Unwritten and Unthunk

• Drove to Campbelltown, Croydon Park, Blacktown and Quakers Hill. From which I then travelled to Kingsford, Newtown, and then Quakers Hill.
• Shepherded a very large cheque across the city (or at least, a small cheque for a large sum of money), to pay a 10% deposit on our house.
• Listened to three sermons by John Stott (whose voice is exceedingly elegant)
• "Got stuff done", with Herr Donovan.
• Had our first parenting class at RPA.
• Spent 45 minutes waiting for our car to get released from its metal cage; aka the parking lot that closed at 7pm.
• Spent a further 30 minutes with the security guard, as he tried the right swipe card several times, unsuccessfully, and then proceeded to try every other card in the security-guard book, also unsuccessfully.
• Was rescued at the eleventh hour by a late-working doctor with swipe-card access, who had to re-enter the car-park, have us tail him out (without either being caught by the boom gate, or rear-ending his car (approximate value in 6 digits), and then re-swipe his card to open the security gate.

As per cryptic messages on Facebook, we're buying a house.

I find telling people about it a bit like having a baby... well, the bits that I'm familiar with, anyway.

So, much as we have actually put pen to paper, and have a contract with our names, our signatures, and a price on it, one wonders if it would actually be more prudent to wait til after the all-important cooling-off period. After all, if some unpleasantness is uncovered by our conveyancers/solicitors in the next few days, then we could potentially abort, and leave behind our deposit with some sadness. A bit like a miscarriage.

Once again, we enter into a phase where there are all sorts of experts in fields I know nothing about (pest inspecting, building-inspecting, conveyancing, renovations) and I'm seeking out everyone's ideas and trying to figure out what we need and what we can get away with. I.e., do we need to have a bassinet and a cot and a pram and a stroller and a car-seat and a change table? Some friends of friends used their dining table as a change table, and a washing basket as a bassinet... could that work for us? Do I need an expert to do our re-grouting or is that something I can do myself with time, effort, and research?

Everyone, family and friends, has an opinion. I just do what I do best, listening to everyone, weighing the mountain of the advice, and (eventually) settling on something that will work for us and our baby (and our house).

§

Okay, so here's where Grace comes in.

I've been observing myself as I tell people about our news today.

The thing I find most diffcult—more difficult than the timing, the cooling-off period, etc—is the whole aspect of grace.

I am no longer a highly paid IT professional. I am a ministry trainee who gets paid ¼ of what I did. Next year, I will become a full-time Bible college student, earning even less than what I get paid now.

So any observant person would realise that there is no way.... no way that I could possibly afford a house like ours on my own. At all.

My father, who has a penchant for generosity, is buying the house for us.

In reality, he's not even buying it as an investment property, which I am often tempted to say... a full-time mum and a bible college student wouldn't even be able to afford to pay market rent. He's buying it because he loves us, and wants to give us somewhere to live.

This is grace, pure and simple. Unmerited generosity. Undeserved and unearned favour.

And, in my human nature, I rebel against the idea of grace.

The idea that my father is doing something in his self-interest, investing in property sounds a better story. When I say he's "helping" us buy a house, it sounds like their chipping in, when in fact they're contributing the entire sum.

The liar and the sinner and the social conformist in me wants to explain away grace. I am ashamed of it. I am ashamed of undeserved wealth, and the affluence of my family. Most people in my situation couldn't do this... live in a veritable mansion they didn't pay for. They struggle and scrape to get through college.

How ought I to respond?

Firstly, I could either be thankful, or ungrateful. I could take our riches for granted, or I could remember, and keep reminding myself all of this, too, comes from God. My father is the father God gave me, and his riches too come from God.

Secondly, I could keep quiet about it (in my embarrassment) or I could be vocal about it. I could sing praises of the one who has been generous to me, or I could be ashamed of my father and my Heavenly Father. I think there's a warning against that somewhere. (Mark 8:38).

Thirdly, I remember this: that those to whom much is given, much is required. I hope and pray that this house is something that we can use for the glory of God. I hope it is a house where we can be hospitable in. I hope it is a house where we can raise godly children who love the Lord Jesus. I hope it is a house where the Bible is read. I hope it is a house in which people will see the people of God in action, despite imperfection. I hope it is a house where we can share our lives with others.

Pray for us. And pray for me that I might live and act as I should.

Our child will be born in March 2009.

If my maths works right, then their life should look something like this:

• 2014: Age 5, First day at school
• 2021: Age 12, Enters that wonderful twilight world known as high school
• 2022: Welcome to the wonderful world of adolescence, and teenage rebellion!
• 2025: The roads become a much more dangerous place...
• 2026: Our car tends to disappear far more frequently than it used to. Apparently they let babies drive when they get to 17. On their own.
• 2027: Scarily enough, university... bars and nightclubs await. Legally. Of course, they won't drink at all before this date. Not at all.
• 2030: All those baby photos and videos we're going to take get pulled out of storage (off a hard disk, no doubt) and dusted off for compulsory embarrassment.

Well. Because I don't have enough things to do at the moment, I was thinking I should redesign my blog. Because I'm a bit over the whole boringness of it.

But then I'm wondering... how many people will it affect? Most blogs I read these days are via Google reader, which means that I rarely get to appreciate the wonderful web designs of the originating website.

I could hack my RSS feeder...maybe sneak more formatting into the HTML. But that would be sneaky and probably break a lot of things for a lot of other readers...

Should I bother?