I love writng Memorial Box Monday posts that are fresh and recent. Why? Because it reminds me that God is currently working on our behalf and He’s got our back! He is always, always, always working in our lives, but so often it is easy to fail to recognize His hand or even just forget to acknowledge that it is Him!
Yesterday I was talking to my sweet friend Shelley at church. Her husband lost his job about 2 months ago and they are now trying to sell their beautiful home. Shelley was telling me how she and Mark have asked the Lord to sell their home in such a way that even the worst skeptic would know it was only God. I love when people pray like that. It takes courage and boldness and faith! They want the world to see God’s hand. No doubt, for Shelley and Mark, that’s how He’s gonna do it when He sells it!
Well this Memorial Box Monday story is fresher than fresh! It just happened last night!! How’s that for hot off the press? Remember yesterday when I mentioned that we had been sitting around talking on the porch after church, Graham found that Hillsong was playing in Albuquerque? There was about a 5 minute discussion and in literally, just a few more minutes Graham, Liberty, Emma and Dw were loaded in the car and on their way. It’s a four hour drive and it was starting in just about exactly 4 hours! As everyone was getting ready Josh had gone online to buy the tickets for them, but the site had said that there were no longer tickets available online and would “probably have some at the door”.
At one point, as they were preparing to leave, someone said, “What if we can’t get tickets?” Somehow we just knew that God was going to provide. They would get in. The only prayer I was praying as they left was for safety and favor.
As the time neared 7:15pm they called to say that they had gotten lost and could I hop on the internet and see if I could figure out the directions for them. They had never been to the church before. The church’s name is Legacy Church. Anyway, our internet service was down {horrible lightening storm on Friday and it keeps going off many, many, many times a day}. So I said I couldn’t help them, but I would pray {best help there is – no doubt!}.
From what I understand, they were able to find the church fairly quickly after they called for directions. The parking lot was huuuuge and completely loaded with cars. Dw dropped the kids, went to park, and then take a shuttle to the church. At 7:22pm Emma texted me and told me they were sold out. I started to pray for favor again.
Dw had asked a parking lot attendant who said, “the place is sold out, there are no tickets left”. Dw phoned the kids who were waiting near the door and told them to start asking people if anyone had an extra ticket to sell. Emma is like me. Ummm, not so into asking people anything. Graham asked. He found two tickets at will call that they could buy. But there were four of them , two tickets was a start, but not really what they needed. Graham, being a brother turned to Emma and said, “Dad and I will go in, you and Liberty could always wait in the car!” {Don’t ya’ love brothers?}
As Dw was riding the shuttle to the kids, he was asking people on the shuttle bus if anyone knew of any extra tickets they would be willing to sell? No one had extras. Before long, two ladies who were riding the shuttle came to him and said, “You came all the way from Colorado, you can have our tickets.” How amazingly generous of those two ladies!!
At the time, Dw was unaware that Graham had found two at will call. Dw thanked the kind ladies but said he couldn’t do that. When Dw got to the church they all went inside. Dw saw a young woman who reminded him of his administrative assistant, Kelly. She had a walkie-talkie and appeared to be someone of influence. Dw went right to her and asked if she knew of any tickets they could buy. He explained that they had just saw it online and had hopped in the car and drove from Colorado.
She said, “Hang on. I will get you in.” My crew was ecstatic and Dw quickly asked, “Where should I pay for them?” She said, “Follow me, and there is no charge!”
She then went to the door and ushered them straight in to the huge sanctuary and said to the people she passed, “These are VIPs from Colorado, we need to find a place for them to see the concert.” Ha! I laughed outloud when he told me thatt!! VIPs from Colorado?? Don’t think any of us have ever been called that!!??! Dw had told her that he was a pastor – that was it and that they had driven from Colorado!!
And they were in. No charge. Nada. Nothing. Dw was teary-eyed as he told me. She explained, “If our pastor knew you were here needing tickets and had driven from Colorado, he would want us to do this.” Dw is going to write a letter to the pastor and thank him for modeling generosity to his congregation and his staff.
When Dw told me of all this the Lord brought to mind this verse:
“A generous man will prosper, he who refreshes others will himself be refreshed!!”
Proverbs 11:25
My sweet hubby is the most generous man I know. Generous financially, generous with grace, generous with God’s love. He would have completely done the same thing if the situation had been reversed! Dw daily refreshes others – apparently God knew it was his turn to be refreshed! We were in awe how God moved just the right people to just the right places….absolutely showing us again that He, indeed, is our Miracle-working, Mountain-moving, Awe-inspiring, Gasp-giving God!!
Dw sent me a picture of Liberty at the concert from his cell. Dark, but can you see her smiling?
He was so weepy as he told me that at one point he looked at our three, Emma, Graham and Liberty and they were all, arms lifted in praise, worshiping our mighty God together….He said it was totally unbelievable…
In the door to see Hillsong, where tickets were sold out – and for free at that!! Only God. Only Him. Not sure what will go in the Memorial Box, but something.
So what about you? What has God done for you?? Please do share. I love reading the stories…they are so encouraging…Faithful God ministering to His beloved, meeting their needs…showing up for surprises!!
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Love, love, love it! 🙂 So awesome.
Oh! What an awesome story and what an amazing picture of all three worshipping God together!!!! Brings tears to my eyes!
Shannon
Such a sweet story of God blessing your loved ones…and to think — He had it planned all the time!
LOOOOOVVVVEEEE this!! Our God is amazing!! Thanks for sharing!
Love you guys!
wow that is awesome! oh how awesome that they got to see hillsong! what a story! Just last week someone that reads our blog but whom we have never met sent us the $600 we needed for our lawyer fees to finalize isaacs adoption, in the mail and just did it because they were radically in love with Jesus. how awesome is that!
stopping by to say hi!! what a great post!!!Love your blogI bet they were awesome in concert!!!:)
Oh, I like this memorial post! Something about it brings tears to my eyes…maybe just the sheer evidence in everyday life that God really does provide in the most awesome of ways. When we're busy trying to pull things together, He has already worked out the details. I hope everyone had a wonderful time worshipping God at the Hillsong concert!
Linny-I hopped on to see if you had heard anything and I was a little happy that you haven't. It just seems when it is not good news they seem to call right away but when it is GOOD NEWS they don't call right away!! So I will continue that it was just a weird thing and not the ugliness it could be!
I didn't have time to read your story yet. but…I wanted to let you know that today we will be fasting and praying for our motorhome and yours!! 🙂 I hope this next week brings sales! 🙂
i love love love your blog and reading about your precious family! keep sharing…what an encouragement and praise to God!
Another fantastic, God-believable story!!!!!
amazinggg!!