“For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.” Jeremiah 29:11

Sometimes when so many difficult things happen so close together, we fail to see the humor in the situation.  We fail to see the good in it and we fail to notice the blessings God gives us.  Just the other day I was thinking about how many times God’s perfect and incredible timing had saved us, blessed us and taught us how much He loves us.  Here’s just a brief look at a few of the examples of God’s incredible timing in my family’s life.

Several years ago, we lived in California and drove to ARIDzona to visit my folks a few times a year.  One time, we noticed the brakes had a slight squeak while we were desert bound.  My dh, my father and several of the men there all said it seemed minor and we could take the car in to the mechanic when we got home.  On the way back, we hit a lot of traffic that holiday weekend.  It was stop and go all the way.  The squeak turned into a grinding noise which began to sound a bit more like a horror movie sound effect.  All the way back we were increasingly afraid the brakes would give out.  It was very late and there was no place to stop off.  Miraculously, the car was drivable all the way home.  It was only when we were in our driveway that we realized how bad it was.  It was only then that the brakes finally gave out and we coasted into the garage. God’s perfect timing kept us from being stranded and/or being involved in an accident.

In 1999, I had my second child, Christopher Ryan.  By then, I was an older mom and it had been 9.5yrs since I had my first baby so the dr said my body wouldn’t remember what to do.  He figured the labor would be long, probably even longer than my labor with my dd which was 9.5 hrs.  But God had other plans.  Christopher’s birth actually involved several miracles and if everything hadn’t happened just the way it did, he wouldn’t be with us or he would have been a very sickly child.

Chris decided to make his presence known while I was home alone.  My dh was at work, my dd was at school and my folks (who were visiting me day and night for days) went on a short trip to visit my sister that day.  I went into labor thinking I’d have all kinds of time to get to the hospital.  Child birth classes teach you not to go in too early or you’ll be poked and prodded and it could lead to too much medical intervention.  But I was feeling pretty weird so I called my doula.  She rushed right over and had me call everyone back to base.  We figured it was a bit early, but we were pretty far from the hospital and there was sure to be traffic.  So off we went. In the car, the contractions suddenly jumped together and, by the time we were near the hospital, they were on top of each other.  I was admitted and, just after I got into my hospital gown, I felt I needed to push.  There was no dr available in the entire hospital so the nurses were scrambling.  The next contraction brought half of my baby boy out into the world.  Then the contractions inexplicably stopped…with just enough time for the nurses to get all of baby’s first poop out of his nose, mouth and airway before he was born all the way and took his first breath.  Three hours and fifteen minutes after labor started, he was born healthy and free of bacteria that could have killed him or kept him sickly all his life.  God’s perfect timing saved my son from sickness and perhaps even death.

Years later we got a smokin’ deal on a used car still under warranty.  Just prior to the expiration, we noticed it had a problem.  We took it in, but they couldn’t duplicate it.  After the warranty ran out, it developed a HUGE and EXPENSIVE problem.  We were originally told it was no longer under warranty so we would have to pay for the entire cost, $2500.  At the time we were living paycheck to paycheck and didn’t have even a few hundred dollars to pay for a car repair.  We immediately went before the Lord in prayer, but we didn’t expect the answer to be quite so favorable.  The dealership agreed that we did express the problem before the warranty ran out so they would give us a deep discount to repair the problem.  We reluctantly agreed knowing it would be a severe financial hardship.  When the dealer called to say our car was ready, they informed us that the entire repair bill was being covered under warranty.  God’s perfect timing saved us from financial crisis.

In January of this year, my dh got a huge promotion at work that required us to move cross country.  We flew out to Indiana to find our new home. The day we were to fly back to ARIDzona to prepare for our move, my dh’s uncle picked us up to take us to his home to visit before the plane took off.  He was driving too fast for conditions (snow storm) when his car rounded the corner too fast, slid, ran over a tree trunk, became airborne, flipped over and slowly came to rest–instead of sliding further into the freeway below and certain death.  Everyone in the car walked away, though three of us were injured and two of us still feel the affects of those injuries today.  We had no health insurance at the time so we refused to go to the hospital thinking it was just a matter of time before my dh and I felt better.  Unfortunately, our injuries were much more severe than we had first thought. My dh broke his back and I broke my hand which is now disfigured.  We found out that our treatment would be covered under the med pay provision of my dh’s uncle’s auto policy and we were able to get treatment without any out of pocket expense. You can read more about our car accident here, but suffice it to say, God’s perfect timing saved us from death and from the financial struggles from over $25,000 worth of treatment.

“For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.” Jeremiah 29:11

Shortly after moving to Indiana in March, we discovered thunder and lightning.  During a June thunderstorm, the likes of which cause tornadoes that carried Dorothy and Toto to Oz, we heard a loud BOOM and smelled fire.  We found that lightning had struck our driveway, went underground and traveled through our electrical system destroying the weakest connections in our new home.  All totaled, we lost 17 electrical items in our house including both tvs, my computer, my dh’s electric lazy boy chair, several switches/connections, our garage door opener, the wall outlet that caught fire, the bathroom fan, three cable boxes, one cable modum, our home phone base unit, and my printer (which now didn’t work and play well with the new computer).  We did have coverage for the house, but not for our property inside the house.  We spent about $1500 to repair/replace all the electronic items in the house. The only reason we were able to afford to repair/replace all of those items was because for the first time in 27yrs of marriage, my dh’s job paid us more than we needed to live on and we because we actually had quite of bit of savings provided by that salary and a moving allowance given us by his company!  If this had happened at ANY other time during our marriage, we would not have been able to afford to replace ANY of these items.  God’s perfect timing allowed us to only have to worry about the details of replacing and repairing all our items and avoid the stress that comes with trying to figure out how to afford it.

In August, there was another thunderstorm which brought in its wake a flash flood that took the life of that beloved car we worked so hard to have repaired.  The puddle my dh thought he was driving into rose up over his hood and entered the cabin.  Under Indiana law, any vehicle with damage like this is an automatic total loss.  Looking at our options, we were afraid not to have the car totaled as we were not at all sure of the extent of the damage nor were we confident any longer in the reliability of the vehicle after being out of warranty and having had two large repair bills in recent memory.  We were also afraid of the payoff, which we felt would surely be at least a few thousand dollars below what we owed on it.  To our shock, we were told that the car was in such excellent condition that they valued it based on it being a dealer car.  They paid off nearly all of the loan and we were able to purchase a used sports car my dh loves and put the balance on that new loan.  The payment is higher than the other car’s was, but because of my dh’s promotion, we can now afford that payment.  God’s perfect timing allowed us to get out of that vehicle and into another one when it was financially comfortable for us to do so.

For the entire length of the 5.5 years we lived in ARIDzona, we chose not to have any health insurance.  My dh’s company offered an expensive plan that really didn’t cover much and we couldn’t afford to pay for it anyway so we just didn’t.  For all of those years, God found a way for us to afford what little medical attention we needed at that time.  We were even able to afford two naturopath drs who tried, but failed to help me with my growing chronic illnesses.  Then in April of this year we found that the company’s plan had changed making it much more affordable and, to our shock and amazement, it covered a LOT more than it did previously.  We were covered as of June and in August, I began having gallbladder trouble that necessitated its divorce from the rest of my body in September.  We have already begun receiving the bills, some for $300, some for $400 and some for $750.  We have yet to receive the hospital bill which we expect to be at least $20,000.  We will be responsible for $5000 and, while that still sounds like a great deal of money to use, we know we can break it down into payments that we can handle.  We also know that God’s perfect timing has saved us something in the order of $20,000 in hospital bills.

“For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.” Jeremiah 29:11

If we keep our eyes open, we will see the blessings God has provided.  If we put on our blessing glasses (pictured above), we will be able to see God’s hand in our troubled times.

How many times has God’s incredible timing blessed you?  Please share your story here as a blog comment.