Had you told me a few months ago we would be moving to Dallas soon after our youngest heads to college I wouldn’t have believed you. But as you may know, my husband accepted a new pastorate position at the Dallas church where we met 27 years ago. He was not looking for a new job, but as it is in ministry, God calling becomes undeniably clear and irrestible. What wasn’t so clear, or easy, was the house-hunting.
If God has called us here, I just don’t understand what he’s doing.”
My husband kept repeating this statement over our month or so of frequent trips to Dallas. (Yes, pastors doubt God’s goodness and faithfulness too!)
Our desire was to be near the church, which happens to be in one of Dallas’s most expensive areas. And with the market currently as it is, prices are ridiculously inflated and inventory extremely low. Houses get snatched up before they are even officially listed. Additionally, we discovered property taxes are exponentially higher in Dallas than what we are used to in Oklahoma so in some cases we could afford to buy the house but couldn’t afford to live there!
Needless to say, we were super discouraged. But God. He knows what He’s doing and was in every detail. He never left us; he had the perfect place.
The day we found our house was a Saturday we had planned to go to Dallas, not because we were overly excited about the prospects but were at a point we needed to just make one do. The night before, my husband was ready to backout. Our daughter and son-in-law were in town for a wedding and a pool day with them over another discourging wasted trip sounded much better. Never the less, we stuck with the plan to go.
That morning I went for an early walk, scrolling through my daily email subscriptions from various real estate websites as I went. As expected, no new properties of interest had popped up overnight. BUT THEN–an hour later as we headed out, I got an email about a newly listed house in our targeted area. At the time there was only one picture so I had no idea if it was actually something we would like. But I did love the exterior so I texted our realtor to see about adding to our list.
The first property on the list was a house my husband was banking on. But all it took was a driveby to confirm again–pictures can be deceiving! Fast forward a couple more houses (one of which we thought we could make work, but didn’t love), we turned on to the street of the newly listed house. Already cars lined the street for the Open House.
From the moment I walked in I knew I wanted this house. It was the first house I truly could picture us in. But with so many people also looking it felt like a pipe dream. How could we compete when people were offering $200,000 over asking price?!
As my husband and I went room to room, I didn’t want to give away to anyone else how much I loved the house. Upstairs among a crowd I scootched over toward a table to let someone else pass by. Had I not, the 4×6 family photo would’ve gone completely unnoticed. But familiar faces caught by eye. I did a double-take, not believing what I saw. The couple in the picture went to high school with me in Houston. In fact, the wife and I grew up playing soccer together from the time we were little; her dad was the coach. The owners of this home were friends!!!
My heart lept—could THIS be what God was doing? Could the reason for the wait in finding our house be because this couple had not yet decided to move and list theirs? Could this connection help us compete? I prayed it would be so.
We went back to our realtor’s office and submitted an offer with a personal letter attached. Less than two hours later as we crossed the border back into Oklahoma our realtor called to say our offer had been accepted over the others!
Like the Israelites we doubted God’s goodness and faithfulness, and yet a house that was not on the market, on a day we had planned to be in Dallas already popped up at just the right time. Other than a pool (although there is space for one), it has everything we wanted in a house. No other house had.
Only God!
On the day we found our Dallas house, our Oklahoma house was under contract. Two days later it fell through. It feels discouraging a couple weeks after relisting to not have much traffic. The first go around we had multiple offers on Day One. So we wait and we pray asking God to help us not forget what he just showed us in Dallas–He is in the tiniest of details. God knows what he is doing!
Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all we ask or imagine!”
Ephesians 3:20
