Frugal; Clothing

Striving to be Good Stewards of the Gifts He Has Given.


Clothing....

This is really rather simple and doesn't have much if anything to do with me. My husband used to be concerned about how we would manage to clothe and feed a large brood of kids. But the truth is we have never had to worry about clothing our children. This has been one of those ways that God has always provided above and beyond. Part of me would like to think it is His blessing for our refusal to jump on the consumer bandwagon and "spend, spend, spend", I wouldn't go so far as to say that, but the fact of the matter is that this has been an area where we have felt PROFOUNDLY blessed and "taken care of" by He who Dawn (Child of the King) so affectionately and appropriately refers to as DHF, or Dear Heavenly Father. (I love that Dawn, can I "borrow" it??!!)

I started off with the mentality that we would always just buy second hand, and sometimes we do (everything except for underwear and socks and sometimes shoes). But the truth of the matter is that before I usually have need of doing that, within days of my thinking to myself "so and so is going to need...." God has always filled the need by bringing hand me downs (and the exact size/season/type of clothing we've been in need of) to our door from friends, neighbours and even perfect strangers. I have often thought of the passage "see how he clothes the lilies of the field, not even King Solomon in all his glory is better dressed than these..." truly, my kids have received EXPENSIVE, like new clothing that I NEVER would have bought them out of our own budget, from the hands of others. Just this morning I read in my quiet time; "Tyre will not keep the money she earns but will give them to the people who serve the Lord, so they will have plenty of food and nice clothes." (Isa 23:18)

We recently read a wonderful little story by Arleta Richardson in one of her "Gramma's Attic" books. It was about her grandfather, who was a poor preacher who didn't have money to buy shoes. His feet were literally peeking through the soles and the toes, and they didn't have a dime to replace them. He prayed about this need and a few days later a neighbour popped over for an unrelated purpose, but had a pair of shoes with him. He had bought this brand new pair of shoes that didn't fit him properly and he was wondering if the preacher would like to try them on for size and if he might have need of them. The preacher hollered "Praise the Lord, yes, I'll take em'!!" the neighbour responded with; "Well, wouldn't you like to try them on first?" The preacher insisted "No need! When God sends me shoes, He's sure to send the right size!"

I loved that, and that has been our experience exactly. God is good. He calls Himself our provider. He faithfully and abundantly provides for those who are striving to be good stewards of the gifts He has given. It constantly amazes me that despite the fact 4 of our 11 married years have been spent on the mission field, we have always only been a one income family, never grossing more than 35,000 (sometimes as low as 24,000) a year, that we are now mortgage free, have always been debt free outside of our mortgage and live more comfortably and happily than many of our peers with white collar jobs, two income families and 2 children. A little bit of it has to do with careful stewardship on our part, but really, in all honesty it has been God's blessing and provision that has carried us here.

Sometimes I think a big problem in our culture is that we need to let ourselves get to the point where we actually *have* needs, recognize them without immediately trying to fill them in our way and ability, and then ASK God to provide. Then sit back and see what happens. He might bring shoes to your door, he might bring shoes to the second hand store for you, He might bring in money for you to buy new shoes. One thing for sure, He's unpredictable, but one thing He is not is negligent of our needs despite our being oft negligent of allowing Him room to move and bless us.

Hmmm, didn't I say that was supposed to be short and sweet??? Oops. If you don't know me by now...