An Unexpected Blessing

For a while now, I've been wanting to give the girls who work at the club the book Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers. If you haven't read this, please stop what you are doing and download it onto your kindle or nook, get it from the library, or head to the nearest bookstore. It is the greatest love story every written: the love story between you and God. Mrs. Rivers wrote this book based on the book of Hosea in the bible, in which God called Hosea to marry a prostitute. She continually left him and cheated on him, and he continued to love and bring back from her bondage. He did this to show His children that even though they were unfaithful, he still wanted them, chased after them, and loved them.

Back to my story.

Last Sunday I told a dear friend who prays for the Cherished minstry about wanting to do this as a gift some month. It will end up costing a bit more than we usually spend on the gifts, but I figured that I could round up a few people who would want to buy a book to donate. I knew she would be one of them, and found out she had never read Redeeming Love. I told her how great it is and that she should pick it up sometime. This Sunday she grabbed me and told me she was almost done reading it. She loves this book, and has been recommending it to her friends. Then she told me that she wanted to donate enough to buy almost all the books we'd need. She told me how much this book was affecting her, and that if just one girl actually read it all the way through and understood how much God loves her, it would be worth it.

I cried right there in the foyer.

God is so faithful. I was expecting to have to do a little more work to gather the money for the books, and in one fell swoop, through one person, God made it clear that He's got this. We're going to give them at the end of February, and I can't wait!