Peace in TransitionSample

COME LIVE IN OUR BASEMENT

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And after a while the brook dried up, because there was no rain in the land.

Then the word of the Lord came to him, “Arise, go to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and dwell there. Behold, I have commanded a widow there to feed you.”

-1 Kings 17:7-9

Reflect

When the stream where Elijah was living dried up, the Lord ordered him to PCS to Zarephath in Sidon. This city was located in the heart of the pagan territory of Jezebel, wife of King Ahab of Israel. She and her husband both wanted to do Elijah harm. Now if I had been in Elijah’s sandals, I might have requested a change to these orders. I would have questioned the wisdom of going to a place where my God was not their god and where the most powerful woman in Israel, who wanted my head in a basket, had influential relatives.

On top of that, God’s orders contained a footnote that said a widow would be taking care of his basic needs. This was not a rich widow, but one who was down to her last handful of meal and cup of oil. In fact, her plan was to make one last loaf of bread for her son and herself and then to die. I would be hard-pressed not to say again, “Seriously, Lord?”

The Lord continues to teach me not to question how he can work out his plans for my family. If there was one place my husband did not want to be assigned it was Washington, DC. When PCS orders came down for DC in the middle of my son’s senior year of high school, I was not a happy camper. We might as well have been Elijah getting ready to move to a godforsaken land. After the fact, I can say DC was a great place to live.

Our biggest logistical obstacle was maintaining a household in North Carolina to allow my son to finish high school while my husband found an inexpensive place to stay in Northern Virginia. Have you checked the cost of housing in Northern Virginia? The words inexpensive and housing do not go together there. We had no idea how we would afford to maintain two households.

As always, God had a plan. Through the involvement of one of my friends, a couple we had never met opened the basement apartment in their home to my husband for the cost of utilities alone. The woman said that she had never had anyone live in her house, but she believed the Lord had spoken to her to offer the space to this man whom she did not know. He lived there for six months before the rest of the family arrived.

Sister, God can use a PCS move to meet the needs of your family in ways that you have not imagined. Sometimes God uses people who seem most unlikely. Trust the Lord to know where you are going and what you need in order to make the transition.

Respond

Have you questioned the Lord’s timing for a PCS move? If so, why? What lessons did you learn as the plan unfolded?

Prayer

Lord, help me to trust your timing in my life today. Remind me that “for everything, there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven” (Ecclesiastes 3:1). Amen.