God, Where Will This Money Come From???

God, Where Will This Money Come From???

I'm sitting in bed, head on the pillow, tucked under my blankets, tears running down my cheeks.

For the first time in my life I heard myself ask God," Lord, why have you failed me? Why do I always get disappointments for trusting you for big things in my life?"
I've always been careful not to utter such statements. Deep in my heart I know that God is an all-righteous, truthful and loving God. I believe in my heart without a shadow of doubt that His word is true and amen. I cannot imagine my life outside of His grace and life...

This evening I broke into tears. This was unlike the two or three other times this has happened. Today I felt like I was wrestling with God like Jacob was and prevailed.
I felt defeated and weak. I felt like telling God that I give up believing and acting on His word because at the end it only make it seem like I am stupid and lack financial intelligence. But I believe God has a point to prove to me...yet.

Why does God allow us to suffer?

There are many afflictions I have suffered many of which I do not understand - all I know is I will ask God in heaven someday: God, why did this happen? I can only pray that it was not because of my character or for what I had done, but for Him to turn my tests into testimonies!

This is my story:

Early days

• In February 2005 I met a young woman at university.
• A friendship developed over the months. In August the same year, we both knew in our hearts that God had brought us together for eternity;
• We could not however do much about our affection for each other as we had to complete our studies.
• We eventually graduated and in 2009 I got a full time job in a start-up telecommunications company in Johannesburg, South Africa. I believe the spiritual attacks started intensifying here. This is the year I was hoping and had been praying I would propose to my sweetheart. However, things did not work out that way as I was on a super-low salary scale and was not going to be able to pay lobola (bride price) any time soon on that salary.
• I served God faithfully, being obedient in the area of tithing and gave myself wholly into His work; I just wanted to serve God in every way I knew. My sweet heart was studying towards her Masters degree at this stage and successfully completed the program in the same year. In 2010 she also started working.

 The move

• When I started working I was sharing a flat with another guy and it was a mere 15 minute walk to work. However, a year into staying there, a pastor I knew approached me to assist at the church he was leading which was still in its infancy (a year old at the time) and still did not have a building of its own.
• I had to weigh what mattered the most to me, and what was of purpose and value in my life. I decided to move so I could be closer to church and be available to assist the pastor.
• I did not mind this arrangement as I was doing it unto the Lord more than anything. It was an expensive move though because it meant that I was paying more rent - 1,5 times more and also had no choice but to buy a car if I was to serve at church effectively and travel to work. With things getting tight, I still believed that God could see what labour I was putting into His Kingdom and He would provide accordingly.

The purchase of a new car

• In 2011 I purchased a vehicle to help me to travel to work and church. However, a week into buying the car, I experienced a major attack - while driving to work, on the highway, the engine ceased. I had to decide whether to fix the engine or sell the car. Selling would set me back because the car would have a dysfunctional engine, and I would be paying the bank monthly for something not useful to me. I decided to remake the engine. The engine did well for a year.
• Another attack came when I took the car for a service at a workshop across the road from my place of work. They messed up the gasket, there was a serious oil leak, which when I enquired about, I was told to just sell the car. I was emotionally tired and was not in a state to take this workshop to task. The past 3 months I was paying more for oil replacement than for petrol to travel about 40 miles everyday! I have since stopped using the car and try as much as possible to travel with my fiancée or public transport, the latter being either unreliable or expensively priced for the route I travel.

Identity Theft:

• I have recently been going through a legal battle. In July, I received very strange statements from the bank which had my information but I never opened those accounts. I enquired at the bank and requested that they sort this matter out at the transactions were in the region of over $500 000.00. Nothing was done about this, only to find a few weeks ago, I was arrested for fraud with the claim that I am involved in some sort of scam.
• This obviously has been another major setback. So where I am in fact the victim of identity theft, I have now been made into the perpetrator of the crime.
• I was taken into custody for a week but eventually got bail.
• A lot of money went into this legal exercise - the first attorney wanted a lump sum upfront. She was paid but did not do much if anything at all. So I hired another attorney. He also demanded a lump sum upfront. With the help of family and church members I was able to raise the required funds. The person who did all the run around for me was my fiancée and sweetheart of 7 years.
• I must say though that God protected me in the time I was in custody and no harm came to me, that I am thankful for.

The wedding

• Our wedding is set for December 21 this year. In April I managed to settle most of the lobola requirements. My family and I travelled to Zimbabwe to meet my fiancee's family. It was the happiest moment for us to see our dream getting closer and closer. It also cost $5,000.00 to do that. We are now left with just one and a half month to raise $12,000.00 for our wedding since most service providers want to be paid upfront before they can do anything. We have already covered wedding requirements to the value of $3,000.00.
• We have seen the hand of God in all this: my younger brother gave us $650.00 towards the wedding; a close friend of ours offered to make the wedding cake for us free of charge and another friend offered to cover the DJ costs which are in the region of $500.00.
• What we have learnt and believing for along this journey is that we might not have anything, but if our trust is in God, He will move people to cover our needs. As we put our story out there, we trust that God will move you and many others who believe in His supernatural provision to provide towards this long awaited lifetime union. We are also burning our knees in prayer asking God to grant uncommon favour to all that sow a seed into making our wedding and marriage a reality. We firmly believe the Lord will meet you in all your areas of need as we have sustain us in the time when we were most desperate and had no where to turn to but to Him.

• Our God lives and He makes His presence known through people like you and me! Praise God...