Years ago, I found myself in a tight spot. I was in the seventh year of a failing business. Making matters worse, it was a business I felt God had led me to begin. But I now found myself struggling to pay my bills. Which, full disclosure, is an understatement. Truth was, I was up to my eyeballs in debt, about to lose my home, and already beginning proceedings to file for bankruptcy. I was receiving calls daily from my creditors who, like prophets predicting my doom, said that unless I paid up, bad things were going to happen to me. If there was ever an indicator that my world was about to come to an end, it was right there, in plain sight.

And I regret to say, things did not get better. The final straw came just days before Christmas, when a sheriff posted a notice on our door ordering my family to vacate the premises in two weeks or we would be in violation of state law and be forcibly removed. The end had finally come. Within less than a month, my business would be no more. And all my dreams with it.

But something happened around that time. It began during a brief time of prayer when God’s peace filled the room where I was praying. And for the first time ever, I knew — inexplicably — that everything was going to be all right.

Then, a few weeks after I made the decision to close my business, I received a call from a consultant in the industry I barely knew who said he was looking for someone like me to expand his own business. From that day forward, I was kept busy (first as a contractor, then as an employee), making more money than I had ever projected for my own business. Not only this, but I was catapulted into a career where I became a specialist in my industry. This all took place, by the way, during the worst recession on record since the Great Depression.

You have to understand that up to the point of receiving that call, nothing had changed. I had no prospects. I was seriously thinking about getting a job at Home Depot. There is nothing wrong with working at Home Depot, but my point is: It was the farthest thing from my present skill set. It was almost like a switch had been flipped: Whereas I could not make a dime to save my soul up to that point, I now could not keep opportunity from me. I knew what had happened was nothing short of a miracle.

There are perhaps many lessons that can be drawn from my story, but the one I wish to focus on today is this: Though many of us right now may fear the world is about to end, there is no such thing. For at that point, God is still there. And it is often at that point He does His best work. Take heart, He has overcome the world.

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash