It's a PRAISE PARTY!!!!!!

For the last five years, I have come to you with the same prayer request. Post after post, time after time, interrupted by spurts when I tried to give you a break because I felt you were as weary of hearing about it as I was of talking about it. And yet you were always so gracious.

But yesterday. Yesterday.

This.

 God. Sold. Our. House.


It was a day that I confess I feared may never come. And that included yesterday morning when I woke up and got out of bed. I'd heard horror stories of buyers who didn't show up at the closing and figured that sounded about like something that would happen to us. And yet even with the fears that I allowed {shame on me!!} to burn wild, I had this underlying peace straight from the Lord that this would be okay. That this buyer wouldn't bail.

For all the times I prayed and God said no {or wait}, there was a good reason. One of the best reasons is standing beside me in that picture. Had I been granted an immediate yes on this house sale five years ago, he never would have asked me out and we never would have gotten married. So that was a pretty great denial of a house sale.

And I'll be honest: I didn't just pray for God to sell the house. I prayed for God to sell the house to someone who could love and appreciate its legacy and who would use it for the Kingdom. Because that's what this house has always been about. Always. All the way back to when my grandparents lived there. Sometimes I hated praying that prayer because I feared I was sealing my own delay/denial on a sale. Why couldn't I just pray, like a normal person, that the thing would sell? On the double???

Because I knew the house was meant for more than just an owner. It was meant for a Christ-loving caretaker and the right one wasn't ready yet.

I met our buyer back on the first day we moved into our present house. Ryan had come on over to demo the wall in the new house and I stayed behind for the home inspection of the first house. The buyer arrived and shook my hand, looked me in the eye and promised me he would love and care for the house the same way we had. He had found my blog and read my posts and knew the house was more than just a structure. It had a legacy and he would carry it on.

And I knew he was trustworthy. A kindred soul of sorts.

So we waited. The thing we seem to do best and love the least. We waited for paperwork. I panicked a few {dozen} times and texted our {longsuffering} Realtor to say what if he changes his mind and runs away and this house never sells and they take away our new house? God love her. She was patient and talked me down from more than one seller-ledge.

Last week we heard the news. Wednesday, May 4 at one p.m. Closing. And still I couldn't exhale. Those horror stories blared in my mind.

I kept a nervous eye on the phone all day yesterday. What if she called and said it was off? That he'd gotten cold feet? {For the record, I did not worry about cold feet ONE TIME in approaching my wedding. I paid for it with plethora of house sale fretting.}

She didn't call, so we got in the car and drove to town. She didn't call, so we made our way, hesitantly, onto the street and before all four wheels hit the pavement of our own street, I saw that beautiful red beacon of a sold sign perched on top of the everlasting sale sign.

And I cried. Happy, happy tears. We hadn't signed yet, but if she had put up the sold sign, I could at least breathe for a minute.

And right there in the front lawn, we had a praise party. Cars drove by and we ignored them while we leapt and wept in front of a sold sign - capturing the moments from a timer and a tripod across the street.

So we went to the title company to sign it all over. We met our dear buyer, who again immediately assured us of the good plans he had for this house and the love and care he would offer it.

We gave him gifts and our heartiest congratulations - easy to do when we knew our beloved home would continue to be fully beloved.

And I have to pause to thank our Realtor. Five years ago, I listed this house with a woman named Susan, who worked for this same company, and for close to a year, she tried to sell it. Within the last two years, we listed the house two different times with Molly, also from this same company, and she worked hard to sell it. In the end, it was Cathy who made the sale, but I wanted to mention all three, because in my mind, all three were part of this story God wrote. The other two may not have made the final sale, but they worked with me {then with us} and were kind and trustworthy in trying to help us. The entire time, I knew God was the real Realtor, and He would pull out this sold sign when the moment was right.

Even so, Cathy has been a joy to us. I met her almost twenty years ago when she and I both worked in Financial Aid. I actually took her position when she left the school and I ventured forth on my own. Who would have known that all these many years later, she would come back into my life and be part of this pivotal step in our journey?

It was a beautiful day, the signing. After all the signing was done, Ryan, Cathy and I joined hands with our buyer and Ryan prayed over him and over the future he will have in that home. {And I cried, because that is what I do.}

And then it was done. We breathed. All the way out. And all the way in again.

It felt appropriate to celebrate with my coveted annual strawberry shortcake:

So the day may be done, but the praise and celebration continues heartily. We are so thankful. Thankful for the whole story, for the lessons learned in the hard times, and for the immense blessing of being back to one home again.

Thank you...so much...for all the times you prayed for this sale. We celebrate WITH YOU because you were part of this with us.