made sure we were covered, literally and figuratively.

But today. Today is a new start for this man of mine. He’s left his comfort zone and has accepted a new job, one that will have a steep learning curve, but will be rewarding and worth the effort. This change has not been easy for my very-comfortable-in-his-ways husband. His job as an exterminator was safe and known. He’d been doing it for thirteen years and was good at it. It’s what he was doing when we met, when we got married, when we had our babies, and so much more. It is hard to leave the known for the unknown.

But God heard our prayers about needing something more now. He listened when we asked very specifically for a job that would eventually be able to support our family, one that would have good hours, and offer a career, not just a job. Those were tall orders when Chris doesn’t have a college degree or much experience at anything but killing bugs; I hoped God saw us as brave and not demanding. I wanted our desires to match his more than anything.

And our God stepped up big time. He set into motion things long before we even had a job change on our hearts, long before we were even thinking about looking for something. Being a Christian is a lot of trusting and a lot of not knowing. But God let us know and he let us know loud and clear with his answer. It is an overwhelming feeling to know that God was listening, he knew what we needed, and he was taking care of it before we even uttered a sound.

I can trace our answered prayers all the way back to Hurricane Katrina in 2005. I can see just a part of our story today that started all those years ago and in such ugly tragedy. Nothing can take my breath away faster than pausing to look for God’s hand in our lives, how well he has taken care of us, how well he has loved us, and how well he knows us.

Today is the day. Today Chris starts his new job. I know he is anxious and scared and nervous and hopeful. He hasn’t said these things to me because he is a quiet man who keeps those things to himself so maybe those are just my projections onto him, but I’m betting not. Change, even good change, is scary. So today, this week, and forever, I’m resting in the promise that God has gone before us, that he will never fail us, and that he will never abandon us. (Deut. 31:8, NLT).

Because that is, and has always been, enough.