When we were dating I always knew that Mr. HutchLife would do great things as a man of God. When he shared that he felt called to the seminary shortly before we got engaged I knew that we would move at some point. When he applied to seminary and was accepted our assumption had been that he would have a job with the church when he was finished. Unfortunately that was not the case and to say at first that I was frustrated that we moved across country, took out loans and then no job was available? Frustration is putting it mildly. BUT THEN I remembered the God we serve and that He doesn’t ever bring us somewhere to leave us. I was rebuked for my frustration and went to our go-to: prayer.
After much prayer, applying to two jobs and interviews, Mr HutchLife received a job offer where I was working at the time in the Finance function. He had been out of work for 3 years while in the seminary and that was a question that came up in his interviews. He was able to share his experience and what he learned while in seminary. Mr. HutchLife was happy to be working again and add to our income to pay off our debt even faster. I know he’s an excellent teacher/trainer and loves working with people and sowing into people and we prayed that he’d have the opportunity to do so. He was able to do so in his new role and we thanked God for this blessing.
We were then a Double Income, No Kids (DINK) household knocking this debt snowball down. We agreed that his entire paycheck would go directly to the debt snowball. Because we had learned to live on one income for 3 years it was easy to pretend his paycheck “never came” and just pay off loans with it. So from September 2016 to November 2017 outside of returning tithe and giving offering from his paycheck, the rest went to the debt snowball.
The added income was a huge game changer for us on the debt free journey. And even more was in store for us. We have learned to live very comfortably and contentedly on one income and planned on doing so when we became debt free.
Being debt free now, we are on one income. I was able to leave my job and become a stay at home mom and we are still comfortable and content.
Even though we came to Michigan for the seminary and a Pastoral role and it didn’t work out how we thought it would, everything actually worked out even better.
Have you had situations that you thought would turn out one way turn out another? If so, how did you react? Was the change in outcome one you can see as a blessing now or no?
