Miracles All Around

I've been on the jobsite this past week. We usually work 12 hour days while doing system integrations, so blogging is difficult. I have been able to maintain my daily Bible reading, making sure I'm up enough before call time to spend my 1/2 hour with God each morning.

Despite the long hours, I love what I do, working with different churches across the country. Last week I was in Katy, Texas, just outside Houston and this week I'm in Temple, Texas, south of Dallas.

This trip has been tough, however, because it has been several months since I've had an income. My business credit cards are maxed and the bank account is empty. I've managed, but Friday night there was a crisis. I was to rent a car at Hobby Airport in Houston to drive on Saturday to Love Field in Dallas. I was provided the confirmation from my employer for the rental car, and since the reservation came via Hotwire, I didn't think twice about the payment.

Unfortunately, when I arrived at the rental counter, I was required to pay the rental fee. It had not been prepaid with the reservation. Now, a normal one day rental is only a few dollars, but because this was a one-way rental, the charge was $145. I didn't have that much on a credit card nor did I have that much in my business checking. I ended up using my personal debit card, pulling from money my wife would need for the week.

The miracle happened when I arrived in Dallas. My employer had reserved a full-size car for us, but they only had mid-size cars in Houston. Because the Houston Hobby rental agent was so difficult to work with, I chose to address the issue when I returned the car in Dallas. After checking in with the lot attendant at Love Field, I went into the rental office. The agent there was more than willing to help and after talking to the manager started a $25.00 refund to the account.

After a few minutes of typing on the computer, the agent in Dallas called for her manager to come check her work before completing the ticket. The Dallas manager came, made a few changes to the process, and as he walked away told me it had come out even better.

When the very helpful rental agent printed out my receipt, they had deducted $55.00, not the original $25! My first cash-flow miracle of the week.

As I was talking to my wife on the phone (she had graciously listened to my diatribe Friday night as I vented having to pay personally for the vehicle plus having a smaller car for the drive the following morning), sharing with her the blessing of the $55 savings, she also told me about a second miracle.

Again, because I've not been working consistently for a few months, we had fallen behind in our mortgage. We had been working with the mortgage company for a loan modification, and late this week received a letter saying they had deferred our back payments!

It appears that with the work I've completed last week, the work I am about to begin in a few short hours, and the upcoming project I have at the beginning of September, we will not only be able to get our bills caught up, we will possibly have a little extra to be able to rebuild our "rainy day fund."

And building that fund is good, because as many of you can attest, it is currently raining. Fortunately, in the midst of the rain, God provided my family a rainbow! I hope you are able to find rainbows in the midst of your storms as well!