This is probably a story that would be best told by Joe but here's my version!
We prayed for a long time before purchasing a new boat for Joe, I mean our family! :) Joe's heart was truly in the right place! He has sacrificed all of his wants for soooo long! I have to practically beg him to purchase new clothes and he never buys anything other men desire like new cars, phones, hobby stuff, etc. So after years of dealing with our less than perfect boat (that was too small for the family) he finally asked God to make known to us a boat that would be a blessing to our family and not a burden (financially or mentally or mechanically)!! So, as you see in the top picture we believed that was the boat for our family.
So the day he bought it we took it for a test drive as a family. Shortly after the ride began it went from blessing to burden. :( Looking back, now we realize all that went wrong truly wasn't the boat's "fault" but instead our own. We just didn't realize how incredibly different the river here is from what we were used to back in GA! We quickly became stuck in inches of water and lost a few times. Did I mention their was a HUGE black cloud looming in the sky as well! Anyways what we planned as a "quick" trip turned into hours (running right into the middle of nap time:) and just a crazy stressful trip. Mason was screaming his head off because his life jacket was uncomfortable, he wanted to walk around, it was HOT, and he wanted to sleep. Joe was trying his best to control his anger in front of the boys (and his tongue)while I was "trying" to be the one remaining calm, cool, and collected! HA! But our sweet Owen!!!! He was the BEST! He didn't seem to mind that we were stuck in the middle of a river with no clue where we were and his Dada was having to step into the alligator infested water to push us out of the mud. as stressful as the trip was, one of my life's favorite moments occurred during that boat ride. Owen initiated his first "in the moment" prayer. Sure he's initiated prayer at dinner and bed time, but here on the boat he knew exactly who we needed to call upon for help, Jesus! His prayer was so sweet and simple "Jesus please help us get home and not rained on amen." And Jesus did just that! We did get home-eventually. We found our way and the rain didn't start until the boat ramp was in sight. God even blessed us with a dolphin sighting right in front of our boat.
The following day Joe took the boat out with a friend (who just happens to be in the Coat Guard) and they were stranded again in the middle of Terra Ceia Bay. The next day we decided to bring it back to the dealership and sell it. We're still not sure what the "lesson of the story is" and quite honestly as the boat still sits for sale we're not even 100% sure we're doing the right thing by selling it. I suppose we should get Owen to pray about this as well!
