A closer look at the imagined figure resting a hand on the hood, as Laura described it.
I asked my hair stylist if she’d ever experienced a miracle or seen an angel (a question that I sometimes ask anyone with spiritual sensitivity). Laura said that as a matter of fact, something very unusual DID happen to her in 2006.
“I was on my way to an evening church service in Kingman, Arizona. I decided to stop for a bite to eat at Taco Bell. After passing through the drive-through, I prepared to pull out into traffic. I looked both ways and – with the car in gear and with my foot pushing on the accelerator – the car wouldn’t move forward. I pushed some more. Still nothing. Instead, the front of the car was pushed down, as if an invisible force was countering my attempt to pull into the street. I saw the hood of the car pushed down almost a whole foot.
“It was like something big and powerful was sitting on my hood.”
Suddenly, a car sped in front of Laura, and it was at that moment she realized that she had been spared an accident. After weeping about the goodness of God who protected her in such a way, Laura went to church with a thankful attitude and a powerful testimony. Next year she had a beautiful baby boy who remains her pride and joy and who loves God as much as she does. Laura told me that I could share her story.
Here’s what a Facebook friend wrote on my “wall” (with a few words rearranged):
“Several years ago I was suicidal. I decided to walk to the train tracks and stand in front of a train. I lived near the tracks and knew that at least one train ran every hour. It was raining but I walked to the tracks with certainty. I waited…and waited. Finally the lights started flashing, the bells dinging and the arms went down at the intersection. I walked forward and stood on the tracks. I was frightened, but determined. An avowed atheist I thought to myself, ‘God, if You exist, I need You.’”
“The bells started dinging again as the arms on the tracks went up and no train appeared. I waited a bit longer and…Nothing… I stood there for over three hours waiting for a train. I finally took my soggy self home. But guess what? I met my future husband that very evening.
The next day I heard the trains pass by the hour, as they always do. God is good.”
Such accounts of miracles, answers to prayer, and help from angels (visible and invisible) are commonplace in the bible, throughout history, and even in our own time. In future blogs, I’ll tell of more, many of which I’ve heard in the counseling office.
I believe that if you keep vigilant watch, you’ll see God’s hand on the circumstances of your life on a daily basis. God may seem to be moving in “coincidences,” which I call “God-incidences,” or He may surprise us with obvious miracles, but He is there and He never leaves us.
Isaiah 49:15 says, “I will not forget you.”
Psalm 34:7 says, “The angel of the Lord stands guard around those who have respect for him. And he saves them” (New International Reader’s Version).