God's Back Story

For man proposes, but God disposes. -Thomas a Kempis

 

People may make plans in their minds,

but the Lord decides what they will do.

Proverbs 16:9

 

 

We certainly made plans in our minds!

1. Find some land in the country, not too far away from Houston, but out of the city.

2. Build a comfortable house that we could use for weekends and holidays until Steve's early retirement (age 55).

3. Move to the country permanently after retirement when the nest was empty.

 

In order to set the wheels in motion, in 1994 we met with a realtor we didn't know to look at property in a rural county where we had never been.  We drove nearly 2 hours back to Houston that day with the ink on a contract for a parcel of land drying in our hands.  Who does such a thing in less than 8 hours?!  Plans for our retirement dream home danced in our heads, and peace filled all the space in our hearts.

 

BTW--I lied when I said I'd never been in Washington County.  One beautiful, crisp fall morning in 1990, I had been on my way to Bryan/College Station for a meeting when a scene vision unfolded outside my passenger window.  A pristine white 3-board fence caught the rising sun and cast soft shadows on the rolling pastureland that it framed.  Like a thin blanket of batting, misty fog hovered just above the pastures.  As my car and I floated past, I saw the steeple of a country church among deep green treetops.  "Hmm," I thought to myself.  "Wouldn't this be a beautiful place to live?!"  I didn't know where I was, since I had missed my turn several miles back.  But it sure was a pretty sight.  However, I digress . . .

 

This retirement plan thing.  It's hard to explain, but we felt drawn to our future home just like a spacecraft is drawn by a tractor beam to the Mother Ship.  I'll fast forward past the details that bounce around this story.  Our Houston home sold and the moving van dropped us with all our belongings on the threshold of a new life in Chappell Hill Texas in January of 1995.  Young Son enrolled to finish the second semester of 8th grade.  According to our projection (see #3 above), that's at least 7 years before we had planned.  Man proposes.  God disposes.

 

Being the Type A+ driver he is, Steve wasn't up for a daily round-trip commute (make that at least 3 hours drive time) to the family business, so he rented an apartment in Houston.  Friday night through Sunday afternoon was our together time.  From Sunday nights through Friday afternoons I kept the home fires burning.  Cook, clean, carpool.  Repeat.

 

The realtor that we didn't know?  He and his wife lived in a house right across the road from us.  They invited us to come to church and sit with them.  We joined that little country church.  For the first time in our 20+ year marriage both of us dove straight in to a sincere, warm, encouraging faith community.  My commitment to teach weekday Ladies' Bible Study kept me accountable for daily time to pray and study while Steve was in Houston.  Dailiness helped me fall crazy-in-love with the Lord.  Oh, did I mention?  This was the little country church whose steeple I had seen from the highway on that soft fall morning years before.

 

People may make plans in their minds, but the Lord decides what they will do.

 

 

So there we were in July of 1998.  

We had put down roots for 3 1/2 years. 

We were growing and blooming in our new environment.

First Son was in college up the road at Texas A&M.

Young Son was navigating high school with a couple of good friends.

Parents, siblings, and extended family were still living in Houston.

Steve was nesting in Houston each work week.

Practically every neighbor in our rural subdivision left home Sunday morning

in time to be at that little country church.

 

We were connected in deep, meaningful ways.

 

 

God's Back Story . . .