Provider

I very rarely talk about finances and especially not on this blog. It's just kind of a private thing people either don't talk about because they aren't good with money or they are and feel guilty about it because other people around them are having a hard time. We fall in the latter category mostly (depending on what group of friends we are around).

We have just always been faithful tithers and have been able to have extra money to give to others as God leads or we are able.

When we started planning to expand our family, I immediately started looking at how much it would cost to have Julia. Not living cost, but just her actual delivery and hospital stay. We have a high deductible health insurance plan and our family deductible is $5,000 before they cover 80%. Shortly before we were pregnant, we found out that our insurance was dropping the only hospital my doctor delivers at, so we decided to self pay (which is cheaper than running through insurance with a $15,000 out of network deductible). So we got pregnant knowing we would be using savings to pay for the baby. Praise God we had savings to cover it all!

Long story short, we have paid about $7,000 (doctor, hospital, etc) so far not including the epidural. We got the bill for $3800 for the epidural without insurance. Most of the doctors/services have been on our insurance, but not the hospital itself. I called to provide insurance info and should get another bill in 45 days. Yes, we have the money to cover the costs, but I don't want to deplete our savings, and it makes me nervous! I have been praying (kinda secretively) that God would just keep giving us favor and taking care of us and that I wouldn't worry about it. I won't get another pay check until November 9th, so our savings, the short term disability payment received, and Bjs checks have to be enough to cover us in the mean time.

Today I went to my doctor for my 6 week check up. I paid him $2,200 in May for the delivery and haven't really thought about it since then. I intentionally spread out the payments, knowing I wouldn't have normal income after the birth. This is about what I paid him to deliver Seth a few years back. Before I left, he told me they owed me some money because of something with the insurance and more being applied to my deductible . I was thinking some small amount like $100. The check was for almost $2,000!

Right there in the doctors office I found myself saying "Praise God!"

Sometimes I wonder if God will help me when my need isn't as big as someone else's. Not as dire or necessary. After all, we do have money to cover all these expenses, so we don't NEED his provision as much as someone living paycheck to paycheck. And yet, I know better than to doubt him. As we are faithful, he will continue to be faithful to us!

I'm so thankful for how God takes care of his own!