Over the last twelve months, significant life events pushed Michelle into her faith profoundly. The family of three was involved in a frightening car accident, and most recently, Michelle lost her closest friend, Mercedes, to cancer. “I used to carry a list in church with prayer requests each week, and I was always crying,” she said. But she now understands that these events served as opportunities for her to rise up and be lifted by Him. “He says to me, ‘Now is the time for you to practice Michelle what I teach you.’”
Her trust in God’s timing was evident at the scene of the car accident, a traumatic experience for her girls. After realizing they were okay, Michelle was convicted by the Holy Spirit to calmly walk over to the driver and pray with him on the spot. “The old Michelle would not have done that. I’m no longer reactionary. Even in that moment I had time for God.”
Michelle now recognizes painful struggles as listening moments with God. “There are so many struggles where we get confused and scared. Now when I see something that looks wrong, I see it as a faith flag from God. It looks like a red flag, but it’s a faith flag, where He always shows up, reminding me to turn to Him and surrender. He says, ‘How faithful was I before? I carried you through all the corners and winding roads. This is my faith flag for you, Michelle. Dig deeper.’”
Michelle believes there is time for God in almost every moment. “We are so focused on the world’s demands, on how we should respond or that we need so much, or have to do so much. But that’s not how God thinks. To recover and heal is to surrender.”
She now navigates faith by accepting that He works in ways that we can never understand fully. “It’s okay to not know God’s plan. Sometimes we don’t know the, ‘why’, but those things made me who I am today. I can pass on this thinking to my girls to remind them what He promises us; that we will understand what we don’t always know today.”
Michelle is grateful for understanding that she is never going to be alone again. “We weren’t meant to be alone.” She has opened up her life to community and to sharing. She leads a Women’s LifeGroupat Mariners, and is actively leading or engaged in relevant community events.
