It’s the fall of 2020.
Everything is shut down. Everyone is wearing a mask, and yet here we are, my wife and I, walking into another stranger’s house. But we’re not here to make friends… or enemies. We’re house hunting. And I can’t imagine a worse time to buy a house.
Not only is everything weird because the world is reeling from the pandemic, but the housing market is bonkers. House prices are skyrocketing and houses are selling at breathtaking speed. People who have been realtors for years say they’ve never seen anything like it. It’s a great time to sell and a bad time to buy… but here we are.
The problem is, we’re outgrowing our little townhouse. It’s been a wonderful home, but the two bedrooms and tiny backyard just aren’t going to cut it much longer. Our kids are quickly growing up and we need to expand.
We have a wishlist of what we want in this new house of ours.
We want at least three bedrooms.
We want two full bathrooms.
We want a nice, big, fenced-in backyard.
We want it to be in a non-sketchy part of town, preferably not on a main road.
And, of course, we have a certain amount we can afford to pay.
We tell our realtor what we’re looking for. He starts searching and making suggestions. We also start searching. We get an app that lets us search the listings in our area. We spend hours poring over those listings and refreshing again and again to see if anything new has popped up.
Towards the beginning of the house-hunting process, we come across a house that seems to check all the boxes. According to the listing, it has four bedrooms, two full baths, and a nice, fenced-in backyard. It’s also on a quiet street. Everything looks good, so we send the address to our realtor to see what he thinks. He messages us and says that, even though the house is just now showing up in our searches, it’s already under contract. Someone beat us to it.
It’s not the only time that happens. We get better at searching and come across an app that shows us new listings more quickly. Still, there are times we ask our realtor about a property and by the time he responds later that day, the house is already under contract. It’s insane.
We do view some houses. We see some things we like and lots of things we don’t like. I remember leaving one house and my wife commenting that whoever took the pictures for that listing should get a raise because they made the house look WAY better than it looked in real life. We see strange floor plans and questionable decor choices, but more importantly, none of the houses we see check all the boxes. Some have only one bathroom. Some have a non-existent backyard. Some are just out of our price range.
I try to be hopeful, but after a couple of months of fruitless searching, I start to wonder if we need to knock some things off our wishlist. I didn’t want to settle, but maybe we need to. Maybe that perfect home we have dreamed up just doesn’t come in our price range.
One day, early in the morning, my wife is checking the app for new listings and tells me excitedly that a house is back on the market. It’s the one from back at the beginning that seemed to check all the boxes but was under contract before we could go see it. Now, according to the app, it’s available again. We text our realtor immediately. He tells us the house is available and he schedules a viewing for later that morning.
The reason the house is back on the market is pretty odd. Back when it was on the market before, someone made an offer on the house, but their offer was contingent on them selling their house. Apparently, that sale fell through and they withdrew the offer. Our realtor tells us that in a seller’s market, it’s odd that the seller’s realtor agreed to a deal like that since she could have probably sold it to someone else very quickly. We don’t care why she did it. We’re just glad it’s back on the market and we want to go see it before someone else snatches it up.
We’re excited and a little nervous as we drive up. It’s a nice-looking house with a cute little front porch and a carport. We don’t necessarily need a carport, but it might be nice. We walk in the front door and start to check things off the list. Three bedrooms, two full bathrooms, beautiful back yard.
There are also some things that aren’t on our list. The living room has beautiful woodwork with hooks and cubbies where we can put our shoes and hang our coats. The kitchen has a beautiful granite countertop and lots of counter space. There’s a second living area that could be a great place for the kids to play. There’s even a chicken coop in the backyard and (if we want them) two chickens.
None of those things were on our checklist, but they feel perfect for us.
The price is right, the… everything is right. We hardly even have to discuss it. We want to put in an offer on this house. So that day, the very day the house went on the market, we make an offer.
A month later, it’s pouring down rain when my wife and I drive up to our new house, keys in hand. In the downpour, we’re thankful for that carport. We make our way inside and start cleaning and tidying to prepare for our move the next day. As we work our way through the house, everything feels so perfect. This is the perfect house for us.
We talk about all the things that had to happen to get us here. It’s a pretty cool chain of coincidences. As we start to tell the story to others, it slowly begins to dawn on me that there are many ways I can tell the story of how we ended up in this perfect house.
But maybe there is only one right way to tell the story.
In 1 Samuel 17, a young shepherd named David stands before the Israelite King Saul. With what must have felt like unbelievable arrogance, this young man tells the king, basically, Don’t worry, I’ll go fight Goliath. Saul responds, “Thou art not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him: for thou art but a youth, and he a man of war from his youth.” (1 Samuel 17:33) In other words, I don’t think so!
And David’s like, Let me tell you a story.
Here’s the story he tells: “Thy servant kept his father’s sheep, and there came a lion, and a bear, and took a lamb out of the flock: And I went out after him, and smote him, and delivered it out of his mouth: and when he arose against me, I caught him by his beard, and smote him, and slew him. Thy servant slew both the lion and the bear: and this uncircumcised Philistine shall be as one of them, seeing he hath defied the armies of the living God.” (1 Samuel 17:34-36)
If I had killed a lion and a bear single-handedly, that’s a story I’d want to tell! Suddenly this little shepherd boy seems a bit more impressive. Maybe he can take on a giant. But besides sounding impressive, David also sounds really proud.
But then David adds something very important that changes his whole story. After he tells about the lion and the bear and says he can take on Goliath, he says, “The LORD that delivered me out of the paw of the lion, and out of the paw of the bear, he will deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine.” (1 Samuel 17:37)
At that point, Saul agrees to let David go fight Goliath, “Go,” he says, “and the LORD be with thee.”
Now, think with me about David’s story. It teaches us something about how David viewed this really crazy thing that happened to him. The first person you tell every story to is yourself. And the way you tell that story in your own mind will shape how you tell it to others.
When David looked back on his experiences with the lion and the bear, he wasn’t saying, Wow, I really nailed that one, huh? I’m an impressive warrior! Come at me, Goliath. No, David was saying, Wow, look what God did. He is such a great God! Let’s trust Him to do it again.
David goes out to fight Goliath. Goliath laughs at him and says, basically, Come on, give me your best. I’m going to feed you to the birds.
David responds like this: “Thou comest to me with a sword, and with a spear, and with a shield: but I come to thee in the name of the LORD of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied. This day will the LORD deliver thee into mine hand; and I will smite thee, and take thine head from thee; and I will give the carcases of the host of the Philistines this day unto the fowls of the air, and to the wild beasts of the earth; that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel.” (1 Samuel 17:45-46)
Why does David say that he wants to win this battle and defeat Goliath?
Is it so everyone will know that David is the absolute best?
No.
He says it’s, “that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel”
You probably know this, but David wins the battle. If you were David and you defeated Goliath with a little sling and five stones, you’d want to tell that story.
What would make the difference between people looking back at that battle that day and saying, “Wow, look at David!” and people looking back and saying “Wow, look at God!”
It all comes down to how the story is told. People could focus on what a good shot David was and how brave he was and how he was willing to stand up to Goliath when no one else was, or they could focus on how good God was to let a weak little shepherd boy beat the enemy’s champion and how great God is that no one can defeat Him.
David could take the credit or he could recognize that the credit always needs to go to God.
“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.” (James 1:17)
“A man’s heart deviseth his way: but the LORD directeth his steps.” (Proverbs 16:9)
Who deserves the credit for us deciding to go for it and buy a house in the crazy housing market of 2020, not knowing that in the next three years, it would get even crazier?
Who deserves the credit for a realtor making the strange decision to accept an offer that was contingent on another house selling?
Who deserves the credit for that contingent offer falling through at just the right time?
Who deserves the credit for us being the first to make an offer on the house when it came back on the market?
Who deserves the credit that we didn’t get caught in a bidding war like so many other house buyers that year?
Who deserves the credit for finding us just the right house at just the right price?
I didn’t get it at first, but as time went on and I realized just how perfectly it had all fit together, my mindset started to shift and I started to realize how the story needed to be told. The story of my wife and I finding the perfect house is not a tale of happy accidents, fortunate timing, or lucky breaks. It’s a story about the goodness of God.
We all have them, stories where things seem to work out just perfectly. It’s crazy and cool… and we can all too easily leave God out of it. Let’s be like David and recognize that God is at the center of the unexpected victories and the “coincidences” of our lives.
It matters how we tell our stories.
We really worked to find a house. We had a really good realtor. But the real reason our family ended up in the perfect house is that we have a really great God.
It’s been almost four years now and we’ve settled in beautifully to this house God found for us.
Exempla 