Yesterday this story was printed on the front page of our local newspaper. The picture grabbed my attention for obvious reasons- come on, how often does a house just explode!?! Then I found out that this house belongs to (one of my favorite people in the world) Rachel's sister. Jenny's husband, Joe, has been renovating this house for over 2 years (living with Rachel's parents), getting it ready for the two of them and their two little ones. Unfortunately, they will never get to live in it.

Amazingly, nobody was there when the explosion occured. They were planning to move in months ago, but thankfully that hadn't happened yet. The fire department said if anyone had been in the house at the time of the explosion, it is unlikely they would've survived the blast. All of those frustrating delays seem to have been God's way of protecting that family. It really stinks that this happened at all (please pray for this family as they have to deal with cleaning up pieces of their house all over the neighborhood) ... but they are safe, and that is amazing.

Debris lines the exterior Monday of a residence along the 4500 block of 194th Avenue S.W. in Roseland after an explosion early Monday morning. The house, which was in the stages of renovation, was unoccupied at the time of the explosion.