“I saw her. I talked to her. I put antifreeze in her car, for Heaven’s sake!”
It may have indeed been for “Heaven’s sake,”that unexplainable day my pastor experienced. Pastor B., as we call him, is one of the most down to earth, realistic and reliable men I have ever known. If he tells us something, we believe it; which is why we had to believe his angel story as well.
He, his wife and two daughters, driving back East for Christmas, had pulled off the interstate to fill up with gas. The family had gone in the convenience mart to purchase snacks while Pastor B. finished filling the tank, the snow falling harder. As he walked to the front to scrape the windshield, he saw an elderly woman at the next pump with her hood up. He walked over to see if she needed help. She told him she had no fluid for her windshield wipers and of course Pastor B. had extra, so he quickly filled hers to overflowing.
This elderly gray-haired lady with a blue scarf encircling her face, had no way of knowing our Pastor and family were going through a tough transition time with an important decision to be made. He had shared with us many times how he needed prayer just to get the clear “go ahead, or not” from God. Being a man of wisdom and discernment, he is one who never made split second, reckless decisions about anything – much less about the million dollar expansion program to reach thousands of needy folks in the community.
As he closed her hood, he started back to his own car for the snow was increasing.
Suddenly, with the strength of a man, this elderly woman whirled him back around and gripped him squarely by the shoulders, drawing him to her, face to face. With steel-gray eyes, looking straight into his soul, she slowly and firmly simply commanded,“Get ready for what God has ready for you.” Startled, but taking this perhaps as a sign, Pastor B. said, “Would you wait here just a second while I get my wife so she can hear that too?”
As he turned to run into the mart, his family was already on their way out. “Girls come here! I want you to hear what this lady…” In just a split second he turned back around to point out the elderly lady he had just helped, but simultaneously heard his family saying, “What lady?” “Dad, are you OK?” Not only was there no lady, there was no car, and no tire tracks on the fresh snow leading out to the interstate. There were no other cars, just a truck behind him. So he asked the driver if he had seen which way the lady went; he looked at Pastor B. strangely and replied, “Buddy, you and I have been the only two here for ten minutes.” Still holding the half-filled jug of wiper fluid, Pastor B. ran over to examine where he had poured fluid into her car, and looked closely again for any sign of tire tracks. Nothing!
Pastor B. said he had always thought he would know an angel if he ever saw one.
Now he wasn’t sure what he saw. However, he was very sure of what he had heard. He fell to his knees and thanked God, right then and there, with his family and the truck driver wondering if his brain had frozen!
Several months later, the community expansion nearing completion, over two thousand folks of all ages, races, and backgrounds came together to celebrate the new outreach. We too have learned to live in great expectation, believing that “angels” can appear anytime, anyplace, and in the least expected way.
Read more posts by Debra Peppers, Ph.D., here. Dr. Peppers blogs for JenningsWire.
JenningsWire.com is created by National Publicist, Annie Jennings of the NYC based PR Firm, Annie Jennings PR. Annie Jennings PR specializes in marketing books for getting authors booked on radio talk show interviews, TV shows in major online and in high circulation magazines and newspapers. Annie also works with speaker and experts to build up powerful platforms of credibility and influence.
