God did some wonderful things for our family when I was in my 50’s. I was babysitting my grandsons, Craig and Jordan aged around 3 and 4, when their mother was transferred to a better job located 9 hours north of us. The boys were upset and didn’t want to move. They didn’t want to leave me and the rest of the family. But it was a permanent job, whereas her regular job was not. She felt she had to go.
We were sad about it, and I went up to Prince George with her to get the boys settled in a daycare center. Sandy, my daughter, found a lovely daycare in a church and run by Christians. I was very happy about that. The first day I took the boys, we looked around and it was a very large area in the basement of the church. There were wonderful toys and books all around the room. The people were very friendly. I could see the boys would be okay; I stayed for a week and took a train home.
I didn’t think I would see the boys very often after the move. Nine hours was a long way to go to just spend a weekend. The Lord knew how much I loved and missed them because miracles started happening right away. My husband works for a gas utility company. He used to travel to different cities for his work. That year, they asked him to go to Prince George, which was the city Sandy and the boys lived in. The company gave my husband money for gas, food and a hotel. I was allowed to go with him. I don’t remember how many times we went, for a week at a time, but I think it was three or four times during the year Sandy worked there. They had never asked him to work there before, and after Sandy moved to Vancouver, they never asked my husband to work there again.
So, Sandy got an even better job in Vancouver, BC, a huge city by Canadian standards. They only lived 5 hours away now, which meant we could visit them and they could visit us. It was lovely. In fact, my husband’s company now started sending him to Vancouver! We stayed in lovely hotels off and on for two years.
When the boys got older, they went to elementary school and then to a daycare, next door to the school, until Sandy was off work. Well, they were very unhappy in the daycare. They were the oldest ones there and they started getting angry and acting up. Sandy asked if maybe we could move to Vancouver and help with the boys.
By this time, the managers in Vancouver really wanted Dan to move there. Dan had said no before, because we loved living in Kelowna. But since the boys needed us, he told the company we would move there. So, that seemed a miracle to me also that just when they needed us, God made it possible to move where they lived.
When the boys were 12 and 13, my younger daughter, Christine, called from Kelowna. Her daughter, Faith, was sick with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Christine had to work. They could not live on what her husband made. There was just no choice for her. She asked if we could move back to Kelowna. I told her I doubted we could since there was no work there, as far as I knew. But I told her we would pray about it.
My husband told me there was no jobs for him there and would not be; everything had been closed down there. I told him how much Christine needed us, and she needed us right now! We prayed and for the first time in my life, I asked God for a sign. Because if God showed us we would be able to move there then I would go now and my husband would go when the job came up.
That night, I had a dream. I was in an airplane with my mother. She was beside the window. I leaned over and looked through the window and saw Kelowna. “We’re home,” I said to her. Then I woke up. I told my husband God had sent us a sign and I could move right away, and I did.
A year later, my husband had a job in Kelowna with the same company. They had decided to move the main warehouse from Vancouver to Kelowna. My husband had to take a step downward in his career, but he was okay with that. Family has always come first with him. During the year we were apart, he would drive down every other weekend to visit.
Now we say, “God moved a warehouse for us.” Yep, he did, and I’ve very grateful. We lived with Christine and her family for 10 years, until Faith was 14 years old and didn’t need me anymore. I treasure the time I had with her. She has suffered with her disease, and still has some problems, but she has grown into a wonderful, vibrant adult.
I never thought I would be happy living in a huge city with millions of people, but I fell in love with Vancouver. I count those years as some of the happiest of my life. One reason was where we lived, which was across the street from where the boys went to school. We had asked God to help us find a place near the school. We were thrilled with what he gave us.
The school was in a beautiful neighborhood, one block from English Bay and three blocks from Stanley Park. I walked along the beach and through the woods and saw so many beautiful things of nature. Every day the weather was nice, I walked. The boys and I had such fun. We walked or took the bus to the bowling alley, comic book store, arcade, movies, and swimming pool. When you live in the heart of a city, you don’t have to drive anywhere.
How do you thank a God who does such things for you? There is a line in a song that says something like, “It’s gonna take forever to exhaust my gratitude. But I’m never gonna stop, til the whole world knows that I’m grateful…” That’s how I feel sometimes about God. Forever is not enough time to say thank you.
