For Better or Worse : Mexico Christmas Project Update

God Always Has a Plan

Praise God! We have all the money needed to help this family in Mexico. (Read about them here.) And once again my plan was NOT what God had planned for this special project. His is always so much greater!

When we first talked about helping this family when we were in Mexico, we had planned on coming home and using Travis's Christmas bonus to pay for the majority of the work ourselves. We planned on asking friends and family to help out with the difference. When we returned home, we talked with the kids and they were all on board with giving up almost all of their presents to help fix this family's home.

I waited to write the first blog about our project, because we were waiting to see how much more we'd need after the bonus came in. In the meantime, we mentioned our idea to a few family members and some close friends and were overwhelmed by their support. One family offered to help pay the difference right off the top. The bonus hadn't come in yet, so we weren't sure how much that would be. But we were anxious to start collecting the rest of the money so that the carpenter could start on the project as soon as possible, so I wrote my blog knowing that God knew how much "extra" would be needed. I knew He would take care of it.

Within a few days, we had several hundred dollars. I was amazed at how generous our friends and family had been. We kept waiting for the bonus to come in, so that we could tell the other family how much the difference would be. I sent them an update one day and to my surprise they decided to go ahead and donate a very large amount which would cover almost the entire project! I was so overwhelmed with joy at their generosity. We knew that with the Christmas bonus we'd definitely be able to cover the few hundred dollars left and have enough to help some of the other projects Family Missions Company had going on. God was awesome!

We continued to wait, and wait, and wait for the Christmas bonus to come in. It never did. Finally, we got word that there would be no bonus this year. Wow! That was a blow to our plans, but I knew God had a plan. I could now see what had been unfolding right before us. The family mentioned above had given the exact amount that we had figured we'd be able to give out of the bonus. Emily had raised more with her baking in one week than I thought she would. Friends and family donated larger amounts than I expected them to give. One of our local church parishes even donated to our project. A blog reader had also given a substantial amount online for our project. I knew that God had been working, we'd have that last $500 bonus or no bonus.

Sure enough within a few days of finding out that there would be no extra bonus coming in, I received a $300 check and a $200 pledge from two wonderful friends who both said, "I wish we could do more." They had no idea when they wrote their checks that that was the exact amount that God intended them to each give. That was the exact amount needed to finish the project. I was speechless even though I had known that that last bit would come in.

Once again, God humbled our family (mostly me) and showed us that we are not to try to do things on our own. So many times lately we have tried to figure out how we could sell everything and stock pile at least a little for our future full time mission ministry. We don't want to have to depend on others for financial support. That is one of our biggest anxieties about our call to full time missions---having to ask others to financially support our family and our mission work. It makes us both ill to think about not being able to provide for our own family's needs.

God continuously tries to prove to us that He will take care of us and our mission. If you read our blog, you already know how hard he's trying to convince us and that's only half the story! You'd think by now we'd have learned! I sometimes imagine Him taking that deep breath that we parents take when we've been saying the same thing over and over to our kids, and they still do not listen to our instructions. I'm so grateful that our God is patient! I think I'd have given up on us a long time ago!

A HUGE and heartfelt thank you to all of you that donated to this project, to all of you that prayed for it, and to all of you who continue to listen to the promptings of the Holy Spirit and support us in this crazy journey we are on!

Merry Christmas to you all!

May many blessings shower your family in 2013!

The Seilhan Family