Podcast

A Jewish Woman’s Journey to Jesus: Cara Shine E112
Cara: [00:00:00] So when I opened it up and I realized that there were words in red, at first I thought my Bible, there was a misprint. And then as I looked at the study sections, I realized that the words in red were Jesus’ actual words. I was blown away. I couldn’t believe that I had access to more of the story that I knew from Torah and the things that God had spoken to my people, that there was more to it and it was Jesus.
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 mind? 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 prayers, that God would renew our hope and his word and his love through these [00:01:00] conversations.
Kelly: Hey, friends. Well, this story you’re going to hear today captivated my heart and connected my heart to my guest in a major way a few years ago, when I met her at a conference, we decided to wait for her to share her story until after her book came out. And the title of her book will give you a glimpse into the topic of our discussion.
Kelly: It’s called The Hallway Miracle. The prayer that opened a Jewish heart to Jesus. I can’t wait for you to hear this story. If you’ve ever wondered if your prayers and your kindness for another person can be used by God to open their heart to his love, your heart is gonna be full of a bigger, more powerful view of our Lord after this story,
Kelly: Cara Shine is a lay pastor, author, speaker, retired elementary school teacher and high school Bible study teacher with a surprising testimony of finding Jesus in the midst of chaos and fear. [00:02:00] Raised in the Jewish faith, Cara spent much of her early life feeling rejected and judged by the Christians around her.
Kelly: The bullying she endured as a child left lasting scars shaping her view of Jesus and her sense of belonging. But everything changed in the fall of 2002. I’ll let her tell you more about the setting, but it was during a terrifying historical event that you may remember, and it was her fear that made her hungry for the peace and presence of Jesus.
Kelly: Well, Cara thank you so much for coming on the show. Welcome. I’m so glad you’re here.
Cara: Oh my gosh. Thank you so much, Kelly. It is an absolute honor to be here sitting with you today. You and I were talking before about the fact that I should not be on this screen right now, right? Because, prior to this meeting of Jesus for me I would still be doing other things.
Cara: My life would’ve gone a different way, but by the grace of God I was able to meet and understand who Jesus [00:03:00] really was, and it brought you and I together. And I just wanna say. For your listeners who have not had the privilege of meeting you, Kelly is the real deal. I mean, she is just the kindest, most open-handed person you’ve ever met, and I’m so grateful that you and I met, uh, in our own hallway at this conference and that it joined our hearts together because I, I follow your, your ministry in your podcast and I just am so grateful to be here.
Cara: So thank you.
Kelly: Oh, thank you. I really appreciate those words, Kara. They mean so much to me. Well, your early years of growing up Jewish are, we want, there’s something that we want to understand, so please talk to us about this. Your Jewish faith. Your Jewish culture was very, very precious and is, yeah, very precious to your heart.
Cara: I loved being Jewish. Being Jewish was, was everything to me. Um, for background, my, my parents were high school sweethearts, born and raised in the Bronx, New York until my dad joined the military. And so they moved around here and there. They eventually settled in [00:04:00] a small southwestern town in Ohio and they had to make a, a choice about where to live.
Cara: They decided to live closer to the Air Force base, which meant unfortunately we were 45 minutes away from the nearest synagogue. So we were really the only Jewish family in our otherwise very Christian community. And that came with a lot of challenges for my brother and I growing up. My mother,
Cara: such a proponent of trying to help us find peace in a place where we weren’t necessarily understood. So she went up to the elementary school before we started to meet with the principal and ask, what can we do to, you know, protect. My children from antisemitism and they came up with this idea to have her come in once a year and throw Hanukkah parties for my classmates, and she would bring in her her skillet and bake ladkas and have a Hanukkah party.
Cara: And on those days it was, [00:05:00] it was, it was good. It was good. I know that there were a lot of really accepting, loving Christians in our community, and they were our friends, but unfortunately there were also these other Christians who really did a lot of damage to my brother and I, especially when there were no, no parents or, or teachers around, which.
Cara: Would’ve happened on the school bus. So I grew up, unfortunately, hearing some things from these kids on the bus that were heartbreaking. I had a boy walk past me on the bus one day, grab a handful of my hair, and announced to the bus, checked her for horns. We’re all safe. Now I’m a kid, you know, I’m 10 years old at this point.
Cara: I had another, I used to hear things like, oh, I hope you have a lot of shorts and short sleeves ’cause it’s gonna be real hot in hell where your family’s going. I had other people say things like, you know, your parents must be ignorant since they don’t believe in Jesus Christ. And they would hiss the word Jesus Christ at me.
Cara: And I remember just being so confused by that [00:06:00] because when we would make our 45 minute drive to synagogue, I never heard anything negative about Jesus. In fact, I remember the rabbi saying to us at one point when we asked, you know, who is Jesus in all of this? He said Jesus was a good rabbi, he was a good teacher, and he gave us the golden rule.
Cara: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. And in my, my 10-year-old brain, I’m thinking, well, these Christians on the bus who are bullying, my brother and I are not. Not doing that. They’re not treating others the way they wanna be treated. So I didn’t understand who Jesus was and I for 30 years thought, okay, well I don’t want anything to do with Jesus.
Cara: And worse yet, I thought Jesus wanted nothing to do with me. Hmm.
Kelly: That’s so heartbreaking. Yeah. I’m so shocked by the antisemitism that existed. I didn’t have any awareness that that was going on. And now you see more on the news, it’s everywhere. But I remember, I remember running into a woman who was Jewish on our [00:07:00] vacation, and I said, oh, I love all the Jewish traditions.
Kelly: I love studying that in the Bible. And I told her I was a Christian, and she was so surprised. She said, mm-hmm. Most Christians I run into hate us because we killed Jesus. And I said, really? I was so shocked. Mm-hmm. I said, Jesus makes it very clear in the Bible that he laid down his life. It wasn’t taken from him.
Kelly: There is no one to blame. Jesus died as a gift for us. Mm-hmm.
Cara: That interaction. Kelly, as you’re talking, my heart is just soaring. But it just makes me so happy to know that you had that interaction with her.
Cara: And again, I, I can’t speak for any other Jews. I’m not trying to, I can only express what happened in my life and I hope that. Your listeners will understand the importance of the way that they walk and talk and interact with other people, and the difference it can make. So in that one interaction that you’ve had with this woman, you just have no idea the seeds that it might have planted.
Cara: And we know that a lot of Christians don’t feel that way about Jews. I know that [00:08:00] I grew up with a lot of wonderful people. Yeah. But it just takes a few people saying some really hurtful things to twist our Lord and Savior into something that he is not right. The power of the way that we talk and move in the world, it matters.
Cara: It matters in ways that we could never imagine, which is why I wrote this story as a reminder, uh, and I hope an inspiration to people to understand what can happen with the power of our prayers when the Holy Spirit is welcomed in and we, we represent Jesus in a way that’s authentic to who he really is.
Kelly: Right, that’s so good. Well, I truly believe the greatest miracle we ever see on this earth are , the salvation Miracles, where suddenly a heart that was closed off to any thoughts of Jesus is suddenly open and receives his love, and their life is transformed and they become new. So we want to hear your amazing story.
Kelly: It was in 2002. I remember seeing on [00:09:00] the news, the beltway snipers. So set up that whole context for us, and then talk to us about how you came to know Jesus.
Cara: Okay. Yeah. So, at this point, , I married, my husband and I moved, to Virginia. We’re right outside of dc about 20 minutes outside DC in the Pentagon, and in October of 2002, just in the shadow of 9/11, reminded, you know, that 2001.
Cara: So there’s already this fear and anxiety that’s under. Everything because of nine 11. I got my dream job as an elementary school teacher at this school where I just happened again to be the only Jew in a very Christian community. But this time things are different at this elementary school.
Cara: The Holy Spirit has been welcomed in the principal. Many of the teachers are strong, strong Christians who understand what it means to share Jesus in a way that isn’t judgmental, that [00:10:00] isn’t I guess, misrepresenting who he is and. I see the way that they move in the world and it’s different than what I’m used to.
Cara: Yeah. I come to find out that this principal actually would do prayer walks around the elementary school before the fall. Oh, wow. And claim this elementary school for Jesus. He would also at night, walk around and touch his hands onto the doors of the teachers at that school. I found out after the fact he would go into my classroom specifically and put his hand on my desk and pray for God to open my heart.
Cara: Now, all of this I didn’t know anything about Wow until after the fact, but the Holy Spirit was welcomed into this place in a way that didn’t make anyone else feel. Uncomfortable, and I think that’s really important as Christians because sometimes we feel like we have to share Jesus in a way when we don’t have the Holy Spirit [00:11:00] welcomed into our place first.
Cara: These Christians were relational with me and the time that I got there until the sniper attacks in 2002, they were curious in a loving way about my faith, and they talked to me the way that you talked to this Jewish woman about how they loved. The Jewish tradition and they wanted to know more. So we became brothers and sisters as colleagues this way instead of people that were kind of keeping each other at at arms length.
Cara: So in the fall of 2002, these snipers just started shooting all around the District of Columbia, Maryland, Virginia. They basically took the trunk of their car and holed out, uh, a place for a sniper rifle, and they would just. Go around to different places. Gas stations, you could be pumping gas and they would shoot.
Cara: You could be loading your groceries into your car, you could be walking down the street. And the authorities told us for those three [00:12:00] weeks that we held our breath. Don’t go outside. If you have to go outside, duck weave, stay low to the Ground. But life as we knew, it kind of came to a halt and that created intense anxiety.
Cara: Not just for me, but for anyone. If you, if you say, you talk about, do you remember the beltway snipers? Now everyone in this area will go, oh my gosh, that was awful. But that anxiety ended up bringing me to a place where I, I was seeking and looking for hope. You know, we think about the story of Joseph and his brothers and how they betrayed him and threw him, gave him up to slavery, and then in the end, they have to come to him.
Cara: And he just happens to be in a position to help and he speaks and he says, God intended this to harm me, but, or people intended this to harm me. But God intended it for good. That’s how I view what happened with the beltway snipers. It started out horribly, but it brought me to a place of peace where I was seeking something different for hope and peace that these Christians seem to have [00:13:00] that spoke to my heart.
Cara: Yeah.
Kelly: You also had a lot of fearing fear and anxiety about something that happened to your daughter. Mm-hmm. So set up the day when that prayer occurred in the hallway.
Cara: So my daughter, unbeknownst to us, had a peanut allergy that we didn’t know about and she, she had an intense reaction and we almost lost her during this beltway sniper attacks.
Cara: And these Christians knew about it. And I remember they reached out to me and they said, we are praying for your family. And I was so touched by that, that these people would pray for my family. That it, it just cracked open a window in my heart of curiosity. And so the morning that this hallway prayer occurred, I got to school early.
Cara: I was the first one there and I was listening to the radio as I was driving in, and the beltway snipers had just shot a [00:14:00] middle school student getting out of his aunt’s car. Wow. In the parking lot, and in my head, on top of what we had just experienced with my daughter’s peanut reaction and all the anxiety I’m feeling, I was frozen in my car.
Cara: I couldn’t even get from my car into the elementary school. I sat frozen. My friend Sharon. Pulled up at the same time, empty parking lot, and I can see she’s singing. She’s singing, she’s worshiping, you know, I don’t know what she’s singing, but I can see she’s singing to the radio. I’m frozen in my car. She pulls up next to me, opens up her car door and walks into the elementary school.
Cara: She’s not ducking, she’s not weaving. She just walks right in and then she turns around and realized I’m frozen in my car. She just kind of held the door open for me and she, she beckoned me. Come on, you know, let’s go. We gotta get to school. Unbeknownst to her, I had been looking over her shoulder for the past few weeks at this desk calendar that she had on her, her desk [00:15:00] that had scripture on it.
Cara: New Testament, old Testament scripture that I had never seen before. And I was, I had been sneaking in and looking over her shoulder reading these verses. Just that small little thing that she did by having that on her desk, she could have never known that. I was reading, there was this verse, from Isaiah 41 10, fear Not Right.
Cara: And I’m in the middle of fear and it, it stuck on my heart. So as I’m sitting in the parking lot, that verse came back to me. Fear not, fear, not, fear not. And it gave me the strength I needed to open up my car door and run into the elementary school where she greeted me. I, I remember I just looked at her and I said, Sharon, aren’t you afraid?
Cara: And she paused and she said, yes, I am afraid, but I have Jesus. I know. I know that Jesus is in control of all of these things in my life, and I cannot let fear keep me from living my life. And I just started to tear up because I was carrying all of this anxiety. I [00:16:00] didn’t, didn’t know what to do with it.
Cara: Here she was looking so firm, she had this foundation, and the next thing that happened was the most important part because we had this relationship already. Because she had already established for me that she was someone that could be trusted and with no agenda. She just asked, Kara, can I pray with you?
Cara: And in that moment I thought I can forget all those bullies on the bus. That’s not, that’s not what this is anymore. This is something different. This is something that’s provoking me. I feel pursued. And I looked at her and I said, yes. And right there in that empty hallway with nobody there. She grabbed my hands and she bowed her head.
Cara: So I did two. And then she just talked to Jesus like he was her best friend, and everything disappeared from the hallway. I felt like, I could have stayed there forever. And I felt it from the top of my head to the bottom of my toes, and I wanted to stay there [00:17:00] forever. And she finally said, amen. And we opened up our eyes and we were both crying.
Cara: And I just looked at her and I said, what was that? And she said, oh honey, that was Jesus and Kelly. It just, it set off a series of what I can only describe as. More miracles of God now pursuing me to reintroduce himself as not just Adonai, but also to show me who Jesus was as this completed, beautiful story that could take me out of fear and out of anxiety into a place of hope and promise and, and beauty.
Cara: That set off this Holy Ripple effect. That changed not just the course of my life, my family’s life my Muslim neighbor friend who walked this journey with me and ended up coming to Christ as a result. Just so many things, and I’ve held onto this story for 20 plus years, and I finally, [00:18:00] I had this woman walk up to me basically at a seminar I was teaching and look me in the eye, and she said, Cara you need to write this story.
Cara: You need to write this story. So this is my humble offering that I hope will bless other people to understand that God hears your prayers. Mm-hmm. God hears your prayers, and we just have no idea what can be done with the power of one prayer, when the Holy Spirit is welcomed in, and how it can change beautifully the lives of those around us.
Cara: And more importantly, build bridges. Between faiths where there’s misunderstanding, where there’s confusion, where there’s hurt. Jesus can help us build those bridges in beautiful ways, but chances are the people that we’re praying for, they’re not gonna run into the Bible and read the words and be changed.
Cara: But they’re gonna meet you. Yeah, they’ll meet you. You’re the hands and the feet. [00:19:00] Yeah. So my book is that offering to encourage your listeners. Your words matter, your prayers matter and, and building bridges, I think is what Jesus wants us to do.
Kelly: This community loved you, they showed you the love of Jesus, and they loved you to Christ.
Kelly: Yeah. What now? It was quite a journey of you deciding you’re gonna go to church and even to tell your husband. Yeah. Like, oh by the way, I love Jesus now. And yep. I know your whole family was baptized together. It was quite a journey. So tell us a little bit about that, and then I want you to tell us about the first time you read the Bible.
Kelly: Because that was just stunning to me. Okay.
Cara: So, my husband Jeff Shine when I first met him I did not want to marry him because he was not Jewish. He was a Presbyterian. Now he wasn’t a church going Presbyterian, but he was raised in the faith. But he wasn’t necessarily on fire for Jesus.
Cara: So I had never intended to marry somebody who was outside of my faith, but [00:20:00] I’d never met somebody like Jeff. And so we, we had this pivotal moment in our marriage in the beginning, or in our relationship at the beginning, and I just said to him, Hey, I can’t, I can’t be in a relationship with you because I, I wanna marry somebody Jewish.
Cara: And he just said, well. I’ll go to synagogue with you. Like, I’ll, I’ll do those things with you. We can raise any children Jewish. And he made the ultimate sacrifice. So we were married by a rabbi. He stepped on the glass. And yeah, that was the plan until, until Jesus, until that hallway miracle, and in the beginning after that hallway miracle, I didn’t tell anybody.
Cara: I didn’t tell anybody about what happened because I was very scared about what might happen and what I might have to say to the people I loved and about the religion that I, that I loved dearly, my culture, my heritage, what they would say. Yeah. And it took me a long time to, to kind of put those pieces together, but, and I talk about this in the book, God would not let me go and the number of signs and miracles and things that he put into my life to pursue me, to give me the strength that I [00:21:00] needed.
Cara: To finally tell my husband, Hey, guess what? I love Jesus. There was just no other way. And he actually was thrilled. He was like, uh, that’s great. Okay, let’s, so I ended up going to this church with a lot of these elementary school teachers to the same church, Riverside Church. And walking into that church was.
Cara: Was a lot for me coming from a synagogue and a Bima and a cantor and a rabbi, and all the traditions and the songs and the Shema and this little church was in an elementary school gymnasium, and they had a rock band and a white screen with words on it, and people were clapping and raising their hands.
Cara: And it was, the holy But the Holy Spirit was there. And even though it was hard, there was, the Holy Spirit was there. And it allowed me to, to combine my two worlds in a, in a beautiful way. That, you know, there’s just no other way to talk about how that felt.
Kelly: Yeah. That is so powerful. Well, now, the first time you opened your [00:22:00] Bible.
Kelly: Yeah. Tell us about when you first looked at the New Testament. You started in Matthew. Mm-hmm. And the way you described it in the book, just put a fresh, new understanding in my heart. It was just so fun to read it through your eyes. So help us see the New Testament through your eyes.
Cara: Okay, so to understand up until that moment at 32, I had never touched a New Testament before.
Cara: To me, it was something that wasn’t for me because I couldn’t feel accepted. I didn’t think that, that I was wanted yeah, so. Once that, that prayer opened my heart and I started thinking about Jesus in a different way. At this point, I couldn’t even say the name Jesus, yet I was so concerned I was gonna break people’s hearts.
Cara: I finally made this decision. It was actually my Muslim neighbor, Shiku. I shared it with her first because I knew she would understand what I was thinking about doing more than anybody, and she gave me great advice and she said, Cara, before you tell [00:23:00] anybody else, you need to find out for yourself. Who Jesus really is.
Cara: And I, I took her up on that and these Christians gave me my first Bible. And after we went to church, I went home and I sat in the corner of my room with the sun coming in, in this little corner and I turned to the book of Matthew, which I had been told was where I should start. ’cause it’s at the beginning.
Cara: And I opened up to page like 1,365 and it was a study bible. I’m so grateful. It was a study bible. Actually, I have it here. Still, this is my, you know, so many years. Wow. Ago Bible, it’s falling apart. Now this is my baptism day from the, the Christians that that bought it from me. But when I opened it up, I was first of all blown away by the fact that I could read the words of Jesus.
Cara: So when I opened it up and I realized that there were words in red, at first I thought my Bible, there was a misprint. And then as I looked at the study sections, I realized that the words in red [00:24:00] were Jesus’ actual words. Hmm. And I, I was blown away. I couldn’t believe that I had access to more of the story that I knew from Torah and the things that God had spoken to my people, that there was more to it and it was Jesus.
Cara: Yeah. And that at any moment we can open up this Bible and have access. So the words of Jesus himself was something that I still, I still am blown away by that, that thought. So as I sat and I read, read Matthew, I got to the section of the greatest Commandment where the Pharisees are saying to Jesus. What is the greatest commandment of all, and they’re questioning him and he speaks the most important watch word of the Jewish people, which is the Shema.
Cara: It’s the very first prayer that we learn as children. When I was in Sunday school all those years ago, the Shema love the Lord your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your might. [00:25:00] And as I’m reading in the corner of my room with sunlight coming in, the words in red, and Jesus says the Shama it.
Cara: Hit me. Wait a minute. Jesus is Jewish, and Matthew who’s writing these words is a Jew just like me. Matthew is writing about Jesus and he’s got everything to lose, and he’s giving up everything to follow Jesus as well. Yeah, and it gave me courage to know that Matthew a Jew is recording Jesus, a Jew who’s now speaking the Shema, the watch word of my people.
Cara: It all just kind of came together for me in that moment. And then he goes on and he says, and love your neighbor as yourself. And my heart exploded. ’cause that’s exactly what those Christians at that elementary school did, and all the bullying and anti-Semitism that I grew up with all just came into place and I realized that I needed to forgive.
Cara: I needed to forgive all of that, just like I needed forgiveness. [00:26:00] We all need forgiveness. It just kind of washed, it just kind of washed away and opened my eyes to who Jesus really was.
Kelly: Wow. Oh, that’s so beautiful. I love, I love how God met you and ministered to your heart in that space. Well, culturally, telling your parents about this was a great, great fear of yours.
Kelly: Mm-hmm. And so you were terrified for many, many months, but how did you finally make the decision to let them know? I know it was very difficult ’cause you didn’t want them to feel betrayed.
Cara: No. I mean, you think about nobody ever wants to break the hearts of the people that they love. And I think I unfortunately, let my own fear continue on in my heart and create scenarios, which fear does a lot.
Cara: Yeah. Gives you, you catastrophize and think the worst case scenario. And I, I leaned into that more than I should have. And ultimately what, what I did was I ran to my pastor, this new pastor now that is a part of my family’s life, Brian [00:27:00] Clark. And I talked with him. We talked with him about what do I do with this?
Cara: How do I, how do I go about doing this? And he gave me great advice and he said, Cara as you’re reading the words of Jesus, I know that you see that there is this theme of forgiveness and grace. And he just challenged me. He said, if you are forgiving and giving grace to these kids on the bus. Now you’ve given yourself forgiveness and grace with the anxiety and the shame that you’ve put on yourself for these anxiety attacks, why not extend that to your parents as well?
Cara: This is, this is your first opportunity to put into practice what you’ve learned about Jesus thus far, and give them an opportunity through grace. That’s gonna mean you being forgiving and open-handed with them as well. And you have the opportunity to show them the Jesus that you know now as the Jesus who washes feet.
Cara: And Jeff and I talked about it and I prayed about it, and I finally just decided I needed to honor them [00:28:00] by sharing this with them. I didn’t wanna talk about it in a way and keep this thing from ’em, and then what God would do next with it was up to God. I just also happen to have the most wonderful parents in the world who want nothing more than to be a part of my life and my family’s life.
Cara: It wasn’t easy in the beginning. It was, it was a hard conversation, and this is, this is really important actually for your listeners. If you haven’t heard anything else we’ve been talking about, I hope you’ll stop for a moment and hear this most important message. When I told my parents, my father spoke this one sentence that
Cara: i’ll never forget and has helped to keep me focused on my walk and the way that I talk about Jesus from now on. When I told them, he said, why do you wanna follow them after all they’ve done to us? Oh, wow. And it broke my heart. And really, I, I still don’t know how I came up with this next sentence. It was only, it was only God.
Cara: God gave me the sentence and I just [00:29:00] said, dad, you’re right. You’re right. There has been a lot of, a lot of horrible hurt and things done to our people, but I’m not trying to follow people. I’m trying to follow Jesus. Wow. And let me, let me tell you who Jesus is, and I went on to tell them about the Shema and the Greatest commandment.
Cara: And then I told them about in the book of John. How I had read that in the beginning was the word, and the word was God, and the word was with God. And try to explain that, that that the holy trinity and that God and Jesus are actually together in the same thing. And they listened and they heard it hasn’t been easy.
Cara: It hasn’t been perfect, but they have loved me well through all of it. And I just, I, that’s grace, right? I, I’m a lay pastor now, and whenever I get the opportunity to preach, they come and listen. They come and listen. And my dad who has had a real rough year, you know, he is 83 and this past year he’s had three falls that have landed him in the hospital with [00:30:00] breaks and rehab.
Cara: And the hardest one was on Yom Kippur, which is the Day of atonement for the Jewish people. It’s the, it’s one of the high holy days where we ask God to forgive us our sins. We fast from sun up to sundown depending on how you, you reflect on your life, and my dad broke his hip on Yom Kippur this past year, and we talked about how God and Jacob wrestled through the night.
Cara: Yes. Until he broke Jacob’s hip and renamed him Israel and all of that. Through all the suffering that my dad has had over these this past year, I know there has been. Places in his heart that have been opened. And I know on your podcast, I follow your podcast so closely because you give unshakable hope to people who are in the middle of really, really hard things.
Cara: And in those hard things, we know that God can do miracles, right? Right. Genesis 50 20, you intended to harm me, but God [00:31:00] intended it for good. When we are on our knees sometimes. A hip has to be broken in order for us to accept and feel the love that we didn’t know we needed. Yeah. So even though those conversations have been hard, there is hope.
Cara: And my dad let me buy him his first Bible, which sits by his, his desk now., And there’s still conversations about all of these things, but, we trust in Jesus. And we give grace, right? I’m not trying to convert anybody. I’m not trying to bring, I’m just trying to share what God has done in my life.
Cara: And there’s no more powerful thing than sharing what some, what’s happened in your life with others To show them Jesus.
Kelly: Yeah. Oh yeah. That’s just beautiful. I love, I love the one thing that God gave you to say, I’m not following them. I’m following Jesus. And that’s such an important thing for us to remember in a world that is so divisive where people just wanna go to their camps and they wanna just stay there separated from [00:32:00] others. Where you’re saying, I’m not following people, I’m forgiving the people who hurt me. I am following the Jesus of the Bible. Read the Bible and see who Jesus really is. Don’t let those misrepresentations stand in the way of a true love relationship with Jesus.
Kelly: And that, mm-hmm. That’s so important. I wanna say that to so many. People when I hear of them, you know, they’ve been hurt in the church and there’s so many f flawed people, and I’ve been hurt in the church, but why don’t let’s allow those hurts to drive us to the heart of God rather than away from the heart of God?
Kelly: Because we’re not following people, we’re following Jesus. Thank you. Thank you for that word. And I love how wise your pastor was and just saying, you need to honor your parents and honor them by telling them the truth. Mm-hmm. And then also give them space to have all the feels, to have all things that are hard for them.
Kelly: Don’t be offended by that. Just sit in that with them. And it was just beautiful the way the [00:33:00] Lord met your family in that space. Mm-hmm. And the ways he’s obviously opening more doors to relationships.
Cara: Yeah. I think it’s important to look back at the times in our life when we have felt hopeless and helpless.
Cara: Financial struggles, marital problems things with our adult children, with our young children, church hurts. All of these things are just part of living in a broken world. We know that I think about Joshua and. As he’s bringing the Israelites across the Jordan into the Promised Land, he does something really important.
Cara: He asks and instructs one person from each tribe to take , a stone , and make a memorial so that they can remember what God has done in their lives, so that as they move forward into their their future, it changes the way that they move. Being able to be reflective about our past and think about how have we done things in the past, and how do we [00:34:00] wanna move forward?
Cara: And being reflective, I think is so important to look backwards and say, yes, this was something that happened in my life, but I choose to seek. Seek the kingdom. Seek right, seek the kingdom first before I move forward. And being reflective about what can we do better? Listen, there’s no perfect church.
Cara: There’s no perfect people, but. If we’re waiting for that perfect church or that those perfect people, we miss the growth that happens with each other to open hearts and change relationships in a way that grows us all. And that has to be what God wants for us. He doesn’t expect us to wake up and be ta-da.
Cara: Here I am perfect. Today. I’m ready to serve the Lord. And everyone should see my light shining all the time. We’re broken people. But it’s that reflection of looking back and saying, this is what’s happened in my life, but this is how God has redeemed it. And I recognize that, I think is really, really important.
Cara: Mm-hmm.
Kelly: Yes. That’s so powerful. Well, what is it you [00:35:00] know about Jesus now that you didn’t know back then? Can you share that with us?
Cara: I would just say that Jesus is. The way and the truth and the life. Yeah. But I would also say that I just can’t take for granted things that, I used to look at as things that just made sense to me now, and we’ve talked about this before, if you’ve ever seen those videos of the babies with cochlear implants or getting their glasses for the first time, and there’s that moment right before their eyes are opened and then.
Cara: They see and they hear the beauty of what they, what they didn’t know was there. I just didn’t know how good life could be with Jesus. Hmm. I just make, it’s really hard for me to not live into the promise now that I have in the middle of whatever’s going in my life to run into Jesus. When you think about the tabernacle and that veil being torn.
Cara: Yeah, at Jesus’ death, [00:36:00] right? The Holy of Holies was just for a select few, and being in the presence of God was not something that came to just anybody. Now because of what Jesus has done, that veil is torn and we all have access to Jesus. Anytime We want what? Anytime we want, we can step into the presence of Jesus and have a hallway miracle moment.
Cara: We put on our worship music, we open our Bible, we let the words in red soak over us, and we get to be in the presence of Jesus. Mm. And that to me , is just something that I’ll never, I’ll never get over.
Kelly: Oh, that’s so precious. Yes. The words of Jesus himself. Beautiful. His very spirit indwells us, and he is speaking to us.
Kelly: When we open the Bible, the living, the word of God is living inactive. Mm-hmm. Sharper than any twoedged sword. Mm-hmm. I’m just so grateful that he is alive. We’re not worshiping a dead savior who’s in a grave. He is. That’s right. His word is alive. That’s, and he’s been alive. He [00:37:00] created everything we.
Kelly: Through his power and he is creating us anew as well.
Cara: Yeah. There’s a, a Hebrew word dinu that we say during the Passover Seder when we talk about the miracles of God bringing out the Israelites from Pharaoh. , And as we dip our fingers in wine and put a drop on each plate to talk about the 10 plagues, and we say it would’ve been enough nu it would’ve been enough.
Cara: There’s that feeling I think of. Preciousness when we open up our Bibles of gratitude, that just having the words of Jesus dinu that would’ve been enough, or that we get to worship a God dinu, that would’ve been enough, but that God himself came down to earth to rescue us and be with us in our, in whatever hurt we’re in.
Cara: I mean, Diano, there’s a gratitude to our hearts. That heal the places in our hearts that hurt so desperately from being in this broken world that we can run into , a [00:38:00] hallway dinu. It would’ve been enough. But you are still here with us. Father, no matter where I am, no matter how heartbroken I am, no matter the pain, the suffering, whatever it is, you have already done enough.
Cara: Amen. Dinu. Yeah.
Kelly: That is so powerful. I was just worshiping God this morning through the Revelation song, the one that says, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. And then reading Revelation four.
Kelly: In that moment, Jesus on the throne. It’s so powerful, and I’ve realized in my own life, when I am overwhelmed, when I am stressed and I’m wondering how God is gonna make a way through that, just focusing my heart, opening my heart up to the holiness of God, to the truth of His character, to the truth of.
Kelly: What the word says. Who the word says he is. Yeah. That changes my heart. That changes my perspective. It transforms my mind so that I’m not filled with worry, but instead I’m filled with trust in him. Mm-hmm. It’s so powerful. Mm-hmm. Well, what would you say to the person who [00:39:00] is struggling with fear and worry today?
Cara: There’s, there’s this other Hebrew phrase, it’s tekku olam and it means to be a repairer of the world. Hmm. And I, I first heard this phrase after nine 11. I turned on the television like we all did, just to try and get information about what was going on.
Cara: And Mr. Rogers was on, was on TV and speaking to children about the fact that in the middle of really hard things, look for the helpers. Look for the people who are running to help, because in this world, there are more people who want to help than hurt. And Kuo alum is that Hebrew idea that we are to be repairers of the world.
Cara: Wow. So when you are struggling with anxiety, I still fight this battle. I remind myself that I have a choice. I can stay where I am or I can move. A place where God is [00:40:00] calling me to be a repairer of the world. And when you take KU alum and you add it to that scene where Jesus washes feet of his disciples and he says, after he washes their feet with his holy hands, which by the way, hello God of the universe washing our feet.
Cara: At the end of that steam, he says this other thing, he says, now that I have taught you these things. It will bless you if you do them. And it’s, it’s the antidote to how we feel about anxiety. You will be blessed if you do these things when you are feeling anxious, when you’re feeling scared. The antidote to that fear and anxiety is to serve others.
Cara: Get out of yourself, get into community, and be a repairer of the world. Washing other people’s feet the way that Jesus does ours, it heals us. I feel like in that moment when Jesus says, now that you know these things, it will [00:41:00] bless you if you do them. He’s literally writing us a prescription to heal our hearts.
Cara: Get out of yourself, get into my heart, serve other people, and that can’t be done if we’re not filling ourselves with the words in red
Cara: and. And taking that moment to pause before we get into the Bible. Take our sandals off because it’s holy ground. Take that deep breath and step into the presence of God and just be so grateful that we get to open up our Bibles and be in the presence of God and, and toku alum.
Cara: Be repairers of the world, as Christ’s hands and feet. It heals us. It blesses us. If Jesus says, it will bless you if you do these things. Yeah.
Kelly: And you mentioned before Matthew 6 33, you referred to it earlier, seek first the kingdom of God. Mm-hmm. And that’s where we get filled up with all. Mm-hmm. Of who the Lord is with, all of who Jesus is.
Kelly: And we’re reminded the Holy Spirit reminds us of the power, the [00:42:00] fact that his spirit lives inside of us, is always That’s right. Instructing us and teaching us and opening the word so we can underst. Stand who he is. Yeah. And then it’s from that space that we source his love to other people. Mm-hmm. And that’s Kara, what you experienced in that elementary school.
Kelly: Yeah. You experienced the love of Jesus as people. Sought you out and they loved Yeah.
Cara: I’m so grateful yeah. And I hope that this book builds bridges between people of all faiths in a way that allows us to look at each other between faiths, across ideologies, and see each other as just children of God in a beautiful way so that we can have these conversations lovingly, lovingly, and, and as people who wash feet.
Kelly: Yeah. Tell us where people can find you and the name of your book again.
Cara: Sure. They can find me at CaraShine.com and the name of the book is The Hallway Miracle.
Kelly: Thank you so much for sharing your story with us, Kara. This has been an absolute delight and [00:43:00] blessing.
Kelly: I’ll be praying too for God to just pour out favor on this book, this ministry, and your family, as more and more of them come to know Jesus.
Cara: Oh, thank you, Kelly. Thank you so much. God bless your listeners and just thank you for this opportunity and God bless your ministry, Kelly. Thank you.
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 Hope podcast.