WE BOUGHT A BOAT!
Today, TODAY, we bought our next home, a 36’ Dean Sailing Catamaran! It has two heads (bathrooms), 2 berths (bedrooms for the girls), a rather large master stateroom for a cat, and a big galley (kitchen) with plenty of counter work space…actually more than we had on the houseboat. It is moored in a bay off of the US Virgin Island, St Thomas. After Michael flew out to view the boat and did a ton of homework on it this past week, we prayerfully made the decision to take the plunge.
If we back up a few weeks, I had prayed for the Lord to show me an answer when having such a fear filled reaction to the Corsair boat in Virginia (see the video here). It was big, but really needed a lot of love. There didn’t feel like an inch of space on that boat inside or out that did not need to be touched, worked on, cleaned, or redone. That boat needed so much more work done than we had envisioned ourselves doing. In my moment of fear I called out to the Lord in prayer. “Show me, Lord, show me and I promise I will follow You. Even when it doesn’t make sense to me, I trust You and will always say Yes to You. Whatever you ask, my answer will be Yes.” He whispered to me “Lisa, do not worry, you will have everything as you wish on the boat and have money left over”.
In Virginia, I kept trying to run the numbers on that boat and make it fit to have money leftover and I did not understand. It just didn’t make sense. In fact, it would have cost more than we had; much more. However, I trusted that like tithing, quitting work even before we had our children, and many other financial decisions the Lord called us to, it would work because God always keeps His word. His plans are far greater than our own. His resources are unlimited. He made it all and He owns it all.
As a result of following the Lord’s calling to Virginia, our hearts and minds were prepared for the possibility a major refit (renovation) of our future catamaran home. Had we not had that experience, we would not have considered the boat we purchased today. He was preparing us because we weren’t yet ready for what He was calling us to. Added to that, we missed a major hit of Hurricane Matthew and were blessed by the homeschool time learning American history in such a wonderful place.
God is amazing. Just amazing. Not only will we get the size of boat we wanted and be able to refit it exactly to fit our family’s style, we will do so on a beautiful Caribbean island. There will be no two week treck down the ICW, no first crossing, no beating down "the thorny path"; we begin where we want to be. The US Virgin Islands and BVI’s are connected by safe, small, passages for us to whet our appetite and ability to sail. God is good. He is so good indeed.
I know many will ask, “what’s next?”. Here is the immediate plan. We will check into a timeshare in Orlando for a week. That should give us the time we need to prepare for the move. We will ship our belongings on a cargo ship from Fort Lauderdale, then drop the borrowed van in west Florida and head back in a rental car to the Miami airport. We will fly to St Thomas and meet our belongings to claim them and go through customs and US taxing a few days later. Sahsa will need one last vet appointment for a health certificate and additional supply of meds to be permitted to fly and then live in on the island while we work on the cat.
We have not set dates for the move as of yet, but will be working on it this coming week and will keep you all posted. Thank you for continued prayers. We are so very blessed to have each of you and miss you all already. If any of you are ready for a vacation to the USVI (no passport needed), give us a shout!
