Another house 😅

My husband snuck over to me while my son was on the phone to Grandma:

“Let me just tell you about this while Micah’s outside... there’s a house that’s come up... just ask God if I should show it to you?” (I hadn’t looked at any house listings for weeks.)

“I feel fine about it... yes show it to me.” 

It didn’t scream at me, “I am your house!” But it wasn’t bad... it ticked a lot of boxes! 

“Wow, let’s look at it.” 

“I’ve already booked in an inspection.” 

“How many days have you known about this?!”

“Two days... I wasn’t sure when to tell you about it, I didn’t want to ruin your week.”

I wish he’d only given me 24 hours notice because yes, I lost my mind 😅.

I thoroughly checked that the house could work for us. It made so much sense for our family. It was 450 metres from our church. My husband could walk to work and leave me with the car - a total game changer. It was borderline too small in the living areas to fit a grand piano and didn’t have a fourth bedroom to use as an office... but it had the bath of my dreams in the ensuite, a fenced yard, a cubby... it ticked nearly every box on our 30 item list of requirements 🙈.

But the kitchen was PURPLE. Like seriously, purple cupboards. Everywhere. 

Every time I thought about the house I could only think about purple. It’s a bit of a running joke that I hate purple. 

“I’m never going to let God off the hook if he gives me a house with a purple kitchen 🤣.”

Seriously though.

I asked God to confirm the house. He didn’t. 

We asked God to make it clear at the inspection if the house was the right one. As soon as I walked onto the property I had a strong wrong feeling. Unmistakably strong. It pressed on me the entire time I was there. By the time I walked into the garden I was saying, “This isn’t the right house. It feels so wrong.” But it was an even better house than we expected. 

Afterwards I fed Owen in the car while my husband walked up the street with our other two boys. There was a walking track straight into a lovely reserve and then a playground. The area this house was in was a dream. 

I sat in the car wishing God would speak to me. 

I had been trying to learn from last time and go with my sense of peace. I had felt peace about looking at the house. I had not had peace about not looking through it. There had been no screaming demons this time telling me to glorify it and promising it to me which made it seem more of a possibility?

I drove over to the playground and by then I had convinced myself this really could be the one. Maybe the negative feeling I’d had was trying to scare me off? Maybe it wasn’t God?? Did it feel like Him?? How could this be wrong? It all seemed so right. We had to apply. We would be settling a little but could we really have the house of our dreams? Didn’t we need to be realistic? Surely this could be the one. I felt wrong about not applying. 

We applied for the house. 

At some point (I wish I could remember when) I questioned God and he said to me, “I showed you this house to practice your discernment.” I also thought he said it was pretending to be the right house. It had a lot of carrots. 

I kept coming back to those words and thinking it couldn’t be God’s plan, and then checking my logic and sense of peace about my actions and thinking maybe this house was a good plan... 

Seven days after we applied they listed more inspection times. We had still heard nothing. Surely they hadn’t liked us and we weren’t going to get it! I was so angry. I hated the world and wanted to be alone. I took the kids to gym. I sat there and wrote a list of the reasons why the house was bad, and why it probably wasn’t right for us. Then I wrote the reasons it could be right. It didn’t work. I wanted it more after I wrote the list 😩.

Reading over the list it looked much more convincing in the top end though. That was where God actually spoke. 

That afternoon my osteopath said to me, “Your body feels like it needs a rest.” Wow I felt that deeply, on so many levels.

That night something shifted. I had wrestled myself through to mostly let the house go. What really finished it for me was that I had never been able to pray for us to get it - I couldn’t claim it for us in the spirit. I just couldn’t! 

I often notice God wrangle my heart around before I find out something for sure.

The next afternoon a message flashed onto my phone that our application had been unsuccessful. I felt relieved. My heart set itself onto the hope of an even better house. Is that wishful thinking? I don’t know.

I woke the day after that and worked myself into a good headspace. I had been focusing for a couple of days on the promises and prophecies spoken over us for years and the words God had given me for each year... 2018 ‘promises’, 2019 ‘restoration’, 2020 ‘release’, 2021 ‘action’ and ‘satisfy’... he had always come through so amazingly with those words. ‘Satisfy’ is a promise I want to stand on and claim.

I walked downstairs into what I’ll call “way too many hungry people”. I was triggered and I lost all my positive. Everything was a total physical mess, I literally wanted to quit homeschooling forever because I was failing at it, my kids were being traumatised for life. 😅

I had a strong urge to destroy something. The least destructive option was to add to the physical mess so I stormed upstairs to unleash my rage but I stopped myself. 

I chose to feel the agonising emotional pain instead. (New choice, new progress, but not fun.) Among other dramas, our “new house” was about getting away from the struggle in this house and having a better life. Now we weren’t leaving. 

I quickly dressed, grabbed the keys and I drove away. 

I drove to the house we didn’t get and parked outside. It felt so wrong now. I was glad it wasn’t for us but I still had tears.

“What are you going to say now God?!” I asked out loud.

“All the heavens declare the Glory of God.” I heard that clearly. 

Really? You’re going to focus on your glory? 

And then I felt his physical presence sort of reach in and pull down my heart and I saw how self important I was being and self centred. I saw all of it. And he pulled down my pride in an instant. 

In that beautiful space of humility I drove a little further and parked under some pretty trees. I shut my eyes and felt the deepest rest. In that space of not striving to be anything or fix anything where I knew God was going to do his thing and I just had to follow his leading. 

Proving myself, pushing for the life I wanted, trying to make things work in home and family that were falling apart... Striving to be positive, striving to prove I wasn’t just a negative mess... All those things were exhausting.

I was struck by the health of this feeling. It wasn’t humility like that of a worm bowing down to a powerful being. It wasn’t yucky in the slightest. It was a peaceful humble place of surrendering my own agenda and my effort to get there. It was such a healing humility.

That was the rest my heart so badly needed 💖