Beauty for ashes

I know it’s been awhile, but much has happened since I last wrote. We officially purchased a home, and it’s exactly what I’ve been praying for. I had been praying and waiting on God to provide a home as close to Butler as possible in order to be more accessible to the students with whom I seek to minister.

He provided! In fact, I was painting the garage last weekend and heard the Butler football team score a touchdown as our house is a block from the stadium. I am incredibly thankful for the Lord’s provision!

We haven’t moved in yet because I’m having some renovating and painting done, but I am hoping to be in the house by Thanksgiving.

I also am having some landscaping done and consulted with a friend from church who owns his own landscaping business. I don’t exactly have a green thumb, so I left the design up to him. Not too long ago, he showed me the plans for the front yard, which will be absolutely beautiful. More importantly, they included some dogwood trees and hydrangeas, both of which have great significance in my life.

Erik and I were married at the home where he grew up in North Carolina. We had an outdoor wedding and the dogwoods trees bloomed the very morning of our wedding. They were stunning and a picture of beauty for ashes on a bittersweet day: sweet because I was marrying Erik and bitter because my sister had died a month and a half prior to our wedding. I was so devastated and in the midst of great sorrow. God provided a wonderful reminder for me that day, that I would one day rise from the ashes of grief and that He would one day be back to make all things right.

I also love Hydrangeas. Aren’t they lovely? Erik knew I loved hydrangeas and the night he proposed to me, I was surrounded by bouquets of hydrangeas.

So when my friend, the landscaper showed me the plans for the new house, I almost cried. What a gift from the Lord since moving from our old house was so hard to do. It was such a step of faith for me to leave the home that Erik and I lived in. All the memories! He is giving me a constant reminder that He indeed is the one who gives beauty for ashes!