Following my resignation at First Baptist, Moss Bluff, last Sunday, our house went on the market this week. We will not be able to live at 954 Mission Lane with me being unable to work full-time (or at all, presently) so we needed to plan on selling. In God’s providence, a few years ago we bought a small apartment in Norman, Oklahoma, and although there were times when we wondered why we had it, we are now grateful that we do. We hope it will be just the place for me to be able to rest and hopefully, in God’s time, get better, and possibly return to preaching. But first, we needed to get our current home ready to sell. As many of you know, that is no small task.

We knew that we were going to have to get the house ready for “viewing” pretty quickly, but we didn’t expect what happened: first thing Tuesday morning, the first day it was on the market, we received a call that a couple wanted to see it that afternoon. Well, as you can imagine, everything went into “hyperdrive” around our house. Half of our place was set up for a garage sale the next weekend, and suddenly we had to try to get it “showroom ready” in just a few hours.

I’m probably pretty glad that you were NOT a fly on the wall at our house that day! We had a bit of everything, from minor emergencies, everyone running every which way, asking questions and yelling instructions, to me querying Michael about his pattern on running the vacuum (“If I see something dirty, I make sure to run over it!”) and correcting it, to groaning over all the things we just did not have time to do. I couldn’t abide not helping when so much needed to be done, and I was actually having a pretty good day with my POTS, so I was able to get up and do some little things for a few minutes until I would get sick, and then rest for a bit and start the process over again — just the needed dramatic effect for the day!

After we had done all we could, we hopped in the car, I reclined my seat way back, and we went to Sonic and then drove around for a bit, until that first home tour was over. As we pulled into the driveway, I heard a gagging sound from the back seat — our kitten Eponine was doing what I felt like doing: throwing up, right in Michael’s lap! We all exclaimed and groaned appropriately — and then suddenly Cheryl burst out laughing. It just HAD to be the fitting end to this crazy afternoon!

Back in the house afterwards, Cheryl & Michael & I sat in the living room and unwound and talked for a while. We had that kind of fellowship which people share when they have been through a traumatic experience together. In some of the quiet moments that followed our conversation, as we all sat exhausted physically and emotionally, I thought to myself: this is what family is. For most of us our home is not some kind of “paradise” where everyone acts as perfectly as a 1950’s television family. Rather the family is God’s refining furnace for us. We grate against each other, soften each other’s rough edges, learn to practice God’s truths and become more like the people He wants us to be — through all kinds of trying situations, in this less-than-perfect unit called the family. Well, I think everyone in our little family can say that we all had some rough edges removed that day for sure!

Gotta share this too: we wanted to be certain to remove any tell-tale signs of our cats from the house while we were gone, as some people have an aversion to our feline friends. We were going to take both cats with us in the car, but after frantically searching, Cheryl and Michael could never find Cosette. She goes outside often, so we thought she may not have been in the house anyway. While we were out driving, we all laughed about how Cosette would probably come ambling through one of the rooms just when the prospective buyers were touring. When we arrived home, we found: 1) Michael had left Cosette’s cat carrier sitting right in front of Cheryl’s beautifully arranged Jane Austen books on the living room cabinet counter (why didn’t he just print a sign?!!) and 2) Cosette had been asleep under the guest bed the whole time. She slept through the whole episode! Cheryl, Michael & I each probably wished that we could have done the same!