Podcast

An Unexplained Stroke, Miraculous Healing, and a dog named Lucy. Crystal Mayo

[00:00:00] 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 conversations.

Kelly: Hey, friends, my guest today is Crystal Mayo. She is a new friend. I met last summer at a writer speaker conference. I felt an instant connection to this young woman and maybe part of it was because she grew up in Louisiana, just across the state line from where I grew up in Texas. So I love your accent. At the age of 38. Crystal experienced a massive stroke. Her story has been [00:01:00] featured in various books, magazines, as well as radio and podcast shows. We’re going to be talking about her journey , and how she held on to hope and God through it all.

Her first book is called Lucy’s Home. The subtitle is A True Story About a Boy Who Wanted a Dog. This is a touching children’s story. It’s beautifully illustrated, rooted in her family’s real life

experience and is all about the power of prayer. We will be talking about a portion of that story today. I’d love for you to check it out. Maybe you’ll discover it’s the perfect Christmas gift for a young one in your family. I’ve already purchased mine,

Crystal, I’m so thankful you were able to join me today. Welcome to the podcast.

Crystal: Well, thank you, Kelly. I’m so happy to be here with you today.

Kelly: Why don’t you start us off by telling us a little bit about your family?

Crystal: Okay, well, my roots run deep in Southwest Louisiana, and they were teased, permed, and bleached from an early age because I [00:02:00] grew up in a beauty shop that was just like Steel Magnolias. Steel Magnolias is the family, it was from Louisiana, filmed in Louisiana, and I felt like I grew up right in those beauty shop scenes.

And my mom is an amazing woman of faith, and it was not a gossip. You know, beauty shop, she was careful to gear the conversations back to a honoring place and she would always pray with her clients. We just saw many miracles come through there. We would see, I would, so it was like a ripple effect.

There was a Creek that ran out behind the beauty shop and I would sometimes go out there and skip with any of the kids that came in the beauty shop. We’d go skip rocks out there and you just see those ripples form in the Creek. Well, the same thing happened in the beauty shop. And so just the power of one prayer and how it could change everything.

That’s how I grew up. I met my husband and that was an amazing story too. I was away at a different. College and then he, [00:03:00] my mom called and said, I think you should come home for the summer. And I gave up everything internship, all the things I was in and I honored her and came home that summer.

And I had a horrible job, a horrible. I didn’t get paid hardly any money and I thought, why did I do all of this? And and the Lord opened the doors for me to attend a local university. And I liked the education better there, but I ended up there full paid scholarship, just from that lousy job that I thought, why am I wasting my time here?

It wasn’t a waste. And then I met my husband not too long after that. And the rest is history, as they say. Love it. And we’ve been married 24 years, and we have 3 kids, and our oldest is in that same university. He’s in a sophomore in college, and then we have a senior in high school, and a sophomore. So, 2 boys and a girl.

Kelly: Oh, that is awesome. Thank you. You need to write a book about those times in the beauty shop with your [00:04:00] mom.

Crystal: Yes. I want to call those the yellow chair diaries. So if those yellow chairs that I sat in, if they could talk, what would they tell?

And that’s what I hope to produce next

Kelly: okay, really cool. Well, Crystal, I really want to talk about what happened when you had a massive stroke. You were only 38 years old and you had a massive stroke. Can you just take us to that day? It was in August of 2016. And tell us what happened.

Crystal: Our anniversary is August the 12th, and that week, well, let me back up a little bit. I had been feeling called to homeschool my kids, so, I prepared and I prepared and I prepared like a mad woman. I gathered so much curriculum that there is no way a school district would have even been able to teach what all I collected.

And so I worked so hard at all of this. And we were going to, you know, we finished out the school year where [00:05:00] they were in public school, and then we were going to start that next week with homeschool. So I had co ops to attend and I was going to be a tutor. And so there was all these plans and yet they all crumbled.

They did not work out. So it started on Sunday. I had a headache. And just not feeling myself, I was a little dizzy and the dizziness just grew and grew and grew. And by Wednesday, I went to see my doctor and I remember even having to brace myself when I walked and, but I could still walk. I had, I was able to communicate and, it just just things weren’t right, but they looked in my ears and said, I had vertigo. They said my crystals were out of alignment and that I had vertigo. It wasn’t vertigo. So, they were gonna refer me to a specialist. And I just was so tired. They gave me some medicine and all it made me do was [00:06:00] sleep.

Well, my kids were very young then and busy mom. You don’t get the luxury of just sleeping all day. So, my husband had taken quite a bit off that week. My father in law came and, you know, he’d come and sit with me and or take me to the doctor just whatever I needed. And, so we had some friends come in that weekend on Saturday and I was just not myself.

I was, just things were off. And after they left I just told my husband, I need to go lay down. I can’t, you know, think straight almost. And before I did, I got on my knees before I crawled into the bed and I just said, Lord, if there’s something more here, will you tell me? And I took a nap. And when I woke up, My legs didn’t work.

I tumbled out on the floor and it was clear. There was a problem.

I called for my husband and he he came and got me. We, I just said something’s wrong. My, my legs aren’t working. So [00:07:00] he helped put me in the chair. We decided to take our kids to his parents house, and then we went to the E. R. in our hometown and, I was in there for most of the night as they ran tests. They did a CT scan. They did some blood work, some different things, and it all came back fine. They couldn’t see anything and I, I got a lengthy lecture on that. It was anxiety that I was exhibiting. Symptoms of anxiety, you know, sarcastically.

I’m like, well, when your legs don’t work, you kind of do have some anxiety there and

Kelly: that’s going to trigger some stress. Right? That is so weird.

Crystal: Yeah. Yeah. So, we knew that wasn’t right and we were exhausted and then we came home and took a little nap and then we left and decided to go to Houston and God confirmed that by different people calling me and my child, I was in, I think, the [00:08:00] pediatrician’s office that week and he happened to call me that Sunday morning and say hey, I was just thinking about you. Are you okay? I know you were kind of feeling weird this week. And I said, I keep my legs aren’t working now. And he said, yeah, you should go to Houston.

So we went to Houston. We went to Houston Methodist and then there was another friend who called and said, hey, I just want to check on you. How you doing? And I said, my legs aren’t working now. And and she ran into a classroom to pray for me. She was at church that Sunday morning. And her doctor who happens to teach Sunday school was there and he had just dismissed his class.

And so he got on the phone with me and prayed. And he also said, yeah, you should go to Houston Methodist. So we, we went and it was so stormy. And I remember my mom met us at the, in a near town, and we filled up with gas, our vehicle got. It was filled up with water, something water got into the gas tank and our vehicle wouldn’t crank.

And [00:09:00] so my mom was there and we crawl into her vehicle. But my husband had to, it was like a dance. We’ve never had before and it was storming. It was pouring down rain and he had to maneuver the umbrella over us and hold me. And then we kind of maneuvered our way into the car and I mean, he. Doug has been, he was the rock through it all, you know, and he would just pick me up and carry me, but he did that.

Kelly: That is so frightening.

Crystal: Yeah, so we made it to Houston Methodist and they almost sent me home and cause I could communicate. But I could not text, which was very odd. I could not text. It was very garbled, but I could still communicate verbally. But they, the head of the ER came to me and he said, you can’t walk.

And I said, no. And he said, well, my residents seem to miss that. He said, you don’t want to get sick in August because the [00:10:00] residents are new and sometimes they miss some things.

Kelly: Oh, good to know. Let’s all write that down for future reference.

Crystal: Yeah, don’t get sick in August.

But so, it, they ran tests.

They sent me for an MRI. And that was in the middle of the night. Well, that were around midnight. Probably they took me up. And I just, I’ve, since I was a little girl, I had, I was sick. I was sick when I was a little girl, real, real sick and had to be in the hospital. And I think I just had some triggers there of this, of past illnesses.

And just, I would, I didn’t want to be alone in that room, you know, but it was like the Lord would send a nice orderly or somebody to just kind of be there with me. And I remember going into the MRI and MRIs can be so claustrophobic and loud.

Kelly: Right, but

Crystal: there was so much peace in the middle of that, that it was only you can only say it was God.

Kelly: Right.

Crystal: And so they sent me back, put me in a room and [00:11:00] at 1 in the morning. 1 of the doctors said, Mrs Mayo and I was so tired. I didn’t even want to open my eyes. She said again, Mrs. Mayo, I need to talk to you and I, my eyes remain closed until she said, Mrs. Mayo, you’ve had a stroke and I was just, a stroke?

What is a stroke? Only older people I know have had strokes and I was 30 years old. Why am I having a stroke? And she said, we’re going to be moving you to the stroke ward and we’ll be doing more tests. And after she left, I just remember being like, Lord, what, what is this? What? And I felt his peace, his presence come near me as though he was standing right there on the right side of my bed.

And I heard 4 words I’ll never forget. And he said, I will restore you and those 4 words. Were a lifeline, but also took complete faith to believe because [00:12:00] I ended up having so many deficiencies as in I was blind, partially blind in both eyes.

Kelly: Oh, my goodness.

Crystal: Yeah. Could not read. I had a hard time with memory could not handle sound. And smells all of my senses were off the chart and so going outside of the four walls of the hospital were traumatic and traumatizing and

yeah,

no, my recovery took 3 years and so there there’s, there’s a lot in that to unpack, but God was faithful.

And today you cannot tell if you met me, if you looked at me, you would just not know that I had been through so much trauma and therapy and .

Kelly: Wow. So everything has been restored? Everything. Yes. Yes. Wow. That is absolutely miraculous and amazing. I love so much that you felt God’s peace. With you. That is a comfort for all of us.

When [00:13:00] we’re walking through hard times, it wasn’t that you prayed just the right way. It wasn’t that you did just the right things. It’s because you knew Christ and Jesus was with you. He is with you and you felt his presence that shows the heart of God in such a beautiful way.

Crystal: Yeah, and I, I do think community prayer is a factor in it too. You know, there was so many, the prayer chains went out and just that it was unreal. And then, when we returned home, I was in the hospital 18 days. And they ran every test in the world and they could not figure out what happened, but they just, yeah, they discovered I had a pretty massive stroke and it affected 2 sides of my brain.

And so there’s 2 parts here that were affected and I’ve gone. I saw a different neurologist at some point, and he said, he just talked to me as normal. And then he comes back in the room and he goes. Whoa. Do you know you had a massive stroke? [00:14:00] And so, you can’t tell, but there’s evidence in here. There’s scars, and that’s kind of how we all are.

There’s scars and things you don’t see, but there’s been some things that have happened underneath.

Kelly: Whoa. That is crazy. I cannot believe all that you went through. I can’t, and they couldn’t ever determine what happened. I, did you ever go back to that first hospital and say told you so?

Crystal: No,

Kelly: it wasn’t worth it.

I think, but I never did. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I am so thankful for your restoration and I have heard many stories and I love these kind of stories so much that the moment or right before something is about to happen, God will say something like, I will be with you. Don’t worry. Don’t be afraid. You know, just something comforting right at the beginning of a very difficult season or right before to prepare you.

And I [00:15:00] love that God gave you that promise. I will restore you. So he gave you something to cling to a promise from God. We know God doesn’t lie. But when you go through a long season of Not seeing a promise being answered. Surely there is quite a lot of doubt, a lot of wrestling. So can you describe that season?

How did you hold on to hope in those dark days when you questioned whether that promise would ever be fulfilled?

Crystal: Yeah well, I went through a lot of therapy, but God would send the right, right therapist in and help with that. But, you know, I have this children’s book that it talks about my son’s answer to prayer and he wanted a dog so badly.

And I would say, baby, I’m not a dog person. Daddy said, no, and we do not have room in our home for a dog. So this was pre stroke. And I finally told him, I was a children’s director at the time, and I said you can pray about it, and I always talk to the kids about, [00:16:00] you can pray, you can pray.

Well, I was, he did, and, and then God answered his prayer and gave us this dog, and the book talks about how that came about. But this little dog, I did not want, became my answer to prayer, because as I’m learning to walk again, she was there. And as I could not pick myself off the couch, she was there, you know, she just was everything I needed in that season for, to make it through and the perfect little companion, because we didn’t know if I was going to need a sitter, we just didn’t, had no idea the depths of the damage that had been done and what it would take to recover.

So, but with the Lord, it fast forward two years. And I just was holding on to that promise of God, you will restore me, but I’m not restored. You know, I could not, I felt like a prisoner in my mind. Cause I, I felt like I couldn’t handle driving. I didn’t drive [00:17:00] for two years. I didn’t like I, I just could not handle it mentally.

It could, you know, even managing kids and just, you know, Life and it was all I could do just to function. And so at 1 point, I was in my closet and I was reading through the gospels and came across. So many stories where Jesus healed 1 person after another and after another. And I came to the woman with the issue of blood and something about that day was just different.

And, you know, those holy encounters you have, well, yeah, our closets can be holy too. I, I came across the woman with the issue of blood and just something about it sparked in my imagination. What if Jesus was here with me right now? And, you know, we know that he, you know, we could talk to the Lord and, but I needed something more tangible.

So, I took 1 of my husband’s shirts, and I put it right in [00:18:00] front of me, hanging where I was sitting and I took some sandals. I was like, sandals feel more appropriate than tennis shoes for Jesus. So, I put some sandals down there at the bottom, and I just held on to the hem of that T shirt. And I cried out to the Lord and just like, I think I had just been holding it all in

Kelly: and

Crystal: not really talking about it.

And, and at that moment, I just. We just had a moment, him and I, and that was the day the breakthrough came. It started. And that’s a whole long story in and of itself, but I’m like, how can I sum it up? But

the Lord put the right people in place to create a domino effect to where I began to start seeing the healing happen.

And I had to walk in faith. Because when you’re diagnosed with something like I was, you’re given all of the statistics and how [00:19:00] they are unfavorable in your department.

Kelly: Yeah.

Crystal: So, if you do this, you will be better, but if you don’t do this, you will have another one and it’ll be worse and it’ll be this and it’ll be that.

And so there was a lot of fear that I heard from the medical team about how I was to, what I was to do, what I was to take. And Not all of that was tailor made for me and so the Lord took me on a different path and brought me to some people who would say, I’m not sure you should be taking that. Or I, I, I think you should think about this and I, it took a lot of faith because you’re hearing the negative on 1 side and then.

So, it ended up to where I ended up trusting the Lord and little by little, it was like, okay, okay. And then to where. I almost didn’t need any medicine and wow. And just little by little, the [00:20:00] Lord, healed me. But that day that I met him in the closet was the beginning of the breakthrough.

Kelly: Oh, that is so beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. I know that that story resonates with many of my listeners who are dealing with chronic illnesses. And for me as a mom with daughters who Also have chronic Lyme disease. I can so relate to what you’re talking about. Our God is a creative God and the medical communities can say one thing, but maybe God leads us to a particular doctor in a particular place with a particular treatment.

And that’s the path he chooses for us. So I appreciate the way you opened your mind to how God was leading you in the healing journey. And the other thing that I love so much is that it all began with you touching the hem of Jesus garment, figuratively speaking, but really spiritually in your heart.

That’s what you were doing. You fully surrendered in that place. That was so powerful. [00:21:00] So powerful. I wish you could reenact that for us. I wish it were a movie that we could watch.

Crystal: Right. Right. Yes, I have. I have done that for a different women’s event and I’m wondering if I could pull it up, but I’ll have to send you that if I can pull that up.

Kelly: Okay. That’d be great. Well, you did mention that there was fear present in your faith journey, and we all struggle with fear. We struggle with worry about the future. Were there any particular verses that God brought to mind to help you grab hold of so that you could have peace?

Right.

Crystal: Proverbs 31 was the scripture I’m going to turn there. A friend came and visited us in the hospital, and she brought me a picture where she only printed out the last part of Proverbs 31. This version’s different, but she’s clothed with strength and dignity and can laugh without fear of the future [00:22:00] she framed it and I put it in the window when I went into in person rehab.

I asked the Lord, can we have a room with a view and we’ve got the most beautiful room overlooked. Rice University’s soccer field, and they had different games happening then, and it was a great view, but that picture would just sit in the corner of that hospital room, and I just I was so full, full of fear.

That is what made me a prisoner in my own home was fear, because they could not determine how it happened. How do you go on? How do you know that it’s not happening? What is that funny feeling in my body today? Am I having one now? You know, I mean, just fear. Unbelievable. Well, my kids have this.

Is this, is this hereditary? I mean, you want to talk about fear? Yeah. Some, some big time fear. And I like to be a person who was on, I was on the move for sure. I had plans. This is what I’m going to do. And all that stopped. [00:23:00] All of that stopped. And I just remember always looking at that plaque. My friend gave me that picture and just wondering, like.

Will I ever arrive to the spot to where I can, because I didn’t feel dignified at all. I felt like my life was a mess. I felt like I, there was nothing that was together in me. And then to, and then to say, and she can laugh without fear of the future. And I think it’s just experiencing the perfect love of God helped heal that in me.

His perfect love cast out fear. And so, just when I experienced his perfect love, it helped uproot that stronghold I had and I think that fear came back to that childhood trauma when I was sick and in the hospital and then full circle. Didn’t realize that until 1 day. I just was like when fast forward to 2020 when I had cobit, it put back a lot of the [00:24:00] symptoms of what I felt like when I had the stroke and I went, I called 2 of my prayer warriors and I said, y’all got to meet me at church or I’m not going to make it and, they did, and my pastor happened to be there at the time. They were expected to have a baby soon, but for whatever reason, the Lord orchestrated that he’d be at the church. And he helped walk me through that process. And, and it just was a revelation to me of this was a stronghold in my life to where something, a traumatic thing that happened in my childhood.

Was triggering me in my adulthood and, but the Lord helped to, you know, just my pastor said, you know, he took me through this exercise and he was like, what do you see? And I said, a hospital room and I said, but this isn’t where I had the stroke. And I think I was 5 when I got sick when we went on vacation and, and And so I said, this was when I was little, and I barely had memories of it.

I had to call my mom and say, remind me of that trip. And when I was in [00:25:00] the hospital, because I remember being sick, but I didn’t remember all of that. And he said, what was the lie you believed? And it was like, that God couldn’t take care of me, but it was like, well, where do you see Jesus in it? And I was like, in the teddy bear.

So I had had a teddy bear given to me in that trip. And so anyway, it was just beautiful, but isn’t that something how we just never know what happens in childhood that you barely even remember can be such a trigger for something in adulthood. And

Kelly: yeah, absolutely. We talk about that a lot on this show that Jesus is our healer.

He is our soul healer first and foremost. And he. Deals with these deep issues. So I love the way you illustrated how we can pray through that. Go back. Jesus, where did this come from? What is this fear rooted in and picture that place and then ask, Where do you see Jesus in this place? And he will meet you in in these deep fears.

And when he met you there, when [00:26:00] you saw him there, did that uproot the stronghold of fear in your life? I think

Crystal: that’s what I said to my pastor. I was like, was that a stronghold? What is it? Yes, and so, I think it just set me free to understand where this came from and that it was built on a lie that wasn’t true.

Yeah. That trauma when I was a kid, I had, we had gone on vacation and I picked up a virus, but it was a really bad virus. And I think it was traumatic as a kid to be brought to the hospital. And then I remember having to, like, they, they, like, helped undress me and put me in a, a gown like a hospital gown all things that are normal, but they had to hold me down because I was fighting them to put an IV in.

And just that trauma, which is like, we all understand was normal for a kid to have to go to the hospital. There wasn’t anything abusive happening. You know, that’s how they handled me. And I just remember being afraid in that moment, because I [00:27:00] think my mom couldn’t be there right at that time when I was in that room.

And so just the trauma of it, but I’m so glad that the Lord will. You know, set us free from those things that you know, take root. So absolutely.

Kelly: This just makes me think of this particular verse, it’s in Psalm 112, verse 7, and it says he will have no fear of bad news. His heart is steadfast, trusting in the Lord. His heart is secure. He will have no fear. In the end, he will look in triumph on his foes, on his enemies. And that is such That’s such a beautiful description of really what God did for you in that place. I just love it so much.

Thank you, God. Because the question I want to ask is, can I really live without fear in these places where when I look sometimes at the chronic Lyme disease that one of my daughters is still deeply impacted by and I feel God has promised he’s going to set her free, but sometimes the fear and panic can [00:28:00] be overwhelming and I have to go to that place with the Lord just as you did.

I have to find the lies and ask him to speak into them.

Crystal: Yeah, when you said that, when we, when we’re going through things or,

you know, can we live without fear?

Kelly: Yeah,

Crystal: about two years ago, my oldest, he got into a pretty bad accident and we were alerted by life 360. So we have that app on all of our family members phone and it, and so life 360 comes up on my phone and I’m like.

My 360 was, and so I swiped it away and then I was like, wait a minute, maybe I should answer. And so I answered and they said, Anthony appears to have been in an accident. We’ve called all the authorities and we just wanted to let you know that. And it was just.

Kelly: Chris, I cannot imagine.

Crystal: So it’s like, what’s happening?

It’s like everything’s spinning, but yet there was still peace in the midst of that storm to know, [00:29:00] I don’t know what we’re about to face, but I know God will get us through, you know, I know that I can trust him, but I don’t know what’s about to be on the other side of this phone call. And it was miraculous.

He, got in a very bad accident and he only broke his leg by the grace of God, but they had a helicopter waiting for him because they thought he was going to have to be life flighted away, but it didn’t have to. And so it was really truly, truly a miracle that he was okay, but thank God.

Yes, so, and it really cultivated faith in his faith too, as the smoke’s rising from the truck, he’s praying and asking God to help him not catch on fire and, it was something else. But my husband arrived to the scene and he stayed back and he asked the sheriff. He said, that’s my son in there.

And he said is he okay? How is he? And he was like, he’s alive. He’s alive. He’s talking to us and he’s got a really good [00:30:00] personality. So it he’s doing. Okay. He’s doing. Okay. And it was amazing to see the community come out and help him. So he had just. Finished from swim practice. He was a year round swimmer that year and he had, he was thinking about going to state and he just missed that 18 wheeler.

There was an accident up ahead and he ran right into the back of an 18 wheeler and that’s how he broke his leg and everything shifted. You know, that truck was totaled. But, but by the grace of God, I remember being in that moment thinking I don’t know what’s on the other side of this, but I know that God will be with me, whatever is going to happen.

Kelly: Yes, absolutely. So, I’m very curious as you have described how God met you really that just fills my heart up with so much hope in God’s faithfulness and in his ever present help.

We are never separated from his love. We’re never separated from his care. He is intimately involved in our stories and invested. He’s [00:31:00] already gone before us in this. So I want to ask you what what is it that brings us so much peace and comfort into every single situation that brings us so much peace and comfort in our, in our anxieties and as stories unfold that we don’t expect like the one you just shared about your son being in a car accident.

So I want to ask you what. What truth about God’s character comforted you the most as you have been through all of these adventures and learn to find peace?

Crystal: Hmm. I think it’s his faithfulness.

He has met me at every phase of my life and how I first, Came to know the Lord, I was my friend calls it the floorboard revival.

We were on a road trip. We were on a road trip and in those days, my parents didn’t use seatbelts and so I would just lay out in the car and I remember thinking, feeling the Holy spirit come to me and if I had gotten in an accident. And that moment, you know, when I, where would I go? And I just remember crying out to the Lord that, you know, I was a sinner [00:32:00] and to please save me.

And I had grown up in church. I think at one point I had a vacation Bible school. They had done an altar call and I my friend said I’m going down to the front who’s coming with me and I was like sit down You don’t do this until you’re older like sit down and she was like no I’m going I want to be saved and and I Just was like what what is she doing?

And then I ended up going up to the front and making a decision and praying and But it wasn’t until I think that floor board revival that I just really felt that’s when the Holy Spirit was calling me and you know, there was a time when I was in high school and my parents had separated and they had, they called me to the living room and they asked if I come join them.

And it was like, as I walk through that room, the tension. I mean, my body was cutting the tension like a knife, and they sat me down and [00:33:00] said that they weren’t going to stay together

so, I didn’t understand what that would mean. And after they were done talking, I asked if I could go to my room and and so I went to my room and. The 1st thing I did was just shut my door and get on my knees and say, God, what do you do with this? And so leading up to that, the Lord had been calling me.

So, after the floorboard revival, I had gotten interested in. The Bible, and I asked my mom, could I have a different Bible? Because I was using my brother’s children’s Bible and I was like, can I have the Bible? So we went to the store and picked out a new Bible and I loved that my name was on the front.

And so I just would dig into his word. And then that day when they told me that they weren’t going to stay together, I just said, Lord, what do you do with this? And it was like, I held out my hands, like they held all the broken pieces of my heart. And he’s and he said, open your Bible and I pulled it over.

It fell open to Psalm. I’d have to look at what verse it’s [00:34:00] 26 3. that’s not right. But it’s it fell open to the verse that says. Even though your father and mother forsake you, I will be with you. His faithful love has been with me my whole life. And so he met me there in my bedroom during that.

Another time he met me in the bedroom was I’d come home from a date. This was pre my husband and I was like, Lord, I am so tired of dating boys. Could you have my husband And the phone rang that very minute, and it was my my future husband, and I was like, hello, is it me you’re looking for?

Like, who’s on the other end of this phone call?

Kelly: That is so cute. I love the power of God to intervene in our stories. That’s so beautiful. I want to pause for a minute, Crystal. I want to look up the reference for that verse. All right.

Crystal: You might like this anyway, because this is the one. Oh, that is the Bible that you had when you were a child. Yeah. And like how much it’s falling apart. [00:35:00] They say a Bible that’s falling apart means your life’s not. So, it is Psalm 27, 10.

Kelly: Psalm 27, 10. Can you read that for us?

Crystal: Yes, this version says, Though my father and mother forsake me, the Lord will

Kelly: receive me.

What a

powerful verse for God to give you right at that moment when you felt like your life was falling apart. And now your Bible is falling apart.

Crystal: Yeah, he completely spoke through the word and it wasn’t I always like to make this point clear. It wasn’t that. They forsake me. It just, the Lord knew the desperation in that moment. Right, right. You know, there was some issues the lord had to address they ended up getting back together at the end of that summer but there’s a lot of water under that bridge they ended up divorcing after 46 years and Not too long after that my dad got sick And I had to take care of him and our [00:36:00] relationship was not so good and but the lord Brought, that’s when this dog ran into our lives and it was a healing balm for me to go and take care of my dad , and this dog showed up at his house and we were able to go visit and play with the dog because it made things easier.

So the Lord just, I mean, he was just been faithful through every chapter of my life. You know, the stroke story, all of it.

Kelly: Yeah. So just to clarify, you’re talking about the dog, Lucy, that you wrote the children’s book about Crystal’s holding up the book on our YouTube video. just for those who are listening and not watching,

that’s beautiful the way God met you there when that’s where the dog came about, but I just wanted you to clarify very briefly what you had said about your parents. So they were divorced and then they got back together and then your dad got sick. Is that the story? Well,

Crystal: they, they separated that year when the Lord gave me that verse that though your father and mother forsake you, [00:37:00] I will be with you.

Then they ended up getting back together at the end of that year, they were married for several more decades. And so after 46 years, they divorced. And then my dad got sick and my dad became my responsibility.

It was a hard time because it was not a gift for me to want to go and take care of him. But the Lord, as I was taking care of my dad he was a diabetic and I would take care of his wounds. The Lord was healing mine and by the end and the last few. Months before my dad passed he would just pat my hand and say, you’re such a good daughter.

You’re such a good daughter. And so I think my dad just didn’t know how to love and he had not experienced love, but. When I, when I honored him and took care of him, his heart changed I’m grateful. I ended with that in our story. So there was rest restoration [00:38:00] and even between my parents, my mom held his hands when he took his last breaths and.

She had already remarried and I have wonderful stepdad, but mom was there when he passed when my dad passed. And so it’s just God’s grace was, All over that moment and wow,

Kelly: Crystal, we’ve covered a lot of ground today. Oh my,

Crystal: like we ran a marathon, huh?

Kelly: I love that we got to celebrate God’s faithfulness in such very clear and tangible ways.

And I know that this hands my listeners hope this is what God’s use so much in my life as I was growing up and I just tried to understand that God redeems are hard stories. And I remember that what I gravitated the most toward were. Actual stories. I wanted to see it lived out in people’s lives because that’s what helped me have hope in my hard places.

And I know that today, God has taken this story and [00:39:00] handed that same type of hope to our listeners. Thank you so much, Crystal, for sharing God’s faithfulness today. And before we close, would you please give your website for our listeners so that they can connect with you?

Crystal: Yes the website is www. crystal c r y s t a l H mayo. com com.

Kelly: Okay, CrystalHMayo.com. com. Thank you so much. God bless you, my friend. Bless you. Thank you so much, Kelly.

If you were encouraged in your faith today, it’d be great. If you’d help get the word out by subscribing, sharing with a friend or leaving a review, I’d love to hear from you. You can reach out through my website, kelly hall. org and pick up some free resources while you’re there. Thanks for listening to the unshakable whole podcast.