The Bible has a couple stories of people searching for the lost. There is the story of the shepherd leaving the other 99 sheep to look for the one lost. Then there is the story of the woman looking for the one lost coin in her house. This morning I kept thinking of that woman as I tore my house up looking for a lost rebate card that had arrived in the mail on Monday. Word to the wise, when you are a mother with 3 young children do not leave anything undone and never leave anything important on the table. I delayed putting away the card when it arrived and for 2 days I had been thinking (Holy Spirit promptings perhaps?) that I needed to relocate the card. Today I tried to do just that only to discover it missing.

Last night we had been watching “18 Kids and Counting” and Mr. Duggar was talking about the importance of guarding our reactions to things and that kids will watch carefully your reactions and follow that much more then what you say. All while I was looking this morning through my messy house while trying to cook breakfast and with kids practically hanging on me the whole time I felt my temperature rising. I just needed a moment to think about where that card could be and I wasn’t getting it. On top of that I was failing the test. I kept striving for right reactions and not blowing it out of proportion but tempting things kept coming.

We are trying to transition from using credit constantly to using cash only. This is our first month and so whatever money we have has to get us through. It will be close until I get paid again. Our food is coming primarily from the pantry (thank goodness I stocked that up this summer). We are avoiding unnecessary driving and attempting to lay low financially for awhile. In this environment  I loose a sizeable rebate card.

I kept thinking we can adjust somewhere else, it’s not worth it to loose my temper with the kids and the Lord will provide but my reactions were not reflecting peace. Finally I called the company to see if there was any chance I could get another. I didn’t have my hopes up. But low and behold customer service is not dead, it was no big deal and I will receive another card in as little as a week. So all that stress was virtually pointless. I have been loosing stuff a lot lately. My phone a fews weeks ago, my wallet the week after that and now this. Maybe there is a lesson I am supposed to learn? Hopefully I will be done loosing stuff for awhile, but I know I didn’t ace the test today.