Brace yourselves! This testimony is RADICAL.

Well, if there was ever a testimony that showed God's awesome power, loving care, and incredible attention to detail, this one is it. The story I'm about to tell you is the culmination and convergence of almost two years of God's faithfulness, and my part in the story began on Thursday during our Treasure Hunt outreach.

We left the church a bit later than usual (at about 4:30) and were only driving for about 5 minutes when I spotted a woman walking on the side of the road, pushing a stroller with 4 little dogs in it. Since my team leader Katie had "person walking dogs" on her treasure map, I pointed out the woman to her, and we all agreed that she stood out WAY too much for us to pass her by. So we made a quick u-turn, and Katie, Melody and I jumped out of the car to talk with this woman. We introduced ourselves like we usually do to the "treasures" we encounter on outreach ("This might sound a bit strange but we're doing a treasure hunt, and we think you're our treasure because God gave us clues to find you..."), and she was very open and friendly. Then, all of a sudden, she gets a phone call, and asks us to wait for a moment, and what we heard was absolute confirmation that we were right where God wanted us to be. She said something about being freaked out, not knowing what to do, and that she was contemplating calling the police because of whatever seemingly serious incident she was dealing with. Well, long story shortened, we came to find out that she had just been driving with her 33 yr. old son when he began to threaten her, and kept grabbing the steering wheel from her, threatening to wreck the car. Frightened by him, she just stopped the car, took her little dogs, and started walking down the road. And that's when we met her, at a time when she was distressed and at a total loss for what she should do. Needless to say, it was an incredible encounter. We were able to pray for her and the entire situation, releasing peace and protection over her and her son, and just asking God to have His way. We also came to learn that as an attempt to resolve the situation, Sue (the woman) had called her husband, and made him talk to Tracy, her son, and try to calm him down. The HUGE problem with that was that Tracy hadn't spoken to his father since he was 7 yrs. old, and had been harboring anger and resentment against him, so their phone conversation only succeeded in aggravating him even more. When Sue told us that, not only did it open the door for Katie (my team leader) to share her testimony of how God healed her once-broken relationship with her father, but we also were able to write out some prophetic words and encouragement for Sue to give to her son. (I know this is VERY long so bear with me. It's just about to get EVEN BETTER) After being there with her for about 15-20 minutes, we needed to leave to finish our outreach time, so we gave her a card with Bethel's address and phone number, telling her to call us if she needed anything, and after seeing the card, she began to tell us of an incredible experience she had at Bethel two years prior! She had lost her son in an unexpected motocycle accident right on their street, and the night of his death, a friend of hers had taken her to Bethel where she got radically healed! She had been having pain in her hips, and when they sat her down to pray for her, they discovered that one of her legs was shorter than the other so they just prayed, and God GREW OUT HER LEG! Anyway, so we are just getting rocked by this radical testimony of God's goodness in her life but we had to say goodbye and finish up our outreach. So, we went on our merry way and had an amazing time for the next half hour BUT little did we know the depth of what God was up to in Sue's life :).

So, after school, I'm TOTALLY jazzed about the day, and begin telling Maggie (the woman I live with) about what an amazing encounter we had with Sue. And I get to the part about her visit to Bethel two years prior and her healing, when Maggie stops me and says, "Wait a minute, did she have long blonde hair?" I replied with a yes, and then Maggie starts flipping out and telling me that Sue is actually our neighbor three doors down, that Maggie was the one who had taken her to Bethel on the night of her son's death, and witnessed Sue's healing right before her eyes! This woman lives ON MY STREET and I drive by the cross where her son died EVERY SINGLE DAY! And if that's not AMAZING enough, get ready for your mind to be blown by the other side of the story: Maggie is a third-year intern and normally doesn't go on outreach on Thursday but for some reason, she felt prompted by the Holy Spirit to join the Pastors-on-Call team that day. So she sat down with one of the teams, and wasn't really sure what she was going to do but then discovered that they didn't have an assignment yet. All of a sudden, God tells her that she needs to take the team to intercede at the cross where Sue's son died. COMPLETELY RANDOM. Little did Maggie know that at literally the EXACT SAME TIME that they were interceding (praying specificly to break a spirit of death, anger, and affliction) , we were praying with Sue in the crisis that had just transpired! How INSANE is that?! God is SO good!

Haha, well, if you thought it ends there, you're mistaken because God isn't nearly done with His work in this family's life :). All of that occurred on Thursday so on Friday, Maggie decided to pay Sue a visit, to ask her about what God had done and to fill her in with more details. While she and Sue were talking, this guy bursts into the house, and he has a really bewildered look on his face! It turns out that he was the best friend of Sue's son who had died in the accident, and he proceeds to tell Maggie and Sue that he had a VISION that morning. Now, this guy's a total nonbeliever, but he had a crazy vision in which his friend who had died came to him and told him that he knew the Lord and was safe in Heaven, and that he needed to go to Sue and ask her what had happened to her the day before! CRAZY! Needless to say, Maggie and Sue told him about everything, and I'm sure God's work won't stop there!

Isn't that AMAZING?? It just goes to show us in an incredible intricate way that when God begins to work in someone's life, He will invade by every possible means, using all sorts of people and circumstances, to show them that He loves them, sees them, and desires to fullfill His good will in their life. PRAISE GOD! I want more stories like this one!

I love you guys! We serve an awesome God!

Be blessed by His radical love,

Melissa