Staring into the pit and trusting on the LORD.

A job prospect I had been counting on, blew up on Tuesday. It seemed to get a little life back on Wednesday and then nothing could revive it. It ended in the oddest of ways. A way in which the hand of God was clearly evident. This one would have kept me in the "Flathead", a place I clearly wish to live and moreover a place my wife clearly wishes to live in. It is quite normal for me to be concerned with things that please my wife.

It involved going back to work for someone I had worked for before, who was buying another dealership with a partner who was moving from out of state. The purchase has been in the works for a year and would have involved going to work for one of the "Big Three" franchises, the kind of work you want even in these changing automotive times. In truth I would have gone to work there as just a salesman. It would have been a good job even at that level. A major domestic franchise with no established clientele offers the ground floor salesman the chance to sell anybody, without stepping on toes, I would have been content.

What happened though shows me that clearly, God did not want me to take the job. When the closing day came, it became evident that the person or persons with which the new owners were dealing, could not make the deal. Not WOULD not, but COULD not. The parties were not empowered to sell the franchise. Zap. Just like that, job over. It's not like the prospective new owners KNEW either. They had formed a corporation, purchased equipment, gotten a dealer license from the State of Montana and they were ready. When God wipes out the EMPLOYER through actions you have utterly no control over, no influence over, you have to say God is saying "Don't Go There."

Like bowling pins other jobs blew up this week. One employer I have been wooing for in excess of five years had their manager decide not to retire. Another suddenly beset by a tightening budget has put off hiring indefinitely and yet another job I might have been able to get, it seems I have had a bad phone interview and they are now not so interested. I questioned that employer closely since I had other prospects and the market was extremely small. At the time that I began to see real potential in the job, the employer seemed to take offense from the same question and that door is now shut.

The most devastating loss was that of the now "Non Franchise" that couldn't be closed. That I would have taken a lower level position that I am sure I could have had. This leaves me absolutely floundering. Combining this with the fact that my wife quit a job so I could take the job that lasted only one week, and the rate of descent has now accelerated greatly. Whereas I was in a steady but slow and controlled glide before, now I can see the ground rushing up to meet me.

I have not endured the trials of Job, but all trials are similar and Job is instructive because God took EVERYTHING from Job including his health. I have had similar trouble in the past, and I lost all but my children and my health. Arguably I lost my children as well since they are largely estranged from me and I am closer to my step children than I am my own.

What's the point? God can and does reserve the right to take any and everything from you any time. It can be in just retribution for things you should not have done or it can be in spite of our relative righteousness in the world. We have no promise of "do well and prosper" from our God, all of those promises were given to his LITERAL people Israel, and they forsook those promises. The modern day Christian has no more assurances than Job did. Job in fact got things back in the end, for me it would appear that I am going down again and at a most inopportune time.

Though he slay me, yet will I trust him. If he does not save me, I will serve no other God. Not that my severity is as extreme as Luther, but nonetheless, Here I stand, I can do no other.

Job is instructive too because if we learn anything from history, it's that we don't learn from history, which is in truth a repackaging of "there is nothing new under the sun." So I do not seek council from friends, because in the end most friends either don't know what to say, or offer bad advice. I wait on the LORD to see what he will do.

At this point I'll do anything that pays the bills that isn't immoral. At my age and my total lack of resource there isn't a lot that I can think of in the way of career jumping but I'm game because I have to be.

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