Podcast

Miraculous Stories to Strengthen Our Faith: Michelle Layer Rahal E115
Michelle: [00:00:00] he went to reach for the railing, and he stopped, and that was because Bob heard God say to him, “You don’t need that.” And he took off running. The whole church just burst into applause and rejoicing and then he- just sat in the loft and worshiped.
Michelle: The next day, he called his doctor. He told him, “I’ve been healed.” And his doctor said, “Well, why don’t you come in and we’ll really check that out?” He was on 17 pills a day. He stopped taking them cold turkey, and that was 30 years ago.
Welcome to the Unshakable Hope podcast, where real life intersects redeeming love. I’m Kelly Hall, and this is where we wrestle through faith questions such as, how do I trust God’s heart when His ways and delays are breaking mine? We’ll hear from people just like you and me who have experienced God’s faithfulness when life didn’t unfold as they expected.
My prayer is that God would renew our hope in His Word and His love through these [00:01:00] conversations.
Kelly: Well, hey, friends. I can’t wait to share this conversation with you. If you are longing for some fresh courage and strength in your faith journeys, I fully believe you’re gonna get a heart full today. So let me tell you a little bit about my guest.
Kelly: Michelle Rahal is the award-winning author of Straining Forward: One Woman’s Journey From Oppression to Redemption in the Wake of the Vietnam War. And although this is not the topic of our conversation, I just have to say, this is true story, wow, it’s worth the read. I love it.
Kelly: Her other book is Are You Listening? A Guide to Recognizing and Responding to God’s Voice, which is such an important thing for us to understand, how do we hear His voice? That is also not the topic of our conversation today, but I encourage you to check them out. Now I want to tell you about Michelle’s weekly newsletter.
Kelly: It’s called A Glimpse of Holy, and this actually [00:02:00] is gonna be the topic of our conversation. This newsletter that Michelle sends out helps readers nurture their spiritual eyes and ears so they can come to recognize God’s presence in the everyday moments of life.
Kelly: So it’s just filled with powerful, real-life stories. She interviews people, and she writes up their stories, and it’s a reminder that God is actively working in every area that concerns our hearts every single day. And I love that so much because that’s even part of my mission statement, Michelle.
Kelly: I am so glad you’re joining me today.
Michelle: It is an honor to be with you, Kelly, and I’m looking forward to having a fun conversation.
Kelly: Oh, me too. Well, why don’t we start out, Michelle, with you just telling us a little bit of your story, include your faith journey, just however much you want to share.
Michelle: Sure. I was brought up in a very Catholic family, not just my immediate family, but all my relatives. So that was the only, denomination I knew. That was [00:03:00] the only way I knew how to worship. And I- I had a very narrow view of who God was. And I was happy with that. , I didn’t know there was anything more than what I did every Sunday.
Michelle: What I did at mass on Sundays really did not affect my life. It was just something I checked off. And then in my mid-30s, I m- met a man who, my parents told me stay away from, but I didn’t listen. And I ended up marrying him. He was divorced, and he and I moved to Virginia from Upstate New York, which is where I’m from.
Michelle: And, I had always been used to going to church, so I told him I could just about do anything, but I couldn’t give up church. It really wasn’t giving up God, it was giving up church. And because he was divorced and we could not get married in the Catholic Church, he agreed to look for a different denomination, which [00:04:00] was a stretch for me, but we ended up in a Presbyterian Church.
Michelle: And we treated it, treated that church the way I had treated my Catholicism. I went every Sunday. I went home after the service. I never cracked open a Bible. It’s just, my relationship with God was a Sunday thing. Fast-forward seven years and my, husband at the time I found out that he had been unfaithful for several years, and we went through a divorce.
Michelle: And I am now living in Virginia with no family nearby. I had friends from work, but I really didn’t have any solid relationships. Except I had occasionally volunteered to sing and play the guitar with the contemporary worship band at my church, and so I knew some of those people. But I really wasn’t that involved.
Michelle: So [00:05:00] when I went through my divorce I believe that was how God opened the floodgates for me. It was a time of some soul-searching. And for some reason, I felt God calling me to enroll in a Bible study. I was 39 years old. And this was your first Bible study? This was my first Bible study. Yeah. I thought I was doing it all right just going to church.
Michelle: And so I enrolled in this Bible study, and, it was the first time where I experienced the Bible as story. One big story. And I said to the instructor several months in, I said, “I am- I am amazed that this is all connected with so many different authors and so many different time periods, and yet there is a thread that links all these books together.
Michelle: It’s just, why did I never see that before? And I’ll never forget what he said. He looked at me and he said, “Were you [00:06:00] looking?” Mm. Wow. And I thought, no. I had never looked until that moment. And the scripture that means so very much to me is Jeremiah 29:13, which is, “If you seek me, you will find me. If you seek me with all your heart.”
Michelle: And I hadn’t been seeking him. So it was almost as if the scales fell away from my eyes a little bit, and it flipped my spiritual life upside down. I could not get enough of the Bible. I enrolled in several more classes, both online and in person. I started doing some ancient readings the Book of Josephus and some ancient founding fathers.
Michelle: And, I took a class, a three-year course at my church, that was called Growing Your Soul. And I can testify that if you really nurture your spiritual eyes and ears, you can indeed grow your soul. [00:07:00] And so that is how my relationship with the Lord came about, was through this painful divorce. But God used it for good.
Michelle: Michelle, I want to mention too that the fact, because you are a writer. Yeah. And you are, I think in the past you were also … What did you- An educational writer. Yeah, and a radio, news reporter. Yes. So you already had this bent to analyzing written work in that kind of way.
Michelle: Uh-huh. I think it’s fascinating how God speaks to us in the way we can hear him. And when he opened up the Bible, like, he was stirring those bents that he put into you when he created you in your mother’s womb. That is just fascinating. So true. So true. Yeah. And, and I continue to hear from him most often through the written word.
Michelle: Yes.
Kelly: Ah, so good. We definitely see the glimpse of God’s holiness- in that portion of your story. I would love for you to share a time when you [00:08:00] specifically struggled to trust God for something.
Kelly: Now, that story of course contains that element. Yeah. But, but how- Yeah … God ministered to your broken heart through his love and faithfulness and rescued your soul?
Michelle: Oh gosh. Okay. I’ll take you back to 2014. Now let me set this up a little bit to begin with, though. I had remarried, so I was now married to Greg, a man I met at my church, who’s just incredibly wonderful, loves the Lord.
Michelle: A year earlier, my mother had a stroke that was debilitating. I had accidentally fallen down the stairs and injured my ankle, which would not heal. I had been on a scooter for almost three months. Wow. And then one of my very close friends died from breast cancer, and it– I just felt like the world was caving in.
Michelle: A- I was grieving my mother’s illness. I [00:09:00] was hurting myself by not being able to get around and… I would put any pressure on my foot and my ankle would just sear with pain. And now my friend had passed away, and I was just, “God, what are you gonna do next? You know, I- I’m not gonna be able to take any more.”
Michelle: And then I had a stroke, and I thought, ” Okay.” I was in my early 50s, and I thought I was not functioning well now. And it wasn’t a severe stroke, but sounds bothered me. Crowds bothered me. I wasn’t able to go to church for several months because it was too consuming. I couldn’t watch TV. I just wanted to hibernate and to cry.
Michelle: I was crying all the time because it had affected an emotional part of my brain. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So I had a difficult time, just a few months prior to that, I had taken on the project to write my first book, Straining Forward. So I was [00:10:00] in the process of interviewing this Vietnamese woman for her, for her biography, and, uh, uh, I couldn’t even speak to her coherently sometimes.
Michelle: I just… my– I wasn’t able to focus. So I felt like the rug had been totally pulled out from under me, and I did not know how to get footing again. So in that quiet space, two things happened. First, M- Min, the Vietnamese woman that I was interviewing, her background was actually in nursing. So she came compassionately alongside me and said, “We’ll wait.
Michelle: We’ll just talk.” And I didn’t know her well, and so through this time when I was vulnerable, we got to know each other. So when I was able to start writing the book about a year later, she was more open with me. So that was a gift. I saw that as a gift. Also, my mother had another stroke, and because I had gone through a stroke, I could identify more and be her advocate [00:11:00] in ways I could not have before.
Michelle: And thirdly, it brought me to my knees. I remember praying one day and opening to Thessalonians that said, “Pray continually. Give thanks in all circumstances.” And I broke out into tears, and I fell on my knees and I said, “God, I’m having a really hard time thanking you.” And I felt Him say to me, “Don’t thank me for the circumstances.
Michelle: Thank me in your circumstances.” Oh, I love that so much. I thought, “Okay, I can do that. Thank you. I don’t thank you for my stroke, but I thank you for what you’re gonna teach me through it. I thank you for the friends that have come around me and are caring for me. I thank you for the wisdom I’m getting in the silence.”
Michelle: And I found all these things to be grateful for. And it did take about a year for me to feel, I wanna say, normal again. I didn’t wanna drive, I didn’t wanna do things. But in about a year, it, it started to [00:12:00] feel okay again, and I started writing and, . i had a little bit of, a deja vu instance, and my doctor, just to be sure, said, “Let’s send you for another MRI.”
Michelle: So I went back for an MRI, and I saw a new neurologist, and she said to me, “Why are you here?” And I said, “Well, because I had a stroke, and then I had this little incident and my doctor suggested I get another MRI.” And she said, ” You didn’t have a stroke. Who told you you had a stroke?” And I said, “Well, I did.
Michelle: Last October I had a stroke.” And she said, “I’m looking at your brain scan. There’s no evidence in your brain you ever had a stroke.” And I said, “Okay. Here’s the old MRI.” You know? And she plugged it in and she goes, ” Huh. Okay. Well, I guess you did, but I would never know that from looking at your brain now.” Wow.
Kelly: So your brain had been fully healed. It had fully repaired. There was nothing showing up. That is miraculous.
Michelle: So God has kinda laid it on my heart since then to, to share [00:13:00] stories of other people, whether they’re miracle stories of healing or however God shows up in their life, to- Just stories to help others be more aware of His presence.
Michelle: Because He’s everywhere. He’s everywhere
Kelly: Yes. And He’s always working in every area that concerns our hearts, even when we can’t see it. And so these stories are huge reminders. They’re huge encouragers that God is still at work, God is still with me, even though I can’t see Him, even though I can’t feel Him.
Kelly: And so these have been the kind of stories that have really helped encourage my heart. But just the stories in themselves would not do the trick were it not for the fact that God’s Word tells us that He is sovereign, He is powerful, He’s unchanging, He’s eternal, He’s He’s all-knowing, always with us.
Kelly: He’s already gone before us. So because the character of God is, laid out so clearly in the Bible, that gives me hope in these stories, the [00:14:00] same God that’s working in that person’s story is right now working in my story, right?
Michelle: Amen. Yes. I just want to, if I may- talk a little bit about my second book, because that’s where that came from, was that all these stories in the Bible are of how God speaks and communicates with others.
Michelle: And I never planned to write a second book, but He placed it on my heart that He wants people to know that He is ever-present, and He’s always speaking. We just have to find out, how is He speaking to me?
Kelly: Oh, that’s so good. I’m just so glad you brought that up. Well, all right. Let’s move into the, A Glimpse of Holy newsletter.
Kelly: I asked you if you would pull out two of your favorite stories from that newsletter so our listeners could get, , a picture of that. And then I will leave a link in the show notes so that they can sign up for your newsletter as well.
Michelle: Thanks. And, a- and if anyone does too, I love to hear from people who have their own God stories, ’cause I will incorporate them [00:15:00] into future newsletters.
Michelle: So I’m always collecting these stories.
Kelly: Oh, yeah, you interviewed me for one of those stories.
Michelle: I did. So you asked me to pick a couple of my favorites, and I just wanna tell you, this was so hard. Oh, I bet. So I actually tried to pick a couple that I thought people might resonate with.
Michelle: So hopefully that’s, that’ll work. One I pulled was from a woman named Barbara who is from North Carolina. And this story I think just really testifies to the power of prayer. And in it she was telling me that she was having , some symptoms that did not really reveal what was going on.
Michelle: But we also know now in hindsight that how women, show for heart attacks is not the same way men do. So she was having these symptoms n- not knowing what it was, but she kind of brushed them off as indigestion or just feeling bad about something. And the 4th of July rolled around, she, took her 89-year-old mother to the lake house to [00:16:00] watch the fireworks.
Michelle: And the lake house was about 30 miles away, far from where any hospitals were or her home or anything. And she said all of a sudden while they were there, she started feeling like her chest was being squeezed, and she was having a hard time breathing. And she said to her mom, “Mom, we gotta go now.” And she said they hopped in the car, and she just felt like she had to drive.
Michelle: Her, her mother couldn’t drive at 89, so she was driving. And she just started praying. She said she just wanted to get close to civility where she knew she would have the greatest chance of staying alive. And so she started praying as they were driving. Then she said her mother started praying, and then she called her sister, and her sister got on the phone, and she started praying over the loudspeaker.
Michelle: So as she’s driving, she is just praying for safety to get home. [00:17:00] And at one point she felt the need to call 911. So they hung up the phone, and I said … I asked her, “Barbara, what were you feeling?” She said, ” I continued to feel this pressure on my chest.” And she said the only time she didn’t feel the pressure was when they were praying.
Michelle: So she called 911, and the dispatcher said to her, “Pull over immediately. We’ll send a car to where you are.” And she said, “No, I’m only 15 minutes from my house now. Here’s my address. Please tell the ambulance to meet me there.” And so they kept driving, and she … And this is where it gets even stranger. She said the minute she hung up the phone she felt a third presence.
Michelle: She felt like someone was sitting between her and her mom, and she no longer felt like she was driving the car. She said the wheel had a life of its own. Wow. And she came up to this intersection. She had to make a right, and a car [00:18:00] was coming from the left going straight at a hyper speed. But Barbara was also driving hyper speed, and she was turning the corner.
Michelle: And she said- I knew I was gonna get hit. There was just no way. And she said, “I felt the wheel turn smoothly.” We made the left-hand turn, and she said, “I don’t even know what happened to the car. I never saw it pass me. I never saw it stop. It just, we just kept going.” And she said, “I don’t think I even had my hands on the wheel.”
Michelle: And she said, “As I pulled into my driveway, the ambulance came in right behind me.” She says, “I opened my door, I got down, I fell to my knees, and I just thanked God in gratitude for getting me safely.” And they, of course, administered to her and took her to the hospital. She had a 99% blockage in her left artery.
Kelly: Oh my goodness. 99%, and she’s totally fine today. Wow. That is a powerful God story. [00:19:00] Oh my goodness. I know.
Michelle: So there is the power of prayer, right? Right. And the power of God to show up in our moments, that He defies our imagination. The things He can do and will do behind the scenes in our hard stories, we can’t even dream up.
Kelly: That’s why I love Ephesians 3:20 so much. That describes God as He is working exceedingly, abundantly, beyond all we could ask or imagine. Yes. And He is a God of healing. He wants to heal us. He wants to partner with us. He wants to care for us. We just have to step out of our own way and let Him do it.
Kelly: Oh, wow. That is a beautiful story.
Michelle: Yes, of course. I could keep going all day with these, okay. I’m gonna give you number two, which is, this is a coincidence story. This is of a story about a retired pastor.
Michelle: His name is David Wright. And since 1985, [00:20:00] he has been taking groups to, uh, Mexico to work in the Yucatan Peninsula with the Mayans, helping to build churches and community centers. And he usually takes students, a lot of students, and my husband used to go, go with him on these trips. Well, in 2006, he started working on his doctoral degree, and he’d been going to Mexico every year for about 20 years at that point.
Michelle: And the director of Accion Ministries, which is the ministry he works with down there, asked if he would consider teaching a Christian ethics course. And David’s Spanish was very limited, but the students who would be coming to this course- were not really Spanish speakers either. They were Mayan. So, so he said, “Sure, I’ll do it.”
Michelle: So he took three weeks off of school and flew to Mexico, and he did this three-week ethics course using a [00:21:00] translator, to help these Mayan a- students learn about the Lord and ethics. Mm-hmm. And he said his most challenging, part was, grading the papers, because they were written in Spanish, but his Spanish wasn’t very good.
Michelle: But- … all that to say, it was just a three-week course y- and then he went back to pastoring at his church and finishing his degree, and he retired in 2022. But last summer, he went to Mexico again, ’cause he still goes to Mexico e- every year even though he’s retired. He takes the group down there. So he took this group to Mexico last year, and they were working way out in, i- in the rural area pouring concrete.
Michelle: And the way the days go with this ministry, ’cause I’ve gone a couple of times with him, is we get down there, we get to know some of the community through, through a meal, and then during the day, we’re making concrete, pouring concrete, [00:22:00] passing bricks for building. And then in the afternoons, there’s a vacation Bible school and a glasses ministry where we ha- give glasses out to people, and we test their eyes.
Michelle: And then in the evening, we eat a meal. So this had gone on all week for David, and then at the end of the week, the community comes together to celebrate whatever’s been built. And at the end, everybody gathers in a big circle and pray and sings, and it’s just a time of, of joy. And this was the first chance David had to actually speak to the pastor of that church.
Michelle: And so Pastor Edwin and David are speaking in broken Spanish, and he’s asking, Pastor Edwin was asking Pastor David just how long had he been coming to the Yucatán and what his background was. And David told him, ” I’ve been coming here since the ’80s, and, and I even taught this Christian ethics class at San Pablo Seminary.”[00:23:00]
Michelle: And he said Pastor Edwin’s face just went flush. He went, ” I was in that class. It was only taught once.” ” you were my teacher.” But Pastor David said, it was like God let me come full circle in that He allowed me to go to Mexico all those years to build, to physically build these bridges, but He also let me see that I was physically building up the next generation to carry on my ministry to His people in the Yucatán.”
Kelly: Wow. That is so beautiful. So often we forget we can’t see. We can’t see the impact- Mm-hmm … that our faith choices have on the people around us, and we’ll never know. I love that God orchestrated that moment, and I just have to say there are no coincidences in God’s kingdom. So for sure, God orchestrated that just like you said.
Kelly: Yeah. I love how he encouraged that [00:24:00] pastor’s heart in allowing him to see that. Wow.
Michelle: And we, as you said, it- it’s so rare, I think, that we get to see how God is working. I mean- Yeah … we’re told to just plant the seeds. It doesn’t mean we’ll ever see the plant, right? But we, we keep planting. If I can add it here, I’ll add one of my own- Yeah, please
Michelle: little short stories. Another 360 event for me was I had a brother who died of cancer when I was a child. I was eight years old when he passed away. He was six. And he died of a rare form of cancer called Wilms’ tumor. Many years later, when I became a radio news reporter I was working in Buffalo, New York, and a press release came across my desk that a breakthrough had been made in Wilms’ tumor.
Michelle: And I told my director, I said, “I would like to interview that doctor.” And so I went home that night, and I asked my mom, ” Tell me what I need to know. What should I ask him?” So I got [00:25:00] all these great questions, and then I went back the next day. And, you know, it was in the olden days when we were on phones that have cords.
Michelle: And I’m recording on my portable, tape recorder, and I’m asking him all these questions. At the end of the interview, he says to me you asked really good questions. Do you have a medical background?” And I said, “Oh, no, I had a brother who passed away from Wilms’ tumor many years ago.”
Michelle: And he said, “Was his name Jeff?” And I said, ” Yeah. How do you know that?” And he said, “Well, I recognized your last name.” My maiden name was Layer, which is also the middle name I use on my books. So , he said, “When you introduced yourself, I recognized the name, and I knew it as one of them in my case study.”
Michelle: He said, “There’s so few kids who’ve ever passed away from this. It’s so rare.” And he said, “But,” he says, “I don’t know if you know this, but your mother signed a lot of paperwork to have tests run on your brother, and if she had not done that, we could not have made this breakthrough [00:26:00] today.” He said, “So I don’t know if your mom is still alive, but if you, if she is, would you please tell her thank you?
Michelle: Because a lot more lives will be changed, saved because of what she did.”
Kelly: Wow. Gosh, that just chokes me up. Yeah. That is amazing
Michelle: Yeah,
Kelly: mom and I had a good cry that night. Yeah, I imagine. You know, and of course she would prefer to have her son back, but- Right … but knowing that good came out of it. And that’s our God.
Kelly: Yeah. Our God uses those tough, horrible, hurtful situations for good. He can turn anything into good. Yeah. Wow. Yes, I love stories that remind me that Romans 8:28 really is true. It’s not just a sign on the wall. It’s not just a pretty card people put up on, or send you in the mail when you’re hurting. He really truly draws near in our hard situations, and supernaturally [00:27:00] transforms what is bad, what is an awful situation, into something that- Mm
Kelly: you, you can see His glory and His goodness in it, and more than we can even imagine. Yeah. I, wow, that is an amazing story. I- Thank you … I’m so grateful you shared that. Thank you.
Michelle: And you know what, Kelly? Everybody has a God story. Yes. Everyone oftentimes people don’t realize that it’s a God story, ’cause they look at it and it goes, “Well, that was a strange dream,” or, “What a coincidence that was,” or “Well, I didn’t see that coming.”
Michelle: But they don’t give the credit to God. And all those times when something turns around and good comes out of it, it’s all the credit needs to go to God. It’s all for His glory and we need to recognize that.
Kelly: Oh, absolutely. I’ll tell a really quick little story- Yeah … kind of along these lines. I was teaching Bible study in Pueblo, Colorado before I moved here, and one [00:28:00] of the sweet ladies in my study just was talking about a miracle of God that had happened to her when she was driving.
Kelly: That’s why you reminded me of it when you told the story of the woman with the heart attack. She was driving around mountain roads in Colorado, and, the roads were very narrow. There was a cliff on the opposite side, and she … And it was snowing. And she hit an icy patch, and the car just was flying off the road towards the cliff.
Kelly: And then it was as if it was picked up and placed back on the road exactly where it needed to be. And her daughter, who was sleeping beside her, who was a teenager, woke up and said, “What was that? Who was in this car?” I mean, she felt the presence of God. Uh-huh. She felt his power. And it’s a story that cannot be discounted or explained except- You can’t make that up
Kelly: no.
Kelly: You cannot make it up. And I love how simply she told the story. I mean, where [00:29:00] I’m just driving along and this happened, and, and my daughter … I love how God woke up her daughter with his presence so that she could have a witness to the fact that this really was him, that he had really rescued her. She hadn’t imagined it.
Kelly: He’s so good. Uh,
Michelle: and I love that you brought up the witness, because there’s a lot of stories that I have even in my own life where, where you think no one’s gonna believe this, but somebody else was there to verify. Yes. Yeah. Even on our behalf, you’re convincing me, yep, that really did happen. Thank you, God.
Kelly: Thank you, God. Okay. Wow. I love all these stories. I ask you- Oh, I could keep going. I know. We should just keep going. Oh my goodness. So A Glimpse of Holy, these newsletters are just packed full of miraculous stories that are so encouraging. And Michelle, you’re such a good writer.
Kelly: I, I love the story you opened us up with, your own [00:30:00] story, and how God opened your mind to the truth that, hey, the Bible is not just a bunch of disjointed made up stories. It’s one great big story. And he just, , moved in such powerful ways. And then we’ve been able to talk through three of these other stories. If you have another one, we’ll just go there
Michelle: well you had asked me to share Pamela’s, so, Pamela Henkelman, if you’ve ever heard the name. She also has a podcast, the Midlife Mama podcast.
Michelle: But about 30 years ago her- or so, her husband was diagnosed with MS. She had just had their second baby, and he was diagnosed with MS that was both chronic and progressive. And over a period of several years, he started having muscle tremors, short-term memory loss, he had to use a scooter, and eventually he was on full disability.
Michelle: And now, here she is a mama with a couple of kids, and they’re young, and she’s having to care for him [00:31:00] as well. And she said it was a, an incredible struggle. She did not know how she could continue at this pace. But she and her husband were both incredibly faithful b- people, and believed in the power of prayer.
Michelle: Never missed a, never missed Sunday church. Very devout, in their s- in scripture every day. And she said Bob prayed one day, “Lord, I know you’re gonna heal me. I don’t know if it’ll be here or in heaven, but I know you’re gonna heal me.” And she said that just gave her such a peace to know that maybe she was looking for the healing all wrong.
Michelle: Maybe he wasn’t gonna be healed this side of heaven, but she just needed to put her trust in the Lord that it was all gonna work out for good. And a weekend came where she, , attended a women’s retreat. And I’m just gonna put a plug out there. A- if any of your listeners have never been on a women’s retreat, they must go.
Michelle: Because the Holy Spirit moves when [00:32:00] women gather. The Holy Spirit moves when men gather too, but oh my gosh, when you’re focused with a bunch of women on the Lord and His goodness, He shows up in miraculous ways. Anyway, she went on this- Yeah, amen. I’m glad you added that.
Michelle: So she went on this women’s retreat, and the passage that lodged itself into her brain was Joel 2:25. “I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten.” And she came home and she told her husband, she said, “You know, I just feel like God is speaking to us through that passage.” Well, that coming Sunday, their pastor announced that there was gonna be a healing service at the church on, I think she said, a Wednesday night.
Michelle: And they’d been to mel- multiple healing services before. Many people had laid hands on, on Bob and prayed over him, and, and you know, he always felt better, but i- it wasn’t taking the MS away. But they decided they were gonna go to this healing service, so they packed up the kids, they went to [00:33:00] church, they moved into their row.
Michelle: He left the scooter against the wall. He sat in the pew, and she said they just started worshiping. You know, there was music, there was prayer, and somewhere in the middle of one of the worship songs, Bob, her husband, heard God say clearly, ” You are healed.” And he calmly opened his Bible, and he wrote in the front cover, “Healed of MS,” and he put the date, 11-10-1996.
Michelle: And he closed his Bible, and he kept worshiping. And Pamela said she had no idea because they were in the middle of a service. Well, toward the end of this healing service, the pastor asked for anyone who wanted prayer to come forward, and Bob didn’t move because he said he knew in his brain he’d been healed.
Michelle: Why did he have to go forward for prayer? He was fine. And he heard God say again, ” Go forward.” And [00:34:00] he, I guess in his head, he had a little conversation. Why? And he just heard again, “Go forward for prayer.” So Bob stood up, and Pamela said she watched him. She watched him stand up. She watched people come around him to lay hands and pray on him, and she said, “I watched him walk to the altar.”
Michelle: He didn’t get on his scooter. And she said, “I’m watching him walk, and I’m thinking, ‘What is going on?'” And as he got to the altar, he felt the urge to go up the stairs. Apparently, on both sides of this altar, there were stairs leading to a balcony, and it was a visible balcony. And she said he started walking toward the stairs, and she said, “I’m looking at him, going, ‘What is going on?'”
Michelle: And she said he went to reach for the railing, and he stopped, and that was because Bob heard God say to him, “You don’t need that.” And he took off running. It was 29 stairs up. He ran [00:35:00] up the stairs. He ran down the stairs. She said the whole church just burst into applause and screams and rejoicing and praising, and then he- Went back up the stairs a third time and just sat in the loft and prayed and worshiped.
Michelle: And he was totally, miraculously healed of MS after having it for several years. The next day, he called his doctor. He told him, “I’ve been healed.” And his doctor said, “Well, why don’t you come in and we’ll really check that out?” You know? He was on 17 pills a day. He stopped taking them cold turkey, and that was 30 years ago.
Michelle: Their kids are grown and gone. You know, they’re empty-nesters, hence the name of her podcast. And yeah, and he’s fine. Never had another symptom of MS. Never. No. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, so if anyone says miracles don’t happen today anymore, s- it’s so wrong. They’re [00:36:00] everywhere. They’re everywhere. Yes. Yeah. Amen.
Michelle: We just have to believe. We just have to believe.
Kelly: And sometimes we believe and the miracles don’t happen. So what I love about your story so much is the way he looked to the Lord and said, “God is gonna heal me either- Mm-hmm … this side of heaven or on the other side.” Right. I don’t know. But then God spoke again and made it clear that he had done that.
Kelly: So he was responding in faith to the word of God that he received. And even then, he made space for kind of a different story when God said, “Well, walk forward.” And he’s like, “Well, I don’t know. That doesn’t make sense.” And so he works it out with the Lord. And then, and then he … It was just so amazing.
Kelly: I love that so much. And what I would say in addition to what you shared, is that we can go to the Lord and say, “I am weary of this issue. I know you’re a God who heals. I know you will heal on the other side of heaven. But would you [00:37:00] also heal me this side of heaven?
Kelly: And would you talk to me about that? What do you want me to know about that?” Yeah. “Speak to my weary heart. Speak to the longings where I want healing.” Yeah. “And help me find hope in this place.” And God will speak to that. You’re coming to him with a humble, listening heart- Yeah … ready to hear whatever he has to say in faith.
Michelle: And I love how you said we need to make space for that. ‘Cause I think all too often we think of prayer as laying out our petitions, what is it we want. Yes. You know? We go to God as if he’s a vending machine. And we need to go to him with a heart that’s open to his will, because his will is good.
Michelle: But it might not look like our will, you know? And so we need- Right … to be open to whatever he’ll give us and be grateful for it because he will use it for glory. Yes.
Kelly: Well, I think I wanna just close this close out this podcast with this thought. God is a [00:38:00] miracle-working God. Mm-hmm. He is able to do exceeding abundantly beyond all we can ask or think.
Kelly: He does impossible things every single day in every moment around the globe. He is doing impossible things, and if he would peel back the veil between heaven and us right now, we would be stunned. We would fall to our knees in adoration and worship of our great big God who is with us in all his power, in all his love, at all times.
Kelly: He never leaves us. We’re not left. He will never leave us, never forsake us. He’s never distracted by somebody else’s story. He is giving us his full attention at all times. So Michelle, I just wanna thank you so much for this encouragement. So many of us are walking in unresolved stories where we’re just continuing to pray to see God’s breakthrough, and we haven’t yet.
Kelly: Mm-hmm. But when we focus on the power of God that’s being unleashed all around us, it [00:39:00] gives us hope that we will see his possible in our impossible situations. So thank you so much.
Michelle: Thank you. It has been an honor to be here. And if, I’m just gonna add, God’s timing is not our timing. Yes. Yeah. It, sometimes it’s a yes, sometimes it’s a no, and sometimes it’s a wait.
Michelle: Right. Oh, but he meets us in all those places, doesn’t he? He does. Yes, he does. . Well, Michelle, as we close, I would love for you to let our listeners know how they can gain more encouragement from your website. Sure. So my website is my name with my middle name, so it’s Michelle with two Ls.
Michelle: Layer is my middle name, L-A-Y-E-R, Rahal, R-A-H-A-L. And at the bottom of the first page, there’s a, there’s a little sign-up tab there to sign up for A Glimpse of Holy. Uh, it’s delivered every Wednesday in your email box, and you can always check it out, and if you don’t like it, unsubscribe. I never share emails with anyone, so if you give me your email, [00:40:00] you’re only gonna hear from me.
Michelle: And I also am very active on, Instagram, where my handle is the same as my website, so it’s michellelayerrahal. .
Kelly: Wonderful. And again, just check out her books because they’re worth some time. Thank you, Michelle. Thank you so much.
Michelle: Thank you, Kelly. It has been wonderful to be with you.
If you were encouraged in your faith today, i’d love to hear from you. You can reach out through my website, kellyhall.org, and pick up some free resources while you’re there. Thanks for listening to the Unshakable Hope podcast.