Can God Help You Build a Home?

Back in 1977, Jack and I felt that the Lord was leading us to build a house in the country without going into debt. Instead, we were to look to Him continually to supply every need. This was a brand new adventure. I think our extended families thought we had lost our minds. But by the time the project was completed the experience had become such a training ground for us that the house itself had become like a fringe benefit.

With the house dried in and thirty-two windows installed (not counting the patio doors), we decided to store the window screens until the house was finished so they wouldn’t get damaged during construction. Two and a half years later we finished the house and put the screens on the windows so we could move in.

Spring’s arrival in the middle of a terrible Texas drought was a bad combination that year. Within a few weeks our light fixtures were swarming with bugs at night. I’m not talking about a few bugs that slip in when the doors are opened—the house was filled with bugs!

An investigation of the problem revealed holes in the plastic screens as big as softballs. We were horrified. What on earth could have happened? Well, it didn’t take long to discover that the enormous grasshopper crop, with nothing else to eat, had gnawed on those plastic screens until they had made huge holes.

We had a lot of money tied up in all those screens, and the temptation to be disappointed was pretty overwhelming. Especially considering that those screens had been purchased more than two years before, putting them well outside the warranty period.

Even though they had been stored they were still considered “old screens,” so there was not one thing we could do in the natural. We kept saying, “Lord, we don’t know what can be done but we are going to trust You. And we choose not to allow feelings of disappointment to come in.”

As Jack was leaving for work that morning he asked me to talk with the man at the lumber company. The manager listened to my story, took down the number and sizes of the windows, called the window company, briefly told them what had happened, and then added, “Keep in mind that they have had those windows for over two years.” He didn’t even bother to say that the screens had all been in storage.

The impression was exceptionally clear that he had made the call only to appease me, so for the next two weeks we contended with bugs. There was no air conditioning at the time, and we needed those windows for some breeze. So every time we contended with bugs and felt a wave of disappointment try to come over us, we made ourselves quote our scripture and confess our trust in the Lord, even though there was nothing whatsoever in the natural to give us any hope.

Two more weeks passed. Then one day I answered the phone and heard the voice on the other end of the line say, very simply, “We have your screens.”

Even though it had been two and a half years, with no questions asked the supplier had made all new screens from screen wire rather than plastic and had shipped them free of charge. Once again, God had supernaturally intervened and we were not disappointed.

Peggy Joyce Ruth

​From Those Who Trust the Lord

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