We got a job!

Yes, you read right! I mentioned Hubbie's third interview the last time I blogged. Well it was followed by a quick fourth, and yesterday he signed the contract to become an official employee at the consultancy firm. Hooray! We are so grateful and amazed. We can hardly express our joy. Yesterday when we drove to the supermarket, we gazed out at the streets with new eyes and we wanted to throw our arms around the buildings and the people in the rain. We kept yelling, "Woohoooooo! We are here to stay!" and scaring the daylights out of our son.

It's been such a long haul. I was already preparing myself for leaving this friendly town for cold, distant Paris. I thought about what we've been through, and how all of it served to grow us more in our faith. I have learned so much about what it means to trust in the sovereignty of God -- how tough it is to trust in real difficulty, and how easy it is to give it lip-service when life is easy. Not that we've had it that hard, but it was hard enough for us! The beginning was the worst by far, when Hubbie applied for dozens of jobs and never heard from anyone. I think the biggest lesson for us was the realization we had been in a type of spiritual complancency in our well-oiled church in London. We have learned so much about what it means to be truly a part of the church, by attending a church still in its infancy and investing in people more than we ever had before. Many lessons have been learned... and all would have comforted me if we had had to go to Paris.

But we are so very, very happy to be able to stay.

All this has given us an exceptional buildup to Christmas. I don't think we have ever so looked forward to celebrating the birth of Jesus with the family. Today we got out of the apartment and did some Christmas shopping. Had it not been for Hubbie feeling ill, we probably would have spent far too much money. Surely another stroke of providence! Tonight it's like Hubbie has finally allowed himself to exhale after so many months of stressful job hunting. His body called in its debt with a 39.6 C (103.3 F) temperature an hour ago. Now he is literally stretched out on the sofa, snoring. God, bless him.