Jehovah- Jireh

Jehovah-Jireh, God will provide.
God told Abraham to get his only son, "the one whom he loved" to the mountain to offer him as a burnt offering. So Abraham took his son and two young men up to the mountain. When they got to the place where they were going to give the offering and worship God, Abraham told the two young men to stay behind and said, "We will come back to you." As Abraham and Isaac were walking to the alter, Isaac asked his dad where the sacrificial lamb was. Abraham responded, "My son God will provide for Himself the lamb for a burnt offering." They got to alter. Abraham prepared the wood and laid his son on the alter. He stretched out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. But an Angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and told him to stop. He said, "Do not lay your hand on the lad, or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me." And then Abraham saw a ram nearby and he offered it instead of his son. He called the place Jehovah-Jireh, The-Lord-Will-Provide.

In the past month I have seen God provide for me in ways that I've never experienced. In the beginning, I owed $900 on my credit card plus $400 to my parents. I was in no position to buy a plane ticket to Hungary, to buy warm clothes that were necessary to live in Hungary, or to buy a plane ticket from Hawaii to California. One morning I went for a walk and I was thinking about everything and I got this overwhelming sense that God was telling me that He was my provider, my Jehovah-Jireh.


PLANE TICKET
One night I looked up plane tickets to Hungary. They cost $1,300. I was planning on selling my car in order to pay things off and buy a plane ticket but my mom advised me to keep it. So as I was looking at the $1,300 ticket I thought, "Lord, I owe money, I don't have a dime to put towards this ticket." That night and the next morning I prayed about it. I went out to our parents kitchen around lunch time. My dad had just come home for lunch and had placed a pile of paper work on our counter. As I looked through it I found that they were bank accounts. I guess one of my dad's clients had found bank accounts that had been taken over by the state because of inactivity, he looked up our name and found some accounts. And there happened to be one with my name. How much was the account for? $1,300. Jehovah-Jireh


MY PARENTS
I needed to know that my parents were going to be okay with me going. I didn't want to stress them out and didn't want them to be scared the whole time I was gone. When I first told them about it, they were against me going. I told the Lord that I was sorry but I couldn't go if it was going to cause them so much stress. A couple days later my mom came to me and told me that the Lord had softened her heart about me going. And that she felt as if the Lord was calling her to support me $200 a month (we'll get into that later).
My dad still had his doubts and was a little worried about me going to a country we knew little about. His main concern was safety. He wanted to know the form of government. I looked it up and for some reason couldn't find a clear cut answer. The day after my mom told me that she supported me, she found an article in the newspaper, "Bush Praises Hungary for Strong Democracy." President Bush went to Hungary and said that Hungary's democracy is an example to all nations. Needless to say, the article gave my dad peace. Jehovah-Jireh


MONTHLY MONEY
This is a missionary teaching position. The school will provide room and board but will not pay me. Ana told me that the school recommends that I have a minimum of $500 per month to pay for medical insurance, mission trips, personal needs... She vaguely mentioned that her church sometimes supports teachers $300 a month. But I didn't understand if they were going to support me and if so, were they going to support me the full $300 a month? My mom came to me and said that the Lord put $200 a month on her heart to support me. I found out later that the church is going to support me $300 a month. Which equals the recommended $500 a month. Jehovah-Jireh.


SAYING GOODBYE
I had planned on visiting a few of my college friends this summer. I had already planned a trip to Boise and also wanted to fly to see two of my old roommates who are pregnant right now. Not knowing if I was going to Hungary or not, I had to cancel my trip to Boise for the sake of saving money. I was bummed but knew that that was what I had to do.
I talked to Lindsey, one of my old roommates who I wanted to go see. She has a 2 year old and is pregnant. She asked if I was going to make a trip to Southern California to see them. I told her that I couldn't spend the money. We got off the phone and she called me back. Her and her husband had won a trip to Vegas. Everything was paid for so they decided to splurge and buy tickets for a show they wanted to see. She said that she would rather spend the money to fly me out to visit. I didn't feel like it was right for me to take the money but ended up taking her up on her offer. It was an amazing time with her and her family. We got to hangout and talk and I got to play with her 2 year old. It was just a great time. The second day I was there her mother in law called and asked if they were going to see the show that they had originally wanted to see. Linds said, "No, we're not going to see it, but it's ok." Her mother in law said, "Oh no, it's wonderful. I'm buying you guys tickets." And she did. I got to go visit them in Southern California and they got to go to their show. Jehovah-Jireh.


PLANE TICKET FROM HAWAII TO CALIFORNIA
I had a plane ticket back to Hawaii. So I knew that I would get to come back here and pack up and have hangout time with Jaime. But I needed to buy a ticket back to California. All the tickets were from $300-$500. I knew that this was way out of my price range and I just kept praying that God would provide something cheaper. Day after day I got online to look up tickets. And I felt like I was waiting too long. Then one day, I found a deal from Aloha, one way tickets were $150. Jehovah-Jireh.


WINTER CLOTHES
Two summers ago I sold all my Boise winter clothes at a garage sale. After I quit my job and committed to going to Hungary, I realized that I didn't have any winter clothes and had no money to buy them. While I was in Long Beach I talked to Jaime and without even mentioning my need for clothes, she said that she couldn't wait for me to come home so we could look through her clothes from the previous year. She worked at a bank and wore super dressy clothes. To be honest, I didn't think she would have many clothes appropriate for the cold winters. And, I thought she only had 2 bags full. Turned out, she had 6-8 bags full of clothes. I got 3 winter jackets, 8 pairs of pants, a ton of sweaters and long sleeve shirts.... And these clothes are NICE. They're all Banana Republic. And she just gave them to me. If I was her I probably would have said, "Hey, I want these back. Don't spill on them, don't let people borrow them... They're coming back to me." But instead she said, "They're yours to keep. You can wear them, give them away... they're yours." I'm set to go. I don't need to buy any clothes. And GOd provided exceedingly and abundantly more than I could have asked for or imagined. Jehovah-Jireh.


CONFIRMATION
So I quit my job and bought a plane ticket to Hungary but I was still thinking, "Is this really what you want me to do Lord?" When I moved to Hawaii I heard from God clearly through the Bible that that was what I was supposed to do. This time, I wasn't reading my Bible everyday and so of course, I didn't get direction from His Word.

I emailed all the teachers that are over there right now to say "Hi" and ask some questions. One of them wrote back and this is part of her email: "I have been praying for you by name since April. Jesus put your name ("Jen") on my heart and my lips when we were asking Him to send a kinder teacher for the fall." That quenched any doubts I had. Jehovah-Jireh.


DEBT
The ugly word of debt. I knew that God was going to provide for me to pay everything off but I was still a little nervous. I was still getting paid but I also still had bills. I wrote down everything that I could think of that I needed to pay off. I did the math a bunch of times and always came up just even or a little short. Which always made me nervous because there are always bills that seem to pop up out of no where. Someone was praying about supporting me. They were praying about how much to support me and if they should do it monthly or one big sum... They decided to give me the amount that the Lord put on their heart in one big sum. Enough to pay everything off and pay off some of my car insurance for next year.
Jehovah-Jireh



Jehovah-Jireh
God promises that He will provide for us. One of my favorite promises is Matthew 6:25-34. Jesus talks about the birds of the air, how they don't work super hard to store up food for themselves, He provides everything for them. And He tells us that we are more valuable to Him than the birds. He also points out the lilies of the field, how beautiful they are, more beautifully dressed than Solomon (one of the richest kings in the Bible), but they don't dress themselves, He does. (I'm not doing it justice, if you've never read it, you need to. It's beautiful.) His point is, He loves us so much. We don't worry about what we are going to eat or wear, we just need to seek Him and He will provide all these things.

I've never needed to trust God to provide in this way. My parents have always been able to provide all the essentials, even through rough years. And since I've been out of school, I have been able to provide for myself. There have been things that I have wanted that I couldn't buy but nothing that I have NEEDED. Because of that I have never experienced Jehovah-Jireh. Or maybe I have experienced it, but just hadn't realized that it was God who was providing. It's just been amazing. To think that God loves me. ME, little old Jeni Elson. Who am I? A selfish, short tempered, not always responsible, nobody. But He loves me. And He thinks about me. And provides for me. And the cool thing is, I'm nothing special. He feels the same about every person. He feels the same about you. And as you are reading this you might know that. You might bask in His love everyday and love it. But you might not realize it. You might not realize that He loves you in an intimate way. That He wants a relationship with you. I don't know why God is taking me to Hungary. But maybe He wants to show ONE person that it's possible to have an intimate relationship with Him. That He cares for each one of us and wants to speak to us and love on us and provide for us. Maybe you're that one person. I don't know. All I know is that He's amazing. And I pray that if you don't know Him, I mean really know Him, that you would open your heart to Him.


That whole Abraham sacrificing his son thing... Nuts, right? That's what God did for us. He allowed His Son, to die on the cross for our sins. The perfect lamb who was sacrificed for us. Remember how Abraham said to his son, "... God will provide for Himself the lamb for a burnt offering." He did. And why? So that He could have a relationship with us. A perfect God can not have a relationship with imperfect people. But Jesus' blood makes that possible. Jesus was the perfect sacrificial lamb. His blood covers our sins so that we can have that relationship with God.

"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life."- Jesus (John 3:16)