God's Love

Wow... I am obviously not very good at keeping a blog! I'll try to do better but no promises cause I keep breaking them :(

For several months I have been wanting to write about the love of God and how He has taken care of us....so here it is.
Many of you know that our 2010 is not a year I ever want to re-live. Of my entire 38 (almost) years of life, it was the worst year I've ever gone through.
On January 1st I was in Ohio spending some time with my grandma in the hospital because I didn't know if I'd see her again if I didn't go.
I came home on the 3rd and on January 4th Todd came home without a job.
In March my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer.
In early spring Todd was accepted to Oral Roberts University but we've had no way of getting there financially.
In May my missions trip to Moldova was canceled because of a volcano.
In June things were looking really good for a job in Iowa and after 2 months of interviewing...they changed their mind.
The whole summer was just miserable.
In October our upstairs caught fire.
In November both of Todd's parents were very sick and almost didn't make it.

That is enough to make a person go insane. And if God wasn't in my life I probably would have. I can't even explain some of the things God has done for us over the last year. We've never gone without food. There has always been enough. We were given groceries and gift cards. We had an anonymous check show up in the mailbox just when we needed it the most. I've had my way paid to go to 2 women's conferences. We didn't know how we were going to give our kids Christmas but God did something amazing! We had so many gift cards and cash given to us that it turned out to be the BEST Christmas the kids have ever had.

I have not seen my grandma since I left Ohio last January but she is still with us and doing well.
My mom's cancer was caught early. She's had to go through a lot but she is doing well. We literally went through the fire on October 30th but God has blessed us with amazing landlords and we now have a beautiful new upstairs.
There is still a lot I don't understand. But I know God has a plan. I never imagined that it would be a year later and Todd would still be without a job. But in that year God has put some amazing things on Todd's heart for our ministry. I don't understand why we weren't able to make it to Tulsa to go to Bible college. I don't understand why the job fell through in Iowa. We've tried to move back to Ohio...to be HOME!! But yet here we are, still in Rockford Illinois. Maybe God doesn't want us to leave. Maybe our ministry is to be here. God knows exactly what He is doing and I am very excited to see what He does in our lives in 2011. I'm going to stop trying to figure God out and just let Him do His work! God has shown us so much love and I just want to give that love back!