Romans chapter 5

Wow, it's been quite a while since I've posted on this blog. For a little bit I've found myself stuck in a sort of rut that I couldn't seem to get out of. I was wondering why I wasn't feeling a closeness to God that I had felt before. For one, I was dwelling on my sin and feeling hopeless and for another, I wasn't reading God's Word as though it was food I needed greater than physical food. I had no hunger for the Word, no thirst for that endless fountain of living water.

Recently, I have finished reading through all of the gospels and the book of Acts. Now I am reading through Romans. Today in particular, in fact just a few minutes ago, I read Romans chapter 5. If you want encouragement, Romans chapter 5 is a great place for it.

Before reading on any farther, I'd love it if you would read Romans chapter 5. It won't take too long. If you have no Bible near by, BibleGateway.com works great!

Now right off the bat, in verse one, you get some encouragement!

Romans 5:1 - "Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,"

Now a verse that starts with Therefore means that there was important information to keep in mind written beforehand. Lets look at verses 4:23-25:

Romans 4:23-25 - "Now not for [Abraham's] sake only was it written that it (being his Faith) was credited to him (as Righteousness), but for our sake also, to whom it will be credited, as those who believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, He who was delivered over because of our transgressions, and was raised because of our justification.

I just love the added insight that that gives. The Bible wasn't originally written with the chapter breaks where they're at now, so sometimes people break into a chapter without realizing there is good info in surrounding text.

Now, I am not going to go verse by verse through the whole chapter, however, I would encourage you to look through it on your own and let the Holy Spirit speak to you in a way I never could. However, I do want to look at a few more. Verses 3-5 say:

Romans 5:3-5 - "And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

So now, even the trials we go through should be looked at in a positive way knowing that it brings hope and hope doesn't disappoint.

Now I'm going to skip ahead to what really impacted me in a new way, even though I've heard it plenty of times. When I was younger, I used to wish that I could take the place of Adam in the garden and choose not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. I like to think that I would be able to resist that temptation. It seems so easy to point at Adam and say how horrible he is. Then I looked at Romans 5. When it talks about God's love being demonstrated towards us in Christ's death on the cross, which also brings us salvation, it also goes on to say in verse 17:

Romans 5:17 - "For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.

and verse 19:

Romans 5:19 - "For as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous."

As a born-again believer, I have been justified (God declared me righteous through the blood of Jesus) and am now free from sin. Whereas before being saved, all I could do was sin. I was totally depraved until the Holy Spirit of God began a work in me (which He will be faithful to complete!). This means I am no longer a slave to sin and can now live for God; so, going back to what I was talking about with Adam... I now have the righteousness he had before sin entered mankind. I am able to say no to temptation, yet do I? Sometimes. Not all the time. So essentially, I make the same mistakes. I sin just like Adam committed that first sin.

So why do I say all this. For one, I really want you to read through Romans chapter 5 and absorb the truth in it! It's rich! I also want to encourage you to evaluate where you stand with God right now. If you are not saved from the wrath of God by the blood of His son, Jesus, please talk to me about it sometime. Also pray to God that He will save you from your sins. For those reading who are saved, just look at your life and what you need to change to grow closer to God. Embrace the free gift of Grace and press on toward the prize!

I am certainly not perfect. I have my many flaws in many areas, but God's grace is greater still and I am free to live for Him, my Creator, Savior, and Lord of all. May God richly bless you as you pursue His Living Word!

Scriptural Application

This morning I was having a hard time keeping my mind on God and off of my sinful desires. Nobody ever said the Christian walk would be easy.

I have been having such a great past couple of weeks. The many many ways God has been working both through the lives of others and through my life have been indescribable and I'm going to try to stay away from mentioning them all to keep on task with the point I want to make.

With all the things God has been doing and how much I've been realizing it, I knew it was due to the time He has allowed me to spend in His Word. This morning in particular, I was struggling a lot keeping my mind pure, and I knew I had to dive into the Word, the Bible, and use it as intended in Ephesians 6. It talks about The Word of God being the sword of the spirit. A sword in battle is your weapon and also works defensively. It's the one piece in the armor of God that can be used as a weapon. I had to attack my feelings and longings of the flesh (my old sinful self), and I knew I could not do it on my own.

So I knew that the book of Second Peter had some relevant information in it for what I was going through in particular. I opened it up and started reading in chapter 1.

I CANNOT believe how completely relevant it was to my life. Almost every verse in that chapter stuck out to me in the current situation I was in. Let me start going through it a bit.

2 Peter 1:1-2 is more of an introduction, which has value and I encourage you to read it on your own to think about that. I read on to the next paragraph which is verses 3 and 4 which say:

3His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.
- 2 Peter 1:3-4

So in verse 3, where it says "His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness...", that really emphasizes that it is not in my own power that I can overcome sin, it's through God's power. That is an encouraging start. Then in verse 4 it says we can escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. I like to read it backwards and say how do we do that? It is by His own glory and goodness through which He has given us his very great and precious promises which we have to stand on! This was awesome to me!

Now I want to look at verses 5-7:

5For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love.
- 2 Peter 1:5-7

This never stuck out to me so much as this time. For the reason of escaping the corruption in the world caused by evil desires, which I was having, it says make every effort to add to your faith goodness. Well, I have been trying to add to my faith goodness, and then from goodness, knowledge. I've been in the Word a LOT this week because God has really been working on me and may all the glory to go Him for it! The Bible is knowledge, so I've been adding to my faith knowledge and to my knowledge self-control. Now this past week, as a result of being in the Word and building up knowledge, I have become more self-controlled thanks to God. Now the hard part comes in. It says and to self-control, perseverance. Wow. Now I had just been talking to someone online about how perseverance is not something you learn overnight... in fact it's impossible to really learn it because you have to persevere to learn it and that takes time. It was at this point I realized I really needed to persevere. I needed to say no to the sinful desires I had and turn to God and count on Him to deliver me.

What comes after perseverance? It says "and to perseverance, godliness". I want my life to be characterized by godliness. I want the glory of God to shine through me and if I want that, I do not want to give into my sinful desires which takes away from perseverance which takes away from godliness. These all build on each other. After godliness, then brotherly kindness. I need to learn to persevere and grow closer to God so I can share Him with others and show my brothers kindness that comes from God that I could not have on my own. Finally, after brotherly kindness, comes love. God is love.

In my cell group tonight, we talked about how the world defines love and how the Bible defines love and they are very different. Everyone usually thinks of love as doing nice things for others or romantic love based on feelings. True love comes from God and God alone through Christ. God demonstrated His love toward us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Christ died for us. God's one and only Son, Jesus Christ died for us. He became the sin for us who knew no sin that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. It's all through Jesus that we have any hope. So this is how God shows us His love. We are called to love others as God loves us. Wow. Let that soak in for a second. True love is selfless, kind, does not envy, does not boast. True love is shown in a willingness to lay down your life for a friend.

So, to give into my sinful desires that might bring me brief fleeting temporary happiness but ultimately lead to destruction and emptiness, would bring me away from God who is love. Love never fails. It's in the Bible in I Corinthians 13 which I would highly encourage you to read on your own.

Let's go on to 2 Peter 1:8-9

8For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9But if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his past sins.

A possession of the increased measure of the qualities talked about earlier will keep us from being ineffective and unproductive in our knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. I want to be effectual and productive for Christ, so I need to be putting off the old sinful desires and putting on the New self created to be like Jesus in true Righteousness and Holiness. Then it goes on to say in verse 9 that if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind. This is truth! If you want immediate pleasure now, then that shows nearsightedness. Sometimes I forget that I have been cleansed from my past sins. I need to look towards who God wants me to be and focus on the true joy I find in Him!

Now to move onto verses 10 and 11.

10Therefore, my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never fall, 11and you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
- 2 Peter 1:10-11

Therefore, in other words, because of what was previously said, we should be all the more eager to make sure of our calling and election. It is fully up to God to draw us to Him and I am so incredibly grateful He has called me. Then it says "for if you do these things, you will never fall." Well. I think that's pretty straight forward. If I focus on God, stay in the Word, learn to Love others through self-control and perseverance, then I will never fall. It's when I lack these things when I stumble.

Then comes verse 11. "and you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ." Wow! Look at what we have to look forward to. We can have an eternity of life in Christ praising God in Heaven and it will be a rich welcome. Now in light of this, do the sinful desires still seem worth it? I would say 100% not.

Please keep me in your prayers. Pray that I may continue to strive towards the prize, that being Christ Jesus, putting aside all my sinful desires and fully seek after God so I can be an effective witness of His return to call his children home!

The joy of my Salvation!

This weekend was up there as one of the best weekends of my life. Mike Baumgartner wanted to visit his home, but had no car. He lives in Iron River which is around a couple of hours away, and I personally wanted to go on a little road trip with someone and visit them at their home, so I told him I'd be willing to drive him home whatever weekend he wants as long as he wouldn't mind me staying there with their family over the weekend. Well, this weekend, he took me up on the offer so we went to visit his house and his family.

One thing I really like about Mike and Matt Baumgartner is their passion for God. We did some other things like ping pong, playing settlers and hiking around in their yard on the beautiful day outside, but most of the time, we were focused on God digging into his Word and just talking about Theology and about God in general. I really appreciate it and love it. I wish it would happen more around here at Tech. It's something I need to make an effort to do.

So, along with so much time with God and focusing on Him, their mom also made some REALLY good food, so I was well fed and I had Mike's bedroom to myself and I really felt at home and enjoyed the company of his whole family. Their dad also fixed the muffler on my car which was falling off, so it was awesome. I also got to help them out in the sense that I vacuumed a lot of their sanctuary at their church and it was a joy to help out after all they did for me.

Over this weekend, we also visited Matt and Mike's Sunday School teacher/church deacon's house to play settlers with him and talk to him about theology and God. His name is Nathan and he's a REALLY knowledgeable man in terms of Biblical knowledge, so to hear his insight on questions that Mike and Matt had was really good. I got a lot out of it and really enjoyed the fellowship.

In one of the mini-Bible studies we did with just Matt, Mike and me, we talked about what we would be discussing in Sunday School the next day to be prepared for it and to see what we could get out of it so we could provide some insight when we got there too. It was one of the coolest times in Bible study I've had in a long time and I got a lot of out of and I think these random Bible studies need to happen more.

So overall, my weekend was nothing short of amazing and God-filled and even the car ride talking with Mike both ways was sweet. When I got back to Houghton, I hung out with some people and then went to Vespers and then had a good talk with Titus on the way back to drop him off. When we got to McNair we were talking in the car about life and God and we talked for quite a while which I think both of us really enjoyed.

Then later when I finally got home which was already like 12:30, I ended up talking to my parents about my weekend. Usually I'm just so tired and it's so late that I just go to bed, but I wanted to talk about my weekend, so I did. Then for the first time in my life, I really talked about what God's been doing in my life in some detail and talked to my dad about different ways to interpret the Bible and what he believes, what our church believes and what I believe. I never talked about that before, but God's really been doing a work in my life, so I opened up to them and they really enjoyed talking to me since I usually pass by and go in my room and shut the door. I ended up talking to them until about 2 AM or so and had to quit because I had to wake up at 6:40 in the morning. I then looked at homework I had to do. The night had only just begun. So, I worked on my homework until about 3 AM when I finally got to bed, so I got about 3.5 hours of sleep last night.

Now this morning was quite a difficult morning with so little sleep, yet I knew it was good for me to have talked to my parents whether it was late or not and God helped me to get up and make it to class. Somehow I'm still pretty awake (coffee helps too...). When I went to get the coffee earlier on, I spend that time between classes to read the Bible and pray and it's awesome to see what God's been showing me in that hour every day.

Today, I read John chapters 11 and 12. Now in the Campus Crusade weekly email, they have a Bible verse and this week had an excerpt from John 11 and I thought it was really good and exciting to see the story of Lazerous. Luckily, I just "happened" to be there in my personal study. I'd been going through Luke and now I am going through John and they're amazing! Just reading how much Jesus cared for Lazerous that he actually wept! Jesus truly loves us! There was so much more I got out of it as well and I prayed for about 15 minutes which was amazing just to open up to God and talk to Him and praise Him for the wonderful things He's been doing in my life lately. It was one of the best personal devotion times I've ever had, so God's so relevant and actively working in my life now. It's so exciting to see and I want to share that excitement which is why I am writing this.

There is so much more I can say with details, but I think I pretty well covered it and nobody is going to want to read page after page worth of material in every detail in my life. I guess if you want to talk about it or want prayer for anything, please feel free to talk to me. I love talking to people! God has really brought to me the joy of my salvation! Thanks for reading, and until next time, God Bless!

Our God truly is an Awesome God!

This past Thursday was a HUGE day for me in my life. I had so many things to do and typically it would have been overwhelming.

Let me start out with a little background on the big event. At Campus Crusade's large group meeting (TNT - Thursday Night Thing), we came upon the week of sophomore takeover. That means the sophomore class runs everything at TNT including someone giving the main talk for the night. Now as a class we were discussing who would give the talk. I knew one kid in particular, Mike Baumgartner, would want to give a talk, because he does nothing but talk about God and is always in the Word which is what I need to be like. I think it's awesome. I have a HUGE fear of public speaking. I'd rather die I think... now that's a slight exaggeration, but you catch my drift.

However, earlier this summer when I read about Hezekiah, I thought it was so good that in the FAR future, I might wanna give a talk on it if I became more bold or something so I had started working on a talk about Hezekiah. Well anyways, going back to Mike Baumgartner, he said that he had a talk he would like to do if nobody else wanted to, so of course, I was gonna let him do it like everyone else. Well, Mike is an RA in a residence hall, and he had some meeting that came up that he HAD to attend. Therefore, he couldn't give his talk at TNT. Now somebody had to step up.

Now I had told Devin I was working on the Hezekiah speech for much later and he said that since I already got a start on it that I should give the talk. He said he could give the talk if nobody else wanted to. Nobody in the group volunteered, but I didn't want to make the decision right away and pray about it, so I told the group that Devin and I would decide between ourselves who would do it so we wouldn't leave everybody hanging.

So, I went up to Devin a few days later and asked him if he had anything he wanted to give a talk on and he said no. I felt the Holy Spirit leading me to give the talk on Hezekiah since the Lord really laid it on my heart to share it with people and then I would have the opportunity to share it with many at once. One reason that made me feel like I could do it is that 2 weeks before, I gave a short testimony at TNT and I didn't feint, however I was very nervous. I knew I could handle it though and if God was calling me to do it, I needed to take that step of faith.

So now I had the responsibility of making this talk more lengthy and polished from the bit I had started on in a much shorter time than I was going to give it, but I knew that if God called me to speak it, then I would be able to get it done.

It was about a week later making it a few days before my talk that I found out something absolutely amazing. Mike Baumgartners meeting... well, it was canceled. Do you think that that is an accident? Accidents don't happen with God. God used the meeting to lead me to give the talk, then canceled it so Mike could come and hear it. How awesome is that?

Alright, so the Thursday of the talk finally rolls around... getting back to the beginning of the post. I had been praying since I knew I was giving it that God would remove my fear of public speaking. I usually get really really nervous and become more reserved and I feel like I can't be effective in a talk when I'm barely able TO talk. My talk was generally about prayer and I figured I should pray about it a lot, so I did. Along with the talk to do, I had an exam the next day, a presentation the next day in another class and a 5 page research paper to do before Monday. I knew that I needed to focus on my talk because God showed me Luke 12 that day that said somewhere in it: Do not worry what you should eat or what you should drink, but seek the kingdom of God and all these things should be added unto you. That's a paraphrase but it's in there. I knew that if I focused on the talk which was the most important that God would enable me to do the other things adequately.

So I decided to forget about the other things and work on just the talk and pray about it. So, it comes to an hour before the talk, and having gone through it with a couple of other people, I felt pretty comfortable with it. I had been praying that God would remove my fear and all nervousness. Well, wouldn't ya know? I got up in front of everyone without a bit of nervousness. I was able to present it like I was talking to someone individually. It was NOTHING short of a miracle if you understood my personality. God worked through me. Without God answering my prayer, I would have been a nervous wreck and ineffective. People came up to me after and said I did a good job and people I could tell for the most part got something out of it. All glory goes to God because without God, none of that would be possible.

Now that night, I was able to finish off the presentation and present it well the next day and I did much better in the exam than I should have I think... I haven't gotten my score back, but I was able to remember more things than I should have, so that was another answer to prayer.

Quickly to go back to Luke 12, I don't want to leave this out. Right before I read that chapter, I was thinking about how I am running out of money and can't really afford to be buying food. Well, when it said don't worry about what you should eat or what you should drink, it really hit home knowing that God's Word is truth. Since then He's been providing me with food in all sorts of different ways including Mike Baumgartner "suddenly having the idea" to swipe me into the dining halls on a day I didn't eat lunch and was very hungry. I went to visit him 2 minutes before he was gonna eat and he was going to actually ask me that very day. Do you think something like that is coincidence? No way. Prayer is powerful and effective and God is great and uses us in our weakness.

It also reminds me of a sermon I heard of God using us in our weakness a few days before my talk and it applied to me so closely. God really worked through me in a public speaking situation which is a definite weakness so all the Glory could go to Him! How awesome is that?!

Congratualations if you read this whole post. I truly thank you for it and I'll be praying that God's glory will shine through it and it will be an encouragement both to you and to me when I look back it it later on. Until next time, God Bless!

Everything good comes from God!

WOW! So God has been doing an amazing work in me lately. I cannot fully describe it, but He's brought me closer to Himself. The Lord brought me to speak at TNT about how He's been answering prayers in my life. I was extremely nervous and it was a huge step out of my comfort zone, but God enabled me to do it. I wish I could have expressed with more enthusiasm the wondrous things that God has been doing in my life.

One example has been two posts ago about how God provided me with a new car. There have been other prayer requests lately I've had that God has answered right away. My green folder with all my school assignments... Well, I lost it and prayed about it having NO idea where it was and in my inbox I got an email saying it was found and where I could pick it up! I couldn't believe the quick answer to prayer! Then I had an exam scheduled on thursday which is the day of TNT... I've never missed a TNT since my first and I didn't want to ever miss one. Well, I prayed about it and God had the teacher change the date to Monday instead of thursday! Is God not amazing. So many times we put God in a box and put a limit on the kinds of things He'll do or we think that what we want to pray for is so insignificant that He won't really care.

God wants to be intimately involved in our lives, we just need to have faith that God will answer our prayers. He doesn't always answer them the way we want him to either. Sometimes we'll ask for something and we'll get something completely different. Sometimes we'll get nothing we wanted but everything we needed.

I place my hope in my eternity and it allows me to fight off sin on a daily basis. I'm far from perfect, but God is perfecting me until the day of His glorious return when He'll take his children home!

To relate to the title of this post, to sum it up, God has been revealing to me that EVERYTHING good comes from Him. Nice weather comes from God. Bad weather is a reminder to praise God all the more when weather is nice. Good grades come from God. He enables us to study. Christian fellowship that builds us closer to each other and God... comes from God. Not getting hurt on any given moment or good health: it all comes from God.

James 1:17
Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.

There it is in the Word of God. You can believe that and take it to the bank!

Lyrics/Poetry

Well, I've written some poetry to the tune of certain songs, so I guess they are also songs, but I want to eventually add music to them. Here they Are. They don't really have Titles yet and I won't give you the tune, so you can think of a new one in your head without being stuck with the other one I wrote it to. Anyways, here goes...

When life is hard, with trials never ending
We have a hope in Jesus Christ alone
That He’ll return to take his children upward
We’ll live with Him in our eternal home

Until that day, we live for Christ our Savior,
With joy and love in Christian harmony
We have a peace, this world cannot fathom
Because of Christ who died for you and me.

We’ve been made new through the shed blood of Jesus
Rejoice in this, and live for Him each day
Pursuing Christ reveals a life of purpose
So follow in the straight and narrow way.

Now share this truth with people all around you,
The Word of God, more sharp that any sword.
It penetrates the heart and soul of sinners
And brings a hope and eternal reward.

That's the first one. Here's my other one I wrote:

The Son became the sin for us
The wrath of God outpoured
on Him, our Savior on the cross,
so we could be restored.

This gift of love to use is free:
Salvation for all man,
So that we may have eternity
in Heaven, that's God's plan.

Spread news of this to everyone
all corners of the earth
of Jesus, God's own Holy Son
Through Him, we have rebirth.

Some think: a sinner such as I,
Cannot deserve such grace
to those who say this we reply:
just live to seek His face.

Praise God for everything He's done,
rejoice in tribulation
He knows what's best for everyone,
in every situation.

I guess I like my poems/songs to have a purpose and tell a story. Maybe some day I'll write a great song, but for now this is all I got.

Praise God for everything he provides. I encourage you right now to pray for someone who you've said you would pray for. Sometimes we forget that we told others we would pray for them, so I guess it's just a reminder. God bless!

God is AMAZING and answers prayer!

Alright, so the coolest thing happened yesterday. My mom was working at the bank, and overheard one of her co-workers talking to a customer. The customer, an elderly lady, said that she bought a new car and had to get rid of her old one. My mom heard her say a few things about the car and that she wouldn't expect to get more than 1000 dollars for it. So, my mom decides to ask about it and go see it briefly. She said it looked good at first glance and asked the lady for her number.

Now my car is essentially falling apart. It still runs, but there are so many problems with it that it probably will not last much longer. So my mom was looking for me to potentially buy this car. Well, she called me and I was interested in checking it out. We didn't know how much she was going to say it was. So, my mom called my dad and me and we got a time together with the lady selling the car to take it for a test drive.

When we arrived at her house, she let us take it for a spin by ourselves so we could talk about it and comment on it on our own. It's a 1994 ford taurus, so it's pretty old, and it has 128,000 miles on it, which isn't too bad. There's very little rust and has power windows, power locks, air conditioning and cruise control, which makes it better than my current 1995 rust-bucket neon. We went inside to talk to her and she said someone had looked up the Kelly Blue Book price for it and it was valued at 1300 dollars. (I checked and found it to be lower than that, but it was 1055 bucks, so it's somewhat close). Anyways, she said she'd be fine selling it for $950. She invited us in to look at some paperwork on the car and to just talk to her for a while. She ended up saying she would just make it 900 dollars even because it needs an oil change and we'd need to get it licensed, etc.

Well after thinking about it, I don't actually have that much money and I'm trying to avoid taking out any loans while in college, so although it seemed like a good deal I was reluctant. My parents thought I should get it because my car is getting really bad. So, I said I'd like to think about it for a bit and we told her we would get back to her by this afternoon today. She said that would be fine. So, we went home and I came down to houghton. I felt stuck between a rock and a hard place on whether to buy it or not. My car does still run, so I didn't want to pay that much even though it was a good deal. So, I decided to pray about it and pray hard. I asked God to show me that if I should get this, He would have to give me a strong sign... I was hoping it wasn't that my car broke down so I would have to get it out of need.

Well, when I was down hanging out with friends at Cyberia Cafe, my mom called me. When I picked up, she sounded excited and said, "Well Nathan, I think God is working in this situation" so I got excited and said, "why, what's goin on?" Then my mom told me something that God and God alone could explain and cause to happen. She said the lady had called her back and said that on the new car she had bought, she really needed the money to pay the taxes on it quickly and that it would cost her a little over $500 and that we could have the car she was selling for $575! My mom couldn't believe her ears when she was hearing this. This car is worth $1055 and she was offering it to us for $575!

Now I don't know what you think, but things like that don't just happen! We had just called her and told her that we wanted to think about it. We never said no, and she simply called and greatly reduced the price of the car.

Simply put, God answered my prayer and told me to buy this car. To not buy this car would be foolish. Plus, I can actually afford that much without taking out a loan, and I'll have a little bit of money left which should last me until I get a job that I'll need to start looking for. Isn't God simply unbelievable. God truly watches over His children and hears their prayers and takes care of their needs!

Now whenever I drive friends around, the suspension will be better in the back seat and they won't have to ride in pain, so it makes it much better for carting people around too! God is amazing!