As told by Daniel

 On July 31, 1979 Lori and I (as singles) moved with a church-planting team of three families, four single guys and three single gals to Champaign, Illinois. This in itself was an example of stepping out in faith on God’s promises (which Lori has explained in the previous story). Lori is the one in the red dress, and I am in the center of the back row.

Just less than a year after that move, on July 12, 1980, Lori and I got married. Our first year of marriage was a major test in many ways. She has already shared about the emergency C-Section which John needed. As you might imagine, without health insurance, such a bill was a major challenge. And not only that, it came exactly at tax time. John was born on April 15!

Once we knew that we were expecting, I began devoting more time to my carpet cleaning business. I was doing my best to be prepared for the upcoming costs. And God faithfully provided many quite lucrative carpet cleaning jobs, including restaurants, fraternities, etc.

Never having earned very much money, certainly not at my own business, I was not accustomed to putting aside quarterly for the extra upcoming income taxes. But I was working at it and had saved about $2,000 for the tax bill. As it turned out, that was almost the identical amount of the hospital bill. So, I was faced with a choice: Do I pay the IRS, or the hospital?

We prayed about it, and to my knowledge, did not discuss this with anyone. We decided that since the tax bill was due right now, and we had the money, that we should pay it and trust God to take care of the hospital bill somehow. Primarily I was thinking of Matthew 6:33 “Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and all these things (your physical needs) will be added to you.”

Shortly after paying the IRS, as I looked at my bank balance, somehow someone (unknown to us to this day) had deposited $2,000 in our account! So we were also able to pay the hospital bill on time. Amazing to us and to His glory!

(BTW - if any of you out there reading this knows where this came from, please let me know so I can thank them personally!)