Goodbye Saturn, Hello Taurus

In March, amidst the flooding and such, we noticed Mark's car was a bit more temperamental than it usually is.  It's a '97 Saturn that we'd had for well over 8 years.  It's been a faithful car and Mark has truly driven it until it started falling apart and then some.  We had already replaced the transmission, and so when it started jumping between gears and when we backed up, we knew what the issue was.  A trip to the car doc confirmed it.  The transmission was about to go.  Mark listed it on Craigslist and within a week, it was sold.  I just really didn't think we were going to be able to sell it that quickly!  The Lord truly provided.  

 In another area of the Lord's provision, one of Mark's co-workers had a spare car and allowed Mark to borrow it until he got another one.

We were quite surprised when we walked on to several lots, offered a set amount of cash and told that they couldn't help us.  No one was really willing to help us when we were paying cash.  It became the same, "Well, if you finance, I can get you one for this amount of money."  We had both determined to not go in to debt to purchase a car.

So, we were left on our own to search.  By the way, there are a ton of scams on Craigslist so ya'll be careful when searching for a car there.  Big time scams.  The Lord protected us from those as well.

Mark finally found a car after about two weeks of looking and after having a friend who used to be a mechanic check it out.  He was sold.

Now, here's the thing.  We were paying cash.  It was a Saturday when Mark decided to purchase it.  We do not use a brick and mortar bank (it's an online bank).  There was no where to go to take out a money order and our bank only allowed a certain amount out at a time.  So, Mark went to the bank, dutifully, for several days, put some money down with the dealer and eventually, we had our car.  We found out later that our nontraditional bank will overnight cashier's checks for a small fee (well, small compared to the cost of a car).

So, here is the car the Lord has blessed us with!

It's a Ford Taurus.  I could talk about how cute it is and how great it runs and all that...but that's boring.  The main reason I wanted to post this was to have a record of how the Lord has provided for us in so many ways...especially in March!