Early in March we were driving and Steve was complaining about being forced to do the ridiculous business of shifting a vehicle while driving and I joked that we should just sell our car to Jessica and buy a new one. We laughed about it and talked about it extremely briefly before moving on to other topics.
Fast forward a week to a conversation I had with Jessica, jokingly telling her about Steve and my joking conversation of selling her our car. She perked up instantly and said "oh! Would you be serious?!" I was kind of taken back and told her that we'd talk about it and let her know. Steve and I talked about it and just kind of thought, that's kind of ridiculous - then we'd have to buy something else and that's a pain so we forgot about it for a couple of days.
Steve woke up with the boys and took them to school one morning and when I got up and came to the living room he was sitting in his chair with his Bible and coffee and he said these words to me: "I was thinking about selling the car to Jessica, and I thought to myself: what would George do?" (George being my dad). I instantly laughed out loud because if you know my dad, you know that he has a famously high turnover in vehicles. Laughing, I said to Steve: "my dad would say SELL SELL SELL!!" to which Steve agreed that yes, he would BUT Steve was totally thinking of it from a totally different perspective......because if you know my dad, you will know that he is incredibly generous. If he has something that will help someone else, he will give it to them in an instant, no question. And THAT is what Steve was referring to. Here we were with the perfect 4X4 car for Jessica to be driving in snow, mud and who knows what in the village, she knows where our car came from and who drove it and it's easy and comfortable for her to buy it from us. We immediately prayed about it and told God our intentions and He could do what He wanted with it.
We started looking online and found a few interesting ones but nothing that awesome. I had a bit of panic one evening because everything was expensive with way too many kilometers and how do you know what's good??? But I instantly felt God's peace and knew that this was a huge opportunity for us too - our car is awesome, I love and appreciate it. But it fits five people and for a family of four that means that Steve always has the option to take his family somewhere, or to take his guys somewhere, but never both. If we could upgrade to something with more passenger capacity then this would be the perfect time so we told Jessica that yes, we were serious and she could buy our car from us.
It was a tough search to be honest. I practically made it into my full time job searching multiple online site, at all hours of the day. There were so many scams (pay us half and we'll deliver your car to you! Come meet me in this teeny tiny little town with USD in your pocket, I PROMISE we won't rob you blind and leave you for dead!!) Some of the cars were just so far away too - think Winnipeg to Churchill but it's easier getting to Churchill than across Ukraine! We had a friend helping us and I think we frustrated him a little bit because there were things we just wouldn't compromise on - we knew God was telling us to wait for Him to provide what we needed and we weren't about to negotiate. We knew Jessica was in a rush but she understood as well as we did that we would take the time to wait, because God's timing is perfect and He'd bring the right car along when He saw fit.
I, especially was getting frustrated and asked people to pray and quite quickly this car popped up which fit "the list", plus it was IN ZAP. We had our friend Andre call right away and the man said that he was going to be away for the weekend but we could meet on Monday. We met on Monday and he and his wife were so friendly, it was such a relief! The man spoke English really well and they are moving to America so that was the reason they were selling. The car itself was incredibly clean and well-kept and we made him an offer and Steve went to close the deal on Tuesday!
God plans things so beautifully! It fits "the list" we had and our needs and while it's not fast, cool or fancy, it will be immeasurably functional and practical.
We could barely hear the boys in the back, it was excellent, ha ha. Also in the end, the joke's kind of on us because it's STILL a manual transmission! ha ha
We were able to surprise Jessica with her new car tonight at the train station as she was returning from a trip. It was so much fun to see her face and rejoice together that God has provided exactly what we all need.
THANK YOU to everyone who was praying with us! God is awesome and has done so much for us as we have relied on Him. He knows what we need and provides it perfectly and we are so thankful.
