Home is Where the Heart Is

Sometimes your heart is in the wrong place.

Carrin had been working to resolve some deed issues on our home, but frankly as a banker, she said the numbers were wrong and the title not clean.

That home was my Ishmael. It is something I made happen. I did not wait on God. The owner needed to get rid of it and I wanted a home. I tried as hard as I could to make it a house of hospitality, but the truth is, it was a money pit.

Ray’s health began to decline after Carrin’s death. I believe it was in part because this was one problem he couldn’t fix for me. Ray is a Builder Bob. He loves me dearly and if there is a problem, he fixes it. No amount of fixing was going to bring Carrin back.

We sought counsel about the house and two very different advisors said to cut our losses and leave. However, I continued to try to make it work. When Ray who just goes and goes, failed a stress test, the same test I had passed six months earlier, I was stunned. Still I didn’t believe there was anything seriously wrong, because he was the strong one. He had a heart catherization and I figured the worse would be that he needed a stent or two. But stents would not resolve his issues. He needed a quadruple heart bypass.

I really found that hard to believe. I had lost my daughter. Was I going to lose my husband, too?

When faced with death, the house seemed of little consequence. I am called to be Ray’s helpmeet. Continuing to fight to resolve the issues was like trying to whitewash sin. Sin is sin no matter how you color it.

Many stood with us as we walked this out and know that story, but let me tell you the rest of the story. After we moved, it was if a 20 pound weight had lifted. I was so relaxed.

A couple of days later I realized I was drawn to old houses for decades, because I was trying to recreate the happy part of my childhood. It was something familiar to me. Just like the enemy to use the familiar to make us passive and pseudo peaceful.

One day someone stopped me in the hall to thank me for a small book I had given her. She said she had been so overwhelmed with grief and loss that it was like bite-sized pages of encouragement. I still had a copy at home. One night I went through each page and when it referenced a scripture, I looked it up and wrote it in the book. It is called Pearls of Heaven and it tells of our value in Christ Jesus. We are each a pearl of great price that Jesus died to redeem.

For months I had felt that it was time for me to write again in my blog. It is a blog of encouragement directed primarily to women.

As I wrote out the scriptures, I thought of how many don’t know who they are and what fun it would be to show them their value through the blog. I studied the nature of the pearl the science of its creation. It is born out of irritation. Something unnatural invades its space. Isn’t it the supernatural calling of the Father’s love that invades our carnal nature?

Ray’s classes came to a close. He was going to deliver buses for three weeks to pick up the slack. Every route he looked at would net him less than a $100 for a week’s work. It was evident that the Lord wanted him to rest. I heard the Lord remind me that I am his help-meet. The fall season with new colors and products is fast approaching. It was time for me to go back to where I had dropped the axe. (2 Kings 6:6) Except for the retirement village, I had not done any facials since Carrin died.

Then the Lord reminded me that I am in the Pearl Division of Mary Kay. It was too much of a coincidence to be ignored.

While talking to a friend and telling her how when Jesus died, the disciples returned to fishing. They went back to what was familiar. Jesus had disciple them for three years, but that was left for familiarity. I explained that was what I had one here. I was going through some stuff by being at PVC and leaving my family and things were not turning out the way I expected them to go, so I returned to the familiar. I needed an old house as my fix. Then I had an “aha” moment.

When I left to go to college, my mom sold that house that I dearly loved. It was built in 1922. It was three doors from the St. Johns River. Did I mention that I loved that house? It had a lot of idiosyncrasies and yes, it was a money pit. There it was- the door point of trauma of my home being sold and they moved into another house that did not have room for me. As soon as I said it, I said that was FIFTY years ago. I am 68 this year. So THIS is my year of Jubilee.

I believe the next twelve months (who says my year has to begin in January?) are going to be like no other.