Debt Free! (How I became debt-free and you can, too)

Wreath lovingly made by my Sis-In-Law, Janet Lawrence

I updated my Facebook status yesterday and it has caused quite a commotion...I have never received so many "likes" and comments before...not to anything.  Not to surviving Cancer, not to one of these carefully crafted blog posts, not to a clever video re posted...NOTHING has garnered the attention of yesterday's status for me.  As I type this, it has 101 likes!  

What is it?

"Just wired my final mortgage payment!  Debt free in every way!  Praise God, my Provider and Sustainer.  Now...to find a job..."

Thank you for celebrating with me.  I am touched by the support.  I am feeling celebratory and grateful. It's almost like I won the lottery.  But it's really not like that at all.  I didn't "win" anything.  I didn't luck into my home...this was a slow and steady process...this was twenty years in the making...this was the culmination of hard work, restraint, patience, and trust.  This day was the harvest of a twenty-year journey.  

Some are expressing envy.  Some who completed this journey before me are giving good advice (don't forget about saving for annual property taxes and insurance which were formerly taken out of escrow). It's true that even though I own my house, clear of debt, it can still be taken from me.  If I fail to pay the annual property taxes, the government can take it and kick me out!  For this reason alone, I am grateful that I chose to stay in my "starter" home. The property taxes are based on the value of the home.  The lower the home value, the lower the taxes.

When I bought this house at twenty-nine years old, my realtor said I should get a balloon loan because I would not still be in it in five years time.  (This is a loan with lower payments but then you have to pay the whole thing off in a specific time, like five years.  At the pay-off, you fund it by getting another loan).

Being a fiscal conservative, I chose to get a conventional 30-year loan.  I am so glad that I did.  When interest rates fell, I refinanced and chose a 15-year loan.  

Would you like to know my secrets?   Would you like to be debt-free, too?

This is my best advice:

1.  Give money away: You cannot outgive God.  I know that probably wasn't what you were expecting.  I gave my life to Christ at nine years old.  When I was in the membership class at my Baptist Church, it was designed for adults.  I didn't understand much about the class but the one thing I heard and understood was the principle of tithing.  This is the only only place I know of in Scripture where God says "test me in this."  (Malachi 3:10-11).  I took it to heart.  In fact, it irritated my mother, who would have preferred that I not tithe the money I earned waitressing that was earmarked for college tuition. But I fought her on this.  My form of rebellion was tithing!  I have tested God and he has ALWAYS met my financial needs...through unemployment (4 times now), through Cancer treatments (2 times now) and I never missed a mortgage payment in twenty years.

2.  Buy a house worth less that "they" say you can afford.  When I bought my house, I was told that I could afford a home worth 40 to 50% more than the one I chose.  I knew that if I bought that much house, I would not have money for other things I needed and some other things I enjoyed.  I chose a small "starter" home.  It doesn't have some things that I would like...it's not a "dream-home" but it is my home and I love it. 

3.  Fight the urge to Trade Up.  My income nearly doubled over the course of the twenty years it took to pay-off my home.  I was tempted for a brief season to consider trading up to a larger home or a home in a location more central to town.  I fought the urge and I am so glad that I did.  Instead, I chose to stay put and make my home as beautiful as I could...I made it "mine" and I settled in.  This enabled me to do some travelling and never miss a payment, even when I was out of a job or undergoing chemotherapy.

4.  Pay extra every month.  After I refinanced at a lower interest rate, I chose to continue to pay the higher monthly payment and even added some to it.  I paid $200 extra principal for a couple of years.  I stopped when I lost my job but when I regained employment, I paid $100 extra or sometimes just $50 extra.  This shaved years off of my loan.  What really helped me was designing a table in Microsoft Excel whereby I was able to calculate how much time I could shave off my loan depending on how much extra I paid.  It was fun to dream and see how fast I could finish.  I wish I had done this sooner and I wish I had been even more disciplined.  


I need to confess...I have been blessed and I have not always been a great steward of money.  I love pretty things, nice jewelry and clothes, and I have wasted money over the years.  I have medicated pain in my life through spending money.  God has worked on my heart and I have had to learn some things the hard way.   

I wish I had learned sooner.  Don't we all?  But I am a work in progress and so are you!  It is never too late to take steps, even baby steps, towards financial freedom.

(I would be remiss if I didn't add one more thing...the best way to be debt-free is to accept God's gift of His son, Jesus, the One who died for all of our debts...great and small).  John 3:16...Timeless Truth! My biggest debts can't be reduced to dollars and cents...my biggest debts were wiped free at Calvary.

Father, I thank You today for providing a beautiful home for me...far beyond what I ever imagined I would have as a single woman.  Thank you for this gift  of a place of peace, of hope, of ministry, and rest to call my own for this season of my life.  Thank You for a tangible reminder of your provision in my life.






I had help decorating from Elle Westover...so Gifted, and such an inspriration in every way!  Thank you, Elle!  See her website HERE.  Or check out her facebook page HERE.

Auld Lang Syne, Valentine (To Endings and Beginnings...and Accidental Roads)

When I was a little girl, I went to lots of weddings.  My father had six brothers which means I had many cousins.  We weren't a close family. I rarely saw my cousins.  But we always went to their weddings. 

I loved the weddings.  I especially loved the procession.  I loved the anticipation of the moment we would see the bride for the first time.  I loved the rose petals on the white runners and I loved that all eyes were fixed on the back doors of the sanctuary.  I loved the moment when the doors were opened and the music swelled and the song and the tempo changed.  My heart would flutter in my chest and I would find it hard to breathe. The emotion was so strong...this was it!   There she was, always looking more beautiful than I'd ever remembered...shining eyes gazed upon her groom who waited for her at the altar.  This was her moment. This was what she had waited for all of her life.

I was torn between looking at the groom's eyes as he first saw his bride in all of her glory and keeping my eyes on the bride's tremulous beauty.  I would fight to hold back tears.  It was always hard not to cry.

All I knew in my young innocence, is that surely this is when life begins.

If that were really true, at forty-nine, I am still waiting to be born.

By the time I finished college, I had begun attending weddings of my peers.  One would think that some of the emotion of the processional would have worn off by then, but it had not.  My need to cry seemed to escalate with each passing year.  My belief that life was beginning for these people I knew and loved didn't change.  My heart would swell and I would choke back tears.  And I would wonder and pray for when my time would come.

To make matters worse, or so it seemed, when I was twenty-five I attended a revival at my church where I was told that I would be married very soon.  I had fasted and prayed before this meeting as we were instructed by our Pastor, and I had sincerely asked God for spiritual renewal in my life.  When I went to the altar for prayer by the guest Preacher, he looked in my eyes and told me that God was telling him that He was preparing me for marriage.  He said that I would be married very soon.  And he said that my husband and I would be a healing team together.

I could hardly contain my excitement, I was in awe...God really does love me!  It wasn't my intention to ask for a husband at this meeting.  I was seeking God.  But He was telling me that He saw my hungry heart and that He was working on the details of my love life.  It couldn't get any better than this!

I believed, in my heart, that I wasn't really loved (or lovable) until I was chosen by a man.  Not just chosen to date but chosen for a lifetime.  I dated some and believed myself to be in love a couple of times, but my heart was so hungry and perhaps my desperation showed.  I ended two relationships.  Not because I didn't love them, but because it was clear that they could not love me.  Maybe they sensed that the hole in my heart was too big for them to fill.  My expectations were so high...they could not be my happiness.

I entered my thirties with hope beginning to wilt.  There was no husband in sight.  My peers continued to marry at a rapid pace.  Those years of weddings of dear friends were fun, don't get me wrong, and I rejoiced with my friends.  But inside, there was pain.  The pain of unmet longing.  The pain of feeling forgotten. The pain of feeling left behind.

It was like I was stuck in a time warp, repeating the same grade over and over while my friends "graduated" into married bliss, and then...building families.  Thank God that I didn't also have that ticking biological clock in my head.  I was never sure about having children.  Part of me wanted a little girl who would look like me, but I didn't allow myself to entertain the thought.  I just longed for the wedding first, and I figured that would follow in time.

It wasn't all misery--those thirty-something years.  I am grateful to have been part of a large church with a thriving singles ministry.  We were like a family, with the same joys and dysfunctions that most families have. I did not date much in the group, as the competition was fierce and I was never one to fight for a man.  I didn't have the confidence to flirt.  I had crushes that came to nothing.  But we had great fun together travelling to the beach or to the North Carolina Mountains.  There were Bible studies, parties, dances and just doing life together.  Life was rich, it was just very different from the way that I had pictured it would be.

Valentine's days were always hard.  I would hope and pray each year that the following year would be different, but it never was.  One year, I wrote a poem for a contest on the Christian radio station called Eternal Love.  I didn't win, but it was published the following year in Billy Graham's Decision Magazine.

Then, when I was thirty-six, I became a cancer survivor.  It was a tumor the size of a watermelon...Ovarian Cancer.  After emergency surgery, I was hospitalized for a week and out of work for seven months while undergoing six rounds of chemotherapy.  Here is a secret that I learned about my unexpected single life...I had an army of friends and family who loved me.

God used this unplanned turn in the road of my life to show me how truly loved I was.  I thrived during this trial.  One of my most treasured possessions now is a guest book that I had in my hospital room...eighty-nine different visitors came to see me in the week following surgery.  None of these visitors were related by blood, only by love.  My room looked like a flower shop with twenty-six flower arrangements and plants.  I honestly think some of the nurses thought that I must be a celebrity.  Upon completing chemotherapy, I had a "Celebrate Life" party with a DJ and over two hundred guests. In my singleness, I had time for investment in many people's lives. I had many, many friends. What I reaped during that season of life was far beyond anything that I had sown. It was rich and full and beyond what I could have imagined.

This was when I first started to believe that I was loved, even without a husband and a nuclear family.  It was wonderful.  It was real.  And isn't it just like the God I serve to be creative in His way to answer my need to feel loved?  He takes the ordinary and makes it extraordinary.  He takes tragedy and turns it to triumph.  

After thriving during this trial in my life, I believed I had earned the right to be married.  I was sure that soon to follow my illness would be a husband.  I joined dating services and I waited with anticipation.  But eventually, the disappointment set in again.  Where was he, God?  When does my life start...this life I have been waiting for...this "we" life?

More Valentines' Days came and went.  One year, I cried out to God in the parking lot of my workplace, asking Him for flowers.  You can read about this story here.  

Not long after my cancer battle, I lost my parents within eight months of each other.  And then I turned forty just one month after my mother passed away.  The loss of my father was somewhat expected; my mother's death was not.  She had a massive stroke.  These goodbyes were ones that I had dreaded my whole life.  I used to cry myself to sleep at night as a little girl, counting the years and wondering how old I would be when I lost my parents.  I grieved that they were older than most of my friends' parents and I knew that I would be fortunate to still have them into my late thirties.  I asked God to let my father live to be at least eighty.  If he lived to be eighty, I would be thirty-nine (unimaginably old to a little girl).  He was eighty when he died.  I wish I had asked for more.

I am learning with these losses.  I am learning with every turn in the road.  What I did not know in my tears as a child was the way I would feel when God showed up when I needed Him most.  I didn't know in my fears that He is truly close to the brokenhearted, just like He promised in His Word.  He has met me in the valleys in ways that I would not have ever been able to anticipate while still on the mountaintops.  Nothing is wasted with God.  I don't get the measure of Grace that I will need a minute before I need it...but when it is needed, it overflows.  He is always on time and He is always Enough.  Always.

That doesn't mean this journey is pain-free.  Not at all.  If even Jesus wept, why should I be spared tears? The Bible says, "Hope deferred makes the heart sick.." (Proverbs 13:2).  I can attest to this.  Approaching my mid-forties, I felt heart-sick.  By this time, I had witnessed the weddings and the births of new miracles into most of my dearest friends' worlds.  I was stuck in a "grade" that I didn't want to be in.  I felt like a relationship failure.  I felt forgotten.  I began to feel unlovable again.  I began to be bitter.  

I remember exactly where I was when my attitude began to change.  I had to make a choice.  I was in my living room, tying my tennis shoes before leaving the house to play tennis.  I was about to turn off the television when I heard this quote which I have since discovered was penned by E.M. Forster, "We must be willing to let go of the life that we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us."

I decided there and then, in that moment, that I was going to celebrate my life as it is, instead of continuing to mourn what never was.  I was going to embrace the journey.  I was going to plan some vacations.  I was a family of one and I decided that I was going to have a family vacation.

Within the next seven months, I had not one but two wonderful family vacations.  I chose to go to tennis camps in Burlington, Vermont and Tuscany! If you start at the beginning of this blog, you can read about my trips.  Italy, especially, was a triumph.  Pictures of this adventure grace my bedroom walls and in the offices where I work.  When I look at them, I remember the richness of this time in my life...the beauty in yielding to the life I have been given and in letting go of the mourning of what has not yet come to pass.

How patient and kind God is with me!  I am like the Israelites in the desert...they longed to leave their captivity in Egypt, but then...they grumbled and complained in their journey to the promised land to the point of wanting to go back to Egypt!  I laid down my longings in order to celebrate my life as it is...but like a pendulum, I had swung too far.   The pain of unmet longing was too great to bear.  I began to give up my dreams in my heart. I resolved myself to singleness.  I didn't want to live in the tension of gratefulness and yet longing.  I told myself that the man who spoke into my life at twenty-five was just wrong.  He had not heard from God at all.

Thank God for friends and mentors who aren't afraid to speak truth into my life.  All through the years, I have always had wiser people around me to shake me and wake me up.  Someone dear to me challenged me about giving up...she challenged me to face the pain and stir up belief and trust again.  

Life seems to have a cycle and a rhythm to it.  I can go through extended time with not much change and then whoosh!  Change is happening all around me.  In the past two years, I have experienced the "whoosh!" My head is spinning.  So much goodness.  So many trials.  So many triumphs.

You are expecting me to tell you that I have fallen in love?  No...not yet.  Not with a man, anyway.  But my heart is open again.  My faith is strong.  It doesn't hurt anymore to hope.  Because I know that my hope is not empty, it is legitimate.  It is rational hope.  I am getting to know the Author of Hope better and I am trusting Him more.

I have lost two jobs in the past year, yet I am feeling more secure than ever. Feeling secure because my God is who He says He is.  Feeling grateful because my life is rich and full, even though there is no earthly Valentine again this year...no one to send me flowers or kiss me.  No one to hold me at night.

It just doesn't matter today.  My God is who He says He is and He will do what He says he is going to do.  "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."  Jeremiah 29:11  I am starting to believe that the man who spoke into my life at twenty-five may have heard from God after all.  Perhaps it has taken twenty-five years to prepare me for marriage...to prepare me to be part of a healing team.  Maybe it will take even more years.  I will choose to believe and hope.

So...what am I doing on Valentines' Day?  I am having a slumber party with three teenagers!  We are going to eat chocolate and watch chick flicks and share dreams.  We have been sharing life together for the past year. I have been mentoring them as best I can by sharing my journey with them.  They are the daughters I never had...so sweet.

I tell them not to grow weary in waiting on the Lord.  I tell them to think of me when they grow impatient... I am waiting but not passively so...I am living in the wait.  I am celebrating life in the wait.   I am not waiting for life to begin with that walk down the aisle.  

Well...actually...life did begin for me with a walk down the aisle.  It wasn't on a white runner with rose petals. It was crimson carpet.  This journey of mine began when I walked down the aisle of my Baptist church at nine years old, answering a call to give my life to God.  I remember the rapid beat of my heart as I sensed the Holy Spirit nudging me to leave my pew and walk alone.  I remember my mother's tears as I tugged on her coat to tell her I wanted to go. She said, "We will be leaving in a minute."  I said, "No, I want to go up there," and I pointed to the altar.  I remember I was wearing a red checked dress with white knee socks...a far cry from a wedding gown.  I walked alone, to the swell of the organ and the sound of voices singing.  I walked to the front and I stood. And you know what?  I am still standing.

This beautiful song, Accidental Road by Allen Levi is a theme in my life.  

More music by Allen Levi can be found HERE

Will the Real Christian Men Please Stand Up...(eharmony Adventures)

It's a joke, people!  But sometimes, it has felt like this...

I had mentioned in an earlier post that I have decided to give Internet dating another try.  Some of the more humorous Internet introductions in my past can be found here.  

I am feeling adventurous.  I haven't given up on finding true love.  In my daily life, I don't often meet single Christian men who are in my age range.  Many men who are around my age desire a younger woman, particularly if they want to have children.  Much older men have sometimes shown an interest, but I am a young-at-heart forty-nine and I don't always find older men appealing.  It depends on the person.

Anyhoo, I first tried Christian Mingle in October, signing up for three months.  It turned out to be rather disappointing.  At any one time, the highest number of people online was recorded at being five or six thousand.  This isn't a huge amount if you consider every possible location, gender, age range, etc.  By contrast, the free site called Plenty Of Fish shows five hundred and fifty-thousand or so online at any one time. But you get what you pay for...or do you?  On Christian Mingle, I found only a few men in my age range living within three hundred miles of my home.  Of those men, very few (like one, maybe?) had similar interests or values.  He wasn't "the one."

Between Christmas and New Year's, eharmony had several free days.  The frustrating part about the free days is that they do not let you see any one's pictures.  I realized soon that wasn't going to work for me, so I bit and signed up for 3 months of eharmony.  In the meanwhile, I ended the Christian Mingle membership early. Why?  Because the only person who kept messaging me at that point appeared to be lacking English skills. He kept sending me a "hello" and I would write a note and then he would send just a "hello" again.  This happened three times.  Enough, already!  I need someone who can communicate.

One of the nice things about eharmony is that the format appears to be more professional and you can gather quite a bit of information about someone if they choose to answer questions truthfully.  A new feature that didn't exist a few years back when I was last on eharmony is that there are about one thousand multiple choice questions that one can choose to answer.  No one chooses to answer all of them.  Some don't choose to answer any.  I really like when my matches choose to answer at least one hundred or so.  If they are honest, it is easy to weed out those who do not share my values or interests.

One weakness in the matching system that I would like see changed is that you cannot specify denominational preferences.  I am able to specify "Christian."  I would not be open to dating a non Christian.  That is not because I am prejudiced.  My understanding of scripture tells me that it is not okay to partner my life with someone who doesn't serve the same God.  I know too much to plead ignorance.  My faith is central to who I am; I cannot imagine trying to join my life with someone who does not share it.   I long to have a partner in ministry.  That is a nonnegotiable for me.  When I say ministry, I don't necessarily mean full-time vocation.  It can be as simple as praying together for others.  I don't know exactly what that will look like. 

What continues to amaze me on these Internet sites is the range of values in those who call themselves Christian.  Please don't misunderstand me...I am not perfect and I am not looking for perfection.  I am looking for someone whose lifestyle reflects his verbal commitment to Jesus Christ.  Someone whose heart is yielded. Someone who aims for a life that matches his verbal commitment...and when he fails, he gets back up and keeps pursuing God.  He keeps pursuing holiness.  

Apparently, this is more rare than I once imagined.  Here is a list of twenty questions on eharmony.  I have the most common answer(s) in bold (common among the men I have been matched with, all of whom call themselves Christian.  If two answers appeared equally as often, I have bolded both):

1.  The Bible:

     a.  Is the Word of God

     b.  Is a guideline for good living

     c.  Is a book

     d.  Is the most important book in my life

2.  Do you believe that one particular religion is better than another?

     a.  Yes

     b.  No

3.  Your partner suggests going out and getting drunk together, you say:

     a.  Absolutely not

     b.  Why not?

4.  Living together before marriage is:

     a.  Against my beliefs

     b.  Not smart

     c.  Okay

5.  Would you date an atheist?

     a.  Yes

     b.  No

     c.  I'd consider it

6.   Would you convert to a new religion for your partner?

     a.  Yes, if it was important to them

     b.  No

     c.  Maybe

7.  Sex before marriage is:

     a.  Perfectly okay with me

     b.  All good if you are in love

     c.  Against my beliefs

8.   Do you believe in Karma?

     a.  Absolutely

     b.  Nope

9.  Do you believe in Abortion?

     a.  I'm Pro-Life

     b.  I'm Pro-Choice

10. You catch your partner viewing porn online, you:

     a.  Confront them

     b.  Throw something at the computer

     c.  Join them

     d.  Quietly Slip Away and Say Nothing

11. People who think we should legalize prostitution are:

     a.  Completely Wrong

     b.  Right On

12. Have you ever been to a psychic?

     a.  No

     b.  Yes

13. A person who has had more than 10 sexual partners is:

     a.  Not for me

     b.  I don't judge

     c.  Experimental

     d.  Experienced

14. Would you date a 40-year old virgin?

     a.  Absolutely

     b.  Absolutely not

15. Would you date someone with an STD?

     a.  Yes

     b.  No

     c.  Depends on which one

16. Strip Clubs are:

     a.  Okay with me

     b.  Should be banned

17. Would you date someone who is a scientologist?

     a.  Yes

     b.  No

18. What do you think about friends with benefits?

     a.  I'm for it

     b.  Take it or leave it

     c.  It's heartbreak hotel

19. Do you believe God speaks to people?

     a.  Yes

     b.  No

20. Do you think it is okay to do recreational drugs once in awhile?

     a.  No judgements here

     b.  It's definitely not okay

Is there anything left to say?

I am grateful for their honesty, at least.  I know that I could not respect a man who would be willing to reject Christ for a relationship.  If that is true, then he does not know Him at all.  If that is true, the god he worships is romantic love or lust.

It would be foolish not to question the integrity and sincerity of anyone who claims to belong to Christ and yet has no interest in obedience or evidence of repentance in his life.  Here is a fantastic Blog Post I found through facebook, 6 Reasons Living Together Doesn't Work.  Couldn't have said it better myself.

Where are the authentic Christian men?  I suppose most of them (my age) are married...or they are not on Christian Mingle or eharmony.

I am thankful that I am only looking for one.  Shouldn't be too hard for God, right?