This week marks the one year anniversary of the finalization of the divorce.
I remember standing there in front of the judge. I had been a stay at home mom (SAHM) all of my kids lives, but I also knew how to make money from home. I sold on eBay to help our family when my husband was home. After he left, I turned it into a full-time business. It was doing great, making good enough income for me to pay my bills, but not something I wanted to do long term as a career. My passion was for helping people, and I honestly just didn’t see how selling toys helped people, truly made a difference in someone’s life. I also had to work it 80+ hours a week, yes a week, in order to make enough to survive without child support.
A Huge Dream Becomes Reality
My dream, my rather LARGE DREAM was to make enough money on my own FROM HOME. Enough money to support my family so that I wouldn’t have to go back to work. My goal was below poverty level, but I know what I’m capable of and how I’m good at living well on little. It seemed doable, but I didn’t know how and seemed so far off in the distance.
I stood there in that courtroom and I told the judge my dream. I told him I believed I could do it. I could work from home and make enough to support myself and my kids, but that it would take me a year to do it.
He laughed. Well not really, but I know he was on the inside. He didn’t believe me, he didn’t believe IN me. He told me that I would lose spousal support if I decided to be foolish and not get a REAL job. My lawyers begged me to reconsider and time and time and time and time again I told them, “NO.”
My family told me to “stop fooling myself and get a REAL job.” The people in my church agreed with the judge, “Just get a job, Sarah.” they said. There was a point where there was not ONE person who believed in me that I could make dreams happen. Not ONE person I talked to, who would encourage me to follow my heart. Follow what I felt God wanted me to do. Not one!
Do you feel like that? Do you feel the waves crashing in? No one believes in you to make dreams come true? You’re trying your best to follow what you feel is right and no one supports you? That is exactly how I felt, and it hurt. It hurt me more than I can express.
I looked in the mirror at my reflection and I prayed. “Lord, am I being stupid? Is everyone right?” I didn’t hear God in an audible voice, but there was something inside of me that just knew. Somehow I knew this was the path He wanted me on. It looked hopeless. It seemed impossible, but there I stood, the only one in the world who believed in myself…in God’s power in my life.
Every day, as I held on to him so tightly, I followed the still small voice in my heart, I obeyed the convictions, I followed what I felt He was leading me to do, putting one foot in front of the other and today, my friend, today I look back and GASP!
Through tears of joy, I tell you, that I make 3 TIMES what I told that judge my DREAM was! One year later, almost to the day this month, I make 3 times the amount I begged God to provide. 3 times the amount that seemed near impossible 1 year ago, and every single person in my life….has been proven wrong.
God’s glory stands. His power, His strength, His might, His character, His love, His grace, His mercy, His kindness STANDS. I walk proud, I stand tall knowing the One that makes me stand.
Listen, I will be very clear….if you are scared to take God at His Word, if you are afraid of falling, if you are a true believer and do not wholeheartedly believe in the One that you serve, do it now! He will NEVER, I repeat NEVER let His children fall. The world may tell you you’re stupid, you are dumb and foolish, you’ll never make it, but if God has convicted you of something, you better believe it, because He WILL make it come to pass. Let there be no doubts. Let my life be a shining example to yours that God is a God of His Word. That if you let Him, and if you obey Him, He will do far exceedingly abundant of what you could ever fathom. He accomplished more than my wildest dreams!
Today, I am completely self-sufficient. I am not on welfare, not even food stamps, no WIC, nothing. I stand on my own two feet placed strongly on a rock given by Jesus Christ and whole-hearted determination toward following Him. I have a lot to be thankful for, but the thing I am most thankful for is you. Listen carefully. I KNOW that everything I’ve been through in my life was sovereignly willed to happen by God for my good and His, but also yours. I went through everything I’ve been through, so that I can stand here to tell you…
It’s possible. With God…ALL things are possible!
There is no greater message I could ever tell you, than that. To give you hope.
