What an incredible experience this has been so far! God, in all of His glory and majesty, does everything in His good timing. And whatever He has planned for us will ALWAYS be worth waiting for!I am astounded by how the Divine Conductor makes beautiful the orchestra of my life. I could never get the timing right on my own. But with Him, the timing manages to be perfect.
As I look back over the course of my life in the last 5 years, I'm astounded that He always puts into place precisely what we need when we'll need it. And He asks of us only what He's already given us the strength to do.
I marvel at how He planted in my heart the seed to become a math teacher, which sprouted just in time for me to add to my certification and then be perfectly timed with the availability of an open position in my school building. And I marvel at how He allowed me to earn a salary at precisely the moment when I found myself needing to live and support myself all on my own.
I marvel at how He made this wonderful apartment become available the very same weekend that I found myself suddenly in need of it, and I marvel at how He inspired me to complete my master's degree by the end of this Summer, precisely when I would need the pay raise for a mortgage I didn't expect to have in the Fall.
I marvel at how He renewed in my heart what had been a 2-year dormant desire for purchasing a home, and how He did so just 2 weeks before the house of my dreams suddenly and finally had a "For Sale" sign on its lawn.
All these things He did without me realizing that its timing was critical to the events that would soon follow. I did not sign up for graduate classes this Summer expecting to need that pay raise for a mortgage in the Fall. In fact, I had not even realized that I had met all course requirements and would be graduating!In all of the major events which have shaped the course of my life, I hadn't the foggiest clue that they were coming or how to prepare for them. My Heavenly Father did all of that for me, and He did it with tremendous love.
When necessary, He tempers my eagerness with no's and not yet's to give me patience. Perhaps that is why, when I made my first offer for the cute little gray house on June 17th, He had the seller say, "No" and present a counter-offer I couldn't afford.
And while I could have wallowed in sadness, I remembered that my third year hadn't yet started, after all. And, if I was to wait until the third year to sow and plant, then why did I think that I could put roots down now? How silly of me.
So, I spent the next few days immersed in prayer and paperwork, and--as Midnight approached and June 22nd came upon us (this being the second anniversary of my Marian promise and the beginning of my third year)--I found myself outside on my deck, looking up at the stars, praying my Rosary in the quiet darkness.
My 9-day novena to Blessed Margaret of Castello would finish that night also, and when the sun rose in the morning, I knew I could sow. I knew I could plant. And then it was up to God to see what kind of fruit this action would yield.
And so I counter-offered the seller's counter-offer, leaving space between amounts and thus leaving room for God to say "No" again if He so desired.
But Almighty God revealed a bit more of His will to me...and somehow, amazingly, it was that the seller would accept my offer!This I found out while sitting in the middle of my grad class yesterday (June 23, 2009), my cell phone vibrating as I ran to the door, my professor already nodding and wishing me well, knowing ahead of time what this call might mean to me.
And so, when my realtor congratulated me, I began to squeal and jump up and down, as if on a pogo stick! And I leaped back into the classroom with a joyous yelp, to which my professor gave me an exhuberant thumbs-up; and, after this, I called my parents and then my grandmother and then my aunt and uncle and a string of others!
But despite all this excitement, I find myself even MORE reliant on God (and this excites me greatly also, because I should always desire to be dependent on Him). This is because there are so many hurdles which myself and the little gray house must go through before we can be together, living across the street from Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.
My financial health must pass a lender's inspection and the little gray home must pass a house inspection. Perhaps it's like the readiness test that couples take before a marriage. We're ready to commit to each other, but we're never without need of the Heavenly Gardner's careful attention and continued guidance.
