Alternate Title: That Time I Went on Vacation and a Tree Fell on My House!!!
Last week Mandy and I were on a relaxing vacation in Playa del Carmen. On Wednesday morning we were in the pool, and when we came back to our cabana to dry off, I saw that I had several missed calls, and lots of texts. The first text I read was from a tenant. It said, “Please get over as soon as you can. A tree just fell on the house!”
We gathered up our stuff and headed to the room. For the next few hours I was on the phone with tenants, contractors and the insurance company. A limb off the very large tree next door had fallen onto the porch. And when I say “limb”, it’s better to picture a tree, because that’s what it looked like.
The next day the limb was removed, and the day after that the damage was assessed and a plan was made.
But that’s getting way ahead of myself isn’t it. Wednesday was a rough day. Here I was on this amazing vacation, and now I was majorly stressed out. How would I regulate my stress so that I could do what needed to be done plus be able to actually enjoy the last couple of days of my vacation?
Each day since last Wednesday has been better, but I thought I would share some of the things that were helpful to me.
First, this was not the first time as a landlord that I had an emergency. I’ve owned rental properties for over fifteen years, and over that time three things have happened. First, I’ve learned a lot. My knowledge and experience has grown. What this means is that I understood the basics of what needed to be done. Second, I have ample financial reserves. I expect emergencies, and therefore I knew that though I wouldn’t necessarily like writing the checks that were going to be required, it wasn’t going to kill me financially. And finally, I’ve developed good relationships with people who know more than I do. I was able to call on some of those relationships to get things moving while I was gone.
And actually, my being in town when this happened wouldn’t have helped much. Sure, I would have been able to go over there immediately, but it’s not like I was going to break out my battery powered Ryobi Chainsaw and start cutting up the limb!
These three things helped immensely, but the fear and stress continued to creep in throughout the day. I was grateful that no one was hurt. A couple of inches more to the left and it could have been a lot worse, since one of my tenants was in the front bedroom when it happened. Those thoughts really weighed on me.
As the adrenaline wore off after a few hours where I had done all that I could do, the stress began to descend like a cloud over me, and this is where the real work was needed.
I think self talk can be a gift at times, but what I’m about to share is a bit different than just self talk. I had to go back to what I believed about God.
I’m always nervous about losing a reader when I bring up God, but I hope that you see that my faith is fleshed out in the messiness of life. It’s not a bunch of platitudes or rules. It’s about a relationship, and if that relationship does not evidence itself during moments of weakness and challenge, I don’t think it’s much of a relationship.
I thought back to Psalm 62. It’s a Psalm written by David, and anyone who knows anything about David knows that he was a king, and kings know a bit about stress.
The Psalm begins, “My soul finds rest in God. He is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will never be shaken.” Who knows what he was dealing with at this moment, but he knew that it was actually possible for his soul to be at rest even as he went through a storm. That’s a pretty strong statement, and one that I was grateful to be reminded of.
It’s the ending of this Psalm that I thought about last Wednesday. David ends this Psalm by saying, “One thing God has spoken, two things have I heard: that you, O God are strong, and that you, O Lord are loving.”
This has been one of my favorite verses for a long time. What it says to me is that it’s one thing for God to be big enough to handle my problems and needs. It’s another thing altogether for Him to want to handle them.
Said another way, it’s one thing for God to be strong. When I think of God’s strength and power, I think about the creation and the sustaining of the world. I think about it in a macro way. It’s good to think about God in this way, but it’s not complete. God is the creator and sustainer of the entire world, but he’s also a father, and he loves his children. That takes the big macro view and hones it in to the very personal. God loves not only the whole world. He also loves me. He knows all about me. That’s huge.
As I reminded myself of these truths throughout the day, I began to experience peace. It’s in moments like these that I am so grateful for my relationship with God. I can look back over my life and see countless times when he took care of me. When I reflect back over that time, it makes it easier for me to place my trust in him today.