BUYING A HOUSE IN GERMANY BY GOD’S AMAZING GRACE - TESTIMONY OF MR. GEORGE ESLI (PART ONE)

At this moment in life GOD has blessed me, filled me with so much grace, shown me His wonders that I am Awestruck and fall on my knees as I humbly proclaim that He is an amazing God.

It was July, 2017. My son Levi had recently started crawling. He just turned 7 months. Jasmine my wife and I, praised GOD for blessing us and making our family from 2 people to 3. Although our apartment was centrally located and good enough, we felt that a little more space would give Levi more play area. Also, we were paying rent and our apartment wasn’t the most comfortable. One of our many desires was to buy our own property, but we never worked on the idea mainly because of financial circumstances; we hadn’t saved a big deal of money.  After speaking with many friends & colleagues we decided to start saving money for the next 2 to 3 years for a down payment and then buy an apartment. The plan looked nice but we didn’t realize it then that we weren’t putting our faith on GOD rather on our own work and money.

Every Sunday when we went to church, we would drive along a beautiful set of buildings and every-time we passed by them, Jasmine used to say how nice it would be if we could buy an apartment in this place. And without putting much thought I would laugh and always say, this is only for millionaires Honey and moved on. I mean sometimes we are so busy attending church that we forget to put into action what we hear at church. Even though every Christian knows that GOD created the whole universe with just His words, at times we forget it.

To be honest, when Jasmine was talking about buying our own house, I was really laughing it out. Well honestly for some reason it never occurred to me that we have an awesome GOD and for Him nothing is impossible. The first feeling which came to me was faithlessness, I mean I have always been a Christian, active at church, witnessed many miracles and GODs guidance. But still it seemed I lacked faith. I didn’t know why I didn’t have faith, but after this entire episode I have learnt to bring GOD and take GODs support for everything in my life. In a way, this was another faith building exercise in my life, not only for me but the entire family.

Sometime later Jasmine convinced me to give house hunting a try just for the sake of experience. I did try searching and it seemed that I was always late. Whenever we found a nice place it was always taken, reserved or sold off.  Jasmine in the meantime found a house just close to where we were already living and it was exactly in the same area which she liked. And somehow, she managed to get the first appointment to the house. We visited the house sometime in September and we instantly liked the house. To our surprise, we found out the seller was a colleague of mine. From the beginning, we always had faith that in all our decisions GOD will lead us. We never had confusion in any major decisions in our life, also in this case we always put the faith in GOD.

After seeing my colleague and feeling that we liked the apartment. We spoke with the house agent saying that we liked the house and what about the next steps. The first thing she said that it was free for us to reserve the apartment and if we did so she would cancel all the following appointments. We thought about it, said a quick prayer and said yes.  The next big thing she said was about the agent fee, she said that it will be paid by the seller.  We were again shocked, because this is a big amount. 6% of the total price of the apartment nearly 18500 EUR (13.5 Lakh). This never happens in Germany where the seller agrees to pay the agent fee. It is a big saving as it will obviously not be covered by the bank hence and should come from one’s saving.

We were praising GOD in our hearts for such grace and love. I explained to the agent our situation that financially we are not ready for this commitment. We don’t have any saving and probably will not be able to pay anything for the house.  She thought about it again and mentioned that there is somebody in the bank who might be able to help us. After thanking GOD for helping us in this stage we left from there. I received the appointment to the bank on the following Tuesday. The first thing we did when we came back home was pray. We thanked the Lord for giving us the very same location that Jasmine always desired to live. We never imagined we would come this far into the process of buying the house.

When it was time to arrange the finance for the house, we were stressed out, spending sleepless nights. But on one side GOD was slowly building our faith. Revealing that it was He who created the universe with just His words and that every situation was under control. GOD was strengthening and encouraging us to try Him. Many times we don’t give the opportunity to GOD to work a miracle in our lives and this was a perfect opportunity which GOD brought in our lives to touch our hearts and show His wonders.

And when it was time for me to go to the bank, it almost felt like I was entering an examination hall, there was just so much pressure I felt. But by GOD's grace, I could hear a slight whisper in my ears from GOD saying “I’m there for you” and so this kept me going. I could feel Him whisper to me again, “did I ever give up on you”

Every time we prayed before an appointment with the Bank manager we really felt that GOD is going to do a miracle. He performs wonders that cannot be fathomed, miracles that cannot be counted.More than that we really felt the love of GOD in our prayers. He loves us so much that He let His only son die for us so that we could have a relationship with Him. We really felt so much grace and we promised ourselves that we would always share these miracles and experiences to glorify our FATHER’s name.

I went to the bank and sat beside the bank manager. I was so stressed. When it was my turn to talk, I explained my situation that I did not have any money, even 1 EURO to spend on this house, all we have is GOD's grace and a desire to move into the house. He listened to me patiently and took about 10 minutes to check in the computer. In the end, he said “your loan is ready and you can sign it”. within 15 minutes GOD made a way to pay 100% for the housing loan. 6 % for the tax and 2% for the notary, summing up to 300,000 EURs (2.2 Crore Rupees). I signed immediately but couldn’t stop praising GOD. I’ve never heard anywhere in the world a bank will give the full housing loan but also additional money for the taxes and registration fees. Don Moen’s song “GOD will make a way when there seems to be no way” came to my mind.

If we think about it, we got a house, without paying the agent, without paying the seller, without paying the tax and without paying the registration fees from our hands but the bank paid it all. It was as if GOD just invited us into our own house for free. All the time we were so amazed and awestruck with GOD's miracles and His love. I always knew I was serving a miraculous GOD but never actually imagined that it will happen right in front of my eyes. I would like to encourage everybody to try GOD and feel GOD's amazing love, He really is an amazing father taking care of us. Even if we have good earthly fathers how much more care and love should we expect from our Heavenly Father who is pure and holy.

After signing the bank and house contract, we testified at church about GOD's amazing grace. All through the next steps GOD was with us, even though there were delays here and there, we gained a lot of faith along the way. GOD will always make a way for us and we just need to trust GOD till the end.

Although now after settling in our new place, we feel so much peace and grace. During the process, I can easily say there were times when we felt, it would have been better for us to just stick to how we used to live. It was so much hard work for us mentally and physically, to do all the arrangements on our own. This thought came to us so many times, but GOD always reminded that He had bigger plans for us and that He will always lift us up to overcome the hurdles in between. I can imagine this will always happen to every child of GOD, when a huge blessing is on its way.

Many times in the middle of the process there would suddenly come a barrier or a delay which was totally unexplainable out of no-where, e.g. the bank process gets delayed because the man responsible is on vacation. But GOD gave us the wisdom to pray in Jesus name and brake all the barriers. Praise GOD that the name of Jesus is above all names.

When we think about how GOD brought us to a foreign country, settled us here gave our own land and home. He lifted us up amidst the local people in a foreign country. We want to give all glory to our GOD alone for He is an amazing GOD.

Praise GOD.