Secondhand Living and Loving It

We buy so many things secondhand.  It is a necessity for us since we live on a meager income for our family size. Ultimately, God has always provided for us because the numbers would never make sense otherwise.  God has given me wisdom in the area of finances and I have seen through the years how he blesses my family.  I have learned that waiting is a blessing.  Sometimes it is not always a joy to wait when the item seems needed but many times I have seen The Lord bless me more for the sacrifice.  Sometimes we want to run out and buy an item when we feel we "need" it.  We grow impatient with our wanting.  When we stop and ponder if it something we really need or not most of the time it can wait.  

My most recent example of this is our "new to us" refrigerator. Being that our other home was a turn of the century home we had to have a certain refrigerator to fit.  The good news was it was the cheapest type refrigerator you can buy!  The bad news is that there were really no frills.  But seriously, do we need frills?  No, we needed a working fridge that did it's job.  And, that is exactly what we had.  Years ago my first fridge was one I purchased from a co-worker for $50 and it served me well for several years. When it went out we purchased a truly new one.  It lasted many years but when it was time to replace it I bought secondhand.  I think I paid $150 for one exactly like I had!  This was a huge blessing because ad I said before I had to have a certain size for my space.  Meanwhile, I dreamed about one of those with the freezer in the bottom... not at all something I "needed" but I wondered if it might make life easier if my little ones could reach the ice.  Well, now we have moved and even though it is a much smaller house we have a little more flexibility on the type of refrigerator we can have since there are not built in cabinets above the fridge area.  I began once again to dream if one if those freezer-in-the-bottom style fridges, again.  For a little while I was diligently searching for one secondhand but it truly was not a "need" so I decided that waiting was a better option... I certainly would not be buying a used one and paying $1,300 for it. I knew if I waited that God would work it out... and part if that is accepting that the way He works it out sometimes means not getting it at all.  Fast forward to now.  We have lived in our "new to us" home for three months now and I really had settled into not changing the refrigerator... even though every time you open the door of the fridge it bangs into the kitchen island and creates huge traffic flow issues in the kitchen.  Meanwhile, my husband keeps browsing these local for sale by owner Facebook groups and a few nights ago he came across a side by side fridge for $350.  I was leery.  First of all, I did not want to spend the money I had poked back.  Secondly, I needed to take measurements to make sure it would even fit (which I suspected it would not).  And lastly, I did not know if it would even solve or help with our traffic flow problem or if the doors would still hit the island.  The lady immediately dropped her price to $300 without us even asking her to.  We started measuring and thinking it through and decided to buy it.  

And, it has all worked out!!!! I should not be so surprised... God always works this stuff out. I did spend that money that was poked back.  The fridge did fit (even though it was a challenge to get it in and through doorways).  And, it did solve our traffic flow problem and does not hit the island when you open doors.  Not only did all that work out I realized that the freezer-in-the-bottom style I had been dreaming of would have had the same problems with the doors hitting the island.  God worked us out a much better one.  I have found when I sacrifice that he has always blessed me exceedingly above what my desires are.  This one allows more fridge space and more freezer space.  It has the ice and water in the door and is even filtered water.  The water reservoir is in the fridge portion so the water is even chilled when you dispense it! My littles will be able to serve themselves when they are thirsty... and, there is a child lock feature to keep them from serving themselves too often (aka playing with the "magic" water/ice dispensers).  This thing is the cadillac of refrigerators. It has a button to "power freeze" when you bring in not so chilled groceries.  And, it beeps when the door is open too long.  Interestingly, like that fridge I was "dreaming" about it retails for about $1,300.  So, waiting got us a better item and saved us $1,000.

Many people will never understand it (and that is okay), but we are secondhand living and loving it.