From 2012 to 2014, my husband and I tackled paying off our student loan debt HARD. It was an exhausting and intense couple of years (not that I didn’t learn some amazing things I never expected) and there was a particular moment I still turn over in my head from time to time.
On a windy Sunday afternoon, my best friend from college, her husband, and my husband, baby, and I headed to a smoothie joint as my friend headed out of town, back to where she lived. We sipped papaya smoothies and chatted and she asked specifically about paying off our student loans and how it was going.
We hesitated but were honest – it was hard and it all felt big and heavy.
She encouraged us to pray about our finances, reminding us that God deeply wanted to know what we were thinking, caring, and worrying about (not that he didn’t already) and wanted to be invited into it.
That encouragement, that day, led us to not only praying about finances but also taking notice of blessings, both big and small, and speaking the out loud to praise and celebrate together.
God absolutely cares about the little things.
In the last week, I have been reminded of this important truth again and again and again.
A team of men came and started working on cleaning up the neighbor’s house. And we kept meaning to walk over and ask about buying the swing set. Until one day, when my husband was literally about to walk over there, they instead came to our house and offered it to us. And then loaded it up on a trailer and drove it over and put it in the yard for us.
We all know weird pregnancy preparedness hormones kick in at strange times. Suddenly last week, out of no where, I needed to be completely prepared for the kids homeschool for next school year. I did some research, started looking around, and in a couple of hours found almost everything used, ready for us when we want to get a head start before the baby comes.
The baby started sleeping through the night. And when she doesn’t, my husband hears her and gets her.
We got a bunch of fire wood and mulch for the garden.
My husband is starting some really cool new things that I am so excited about.
I thought something we received as a gift had expired and I called and the company just extended the deadline for us.
I got a very much needed phone call from a friend on the other side of the world and it was like we were back in each other’s living rooms, not a world apart.
And it seems like every time my husband and I pass each other in the hall or sit down to a meal together, one of us says “Hey, so, praise…” and we can share something else exciting.
I recently heard on a podcast that we need to raise our own family Ebenezers, figurative memorial stones that remind us and our children of God’s faithfulness. And I so love that idea. I know there are seasons of life I will be pointing my children back to and saying “See what God did there?”
But I also want them to learn to see the small things in the day-to-day. To see them, speak them, say them out loud, praise God for them.
God absolutely cares about the little things.
And we can praise him for all of the things: little, big, and everything in between.
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