In February, I found that a key economic indicator that I follow, the Baltic Dry Index, had reached an all time low. Historically, when the Baltic Dry Index hits a low, the US economy is in a recession within 6 to 18 months. I felt that I should begin to get my house ready for sale and my wife agreed, because we saw how house prices fell in 2008 and it took 7 years for them to almost recover. And, we did not want to lose that value in our home of 22 years, again. Near that time I also read Rabbi Jonathon Cohn’s book, ” The Mystery of the Shemitah” and realized that in the fall of 2015, the US may be in for an economic shaking.
So, we began to get our property ready for sale and we decided to move to a rental home for a couple of years to see what effect this economic shaking would have during that time. Our goal was to get our home sold before 9/11/15.
In July we moved from our home into a rental home and continued to repair and repaint our home, making it ready for sale. I also began to talk with my friends about our decision. At one of the weekly IFCB roundtables, Ken Schrader was there and I asked for prayer that our home would sell quickly.
At the annual IFCB meeting held July 18, 2015, Ken’s wife, Nita, came up to me and asked me if I had ever heard of bringing a specific request to God using a prayer cloth and having people agree in prayer that the specific request would be answered. I told her that I had read of handkerchiefs in the New Testament, but didn’t know of that happening now. She told me that she and Ken had had an old tractor for sale for a couple of years and no one would even look at it. Then, they agreed in prayer over a prayer cloth and placed the cloth on the tractor.
It sold 2 days later.
Then, she told me about a house that they wanted to sell. They had forgotten about the prayer cloth and the house was on the market for many months. Then they remembered the prayer cloth and then they agreed in prayer that the house would sell. After placing the cloth in the house, it sold within days.
So I gladly accepted the prayer cloth. And, continued working on the house to get it ready to sell. On a Wednesday in July, my wife and I signed a listing agreement to sell our house. On Thursday, we took the prayer cloth to the house and agreed in prayer that the house would sell quickly. We then placed the prayer cloth under the welcome mat, so that every potential buyer would have to place their foot on top of the prayer cloth. On Friday, the listing became active and we had two potential buyers look at the house. They both made offers. We accepted the offer of the first couple who placed their feet on the prayer cloth and had a solid contract with their loan approval attached by Monday evening.
Our house closed on 9/11/15.
The lesson in this for me was that if we have a financial desire or a financial need, we should agree in prayer with our friends and God will supply our every need.
Al