Unfortunately y only a couple short months after moving in to my new rad apt., I was out of a job. I had only one month’s extra rent saved in my bank (thank God), but other than that, I had no extra savings or income. I promptly filed for unemployment, and a month later was informed, that I would receive approximately $54.00 a week.
What?? That would barely just cover my food expenses for the month. Wow, I was completely stressed, but I knew I had to find some extra income fast to cover my rent and expenses. I decided to post an ad to sub-lease my apartment for at least one month. I figured I’d stay with one of my friend’s for the month and sleep on their couch or something, and during the day, hit the pavement looking for work. In less than a couple days I found a suitable person to sub-lease my apt. (unfortunately I hadn’t included electric and gas into our lease together; so I ended up paying a high then usual gas and electric bill. A lesson I only realized too late).
I moved in with a close friend, and to make my time with her less burdensome (she was a single mother of two), I babysat her children when possible and cooked for the entire family each evening. I then worked during the day as a full time job seeker. Applying, calling, writing and going on at least a minimum of 3 interviews per day. Within a couple weeks and many rejections, I quickly became very frustrated.
I consider myself to have a strong faith in God, and when in a particular jam, I’ll usually just pray to God and say something to the effect: “Well, God, you know me better than anyone (including myself), and you know what I’m going through and what my needs are, and I know that you will provide all that I need, Thank you God!” I have never felt comfortable praying for a particular thing or result; I just figured that would be rather arrogant, as who would know better what I need than God.
So at this time I said just such a prayer. I’d do my part and work as diligently as I could to look for work, and God would take care of the rest. Of course I certainly had times of doubt, but I routinely pushed all those thoughts out of my head when they popped up. About month or so of unemployment, I had received and spent my entire unemployment check on food. When one day I had a strong urge to go to my bank and check my account. I argued with myself for awhile, saying there is nothing in there, so why go to the bank? After going back and forth a bit, I decided perhaps there were a couple bucks left in there that I had forgotten about, and maybe I should just go and check it out.
So off I went to the bank, and when I asked for my available balance, I almost fainted it came to the exact amount I was short to cover my bills for that month. My logical mind, tried to explain the fact away saying it was just a bank error, and the bank would shortly come to the conclusion of their error and take back the money. But deep down, I knew this was not what had happened; God had sent me this money. I quickly said a prayer of Thanks to God, and promptly went home and wrote checks for all my bills.
Then for the next 5 months I paid all my bills, and took whatever money I needed from the ATM machine. I never once looked at my account balance. Now mind you, I was still only receiving a $54.00 dollar check from unemployment each month, and no other income (this was before the days of overdraft as well). I just paid what I had to, and said a prayer of Thanks to God. When the 6th month of unemployment hit, an odd thing started to occur. Everyone around me, started to feed me fear. My friends, family, and acquaintances, all grilled me, asking how I was living with no income coming in. (I hadn’t wanted to tell anyone about my miracle at the time, thinking that I might jinx things if I did). As all their worries and fears started to seep into my mind, I started to doubt whether God would continue to help me out. What if he decides to stop helping me, I thought?
On a day where my fear seemed at its height, I went to my bank to withdraw some funds for groceries, and low and behold, my account was empty. I immediately realized that it was my loss of faith, that God would be there and take care of me that caused my bank account to go to zero. I immediately begged for forgiveness asked that all go back to the way it had been; alas things did not change.
For several weeks I was torn apart, and extremely stressed. Attempting to find a solution myself to get out of this mess. I continued to go on even more interviews and work ever harder than before looking for work; to no avail. It was then, one afternoon, when my best friend Janel treat me to lunch, that I told her, “As of this moment I’m surrendering all my problems to God. I’m going to stop trying to handle everything by myself.” I felt as if a huge burden had been lifted from me, and immediately felt at peace and joy. Within the week, I received a job offer, for more money than I was asking at the time, and for one of the best companies I have had the pleasure to work for. THANK YOU GOD!!!
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Manna from Heaven
