Rotorua Anon

It was around 8:00 at night when the phone rang. The lady talking to me identified herself as Kathleen from WestpacTrust. “Oh no” I thought… “why would the bank want to call us this late at night? There must be something wrong with our mortgage… did we have enough money to pay the account this month?” I couldn’t remember.

Our lives had been turned upside down over the last 18 months. It began when I was so intensely involved in the prayer meetings for a visiting South African Evangelist holding a crusade at our Church - Rotorua City Christian Fellowship. I was so fervent and ardent in my desire to move on with God. I prayed for the fire of God to fall and for Him to move radically in my life.

Well, He did ….immediately.

From the very first night of the Crusade, my life took a drastic change.

One of my three part time jobs instantly began to disintegrate in a particularly unpleasant and stressful way. It quickly began apparent that when my contract was up, it would not be renewed. This turned out to be correct. Because my other jobs were related to this situation, it became déjà vu and in an equally as unpleasant and distressing manner, I lost that work as well.

So began an interesting six months of being out of work – for the first time ever in my life.

I had to walk through issues of loss of confidence, feelings of inadequacy and questions about self worth.

At times even going to Church was difficult because I felt so vulnerable.

It seemed like being in a wilderness. But even then, God was making a way, as He spoke about in Isaiah 43 verses 18 & 19.

Forget the former things:

Do not dwell in the past,

See I am doing a new thing!

Now it springs up: do you not perceive it?

I am making a way in the desert

And streams in the wasteland.

Through this time God proved faithful in the most amazing ways. The church and my family were unfaltering in support of Eddie and I and the children. They prayed for us and were with us in practical ways. One family belonged to a Veggie Co-op and gave us a huge box of vegetables every other week for a long time. People came to the door with gifts of money and gave us food vouchers. Our children’s church camp fees and school fees were subsidised or paid for. Our Church provided food for us through large and generous food parcels.

Somehow we continued to feed back into The Storehouse in various ways and in varying amounts. It seemed to help to give. We came to realise that giving brings freedom.

It was a most unusual time. There were long periods of times where there were just big quiet spaces. It was in these times that I got to talk to God and share with Him what I was feeling and what was going on and where was He in all this. He came to me in dreams and vision and wonderful times, that if I had been working and rushing I would not have experienced.  It seemed like there were lessons everywhere. – about provision, stewardship, persevering, standing, faith.

At last, a friend told me of a job that was available and I was able to begin working again. Just about then, my husband fell over and broke his ankle. He was off work for over 8 weeks. About 2 days after he returned to work, he received a call from his family in Honolulu saying his mother was in hospital with heart problems… at the same time as I was heading into the Accident & Emergency Department with heart palpitations!!! The pressure was on. He had to fly out immediately.Well, that was all about 4 weeks ago and everything is back to “normal.” – lots if extra bills now and of course the inevitable mortgage that seems to go on forever with no end in sight. We had prayed about an interest free mortgage with Liberty Trust for a long time – especially over the last 6 months. But, it never seemed to happen, so we were resigned to the fact that it was our role to keep up our donations and bless other people and we were happy to do that. We expected our reward would be limited to heaven!

I had just been saying to God, “I am just so sick of being in debt.” It seemed as if He said back to me… “You won’t always be.”

And then, that phone call.

I shook the fuzziness out of my head and listened again.

It was Kathleen Deal from Liberty Trust, not WestpacTrust! She was saying “This is the call you have been waiting for…”

We couldn’t believe it! It just seems so amazing. The thought of having the opportunity to become debt free is so exciting. It seems as though the lessons we learned over the past months have placed us in a better position to more fully appreciate this privilege.

We are going to an accountant friend to make some goals for the year of Jubilee, so that through the faithfulness of all the people at and in Liberty Trust we will be one more family to stand free of the bondage to debt.

Thank you all and every one for giving us this opportunity. We appreciate everyone of you who continue to work for and contribute to Liberty Trust. We know our lives will be changed because of you. We look forward with eager expectation to read of your story, too.

God Bless you all

Sincerely

[names withheld upon request]