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Transcript

Can You Hear Me God? · Arise Women of God

• 0:00
  Have you ever found yourself in a place so dark, maybe a hospital waiting room, on a bathroom floor, or in a lonely car, and you've literally pounded on the steering wheel and shouted, can you hear me, God?
• 0:15
  You're asking because you feel like you've been cast out of his sight.
• 0:19
  The heavens are closed, and you're worried that your mistakes or your circumstances have moved you beyond heaven's reach.
• 0:27
  Well, my friend, I feel your pain.
• 0:28
  And don't worry, you're in the right place.
• 0:31
  By the end of today's episode, you will understand that God doesn't just hear you in a cathedral.
• 0:36
  He hears you in the belly of hell.
• 0:39
  We're going to help you solve the feelings of spiritual isolation by looking at the prophet Jonah's deepest descent and Bonnie Randall's powerful rock bottom moment that turned into a miracle.
• 0:54
  We're moving from forgotten to fully seen.
• 0:57
  Stay tuned.
• 0:59
  Ordinary women, extraordinary faith.
• 1:03
  When God calls, we say yes.
• 1:08
  Hello and welcome to another episode of the Arise Women of God podcast.
• 1:13
  I'm your host, Tamara Kay Henderson, and I'm joined today by the beautiful Bonnie Randall, who is a fantastic warrior of light.
• 1:21
  And we're here to talk about the God who stays through the dark, through the de, through the hard times.
• 1:27
  There is beautiful truth grounded in Psalm 34:18, where God teaches us the Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.
• 1:42
  He isn't far away, simply waiting for you to get your act together.
• 1:47
  He is near and he is with you.
• 1:50
  We see this in the story of Jonah.
• 1:53
  He was literally in the belly of a whale because he ran away from God and mission God had for him.
• 1:59
  He was wrapped in seaweed.
• 2:01
  He was in the dark at the bottom of the ocean and he cried out from what he called the belly of hell, wondering if he was cast out of God's sight forever.
• 2:11
  But I love what God tells him.
• 2:14
  In Jonah, chapter 2, verse 7, he says, when my soul fainted within me, I remembered the Lord and my prayer came in unto thee.
• 2:24
  So even, even in the belly of the whale, God heard Jonah.
• 2:29
  Now Bonnie's going to share with us exactly how she knows what that felt like, being in the belly of hell as she experienced her own personal rock bottom moment.
• 2:40
  I have been there many times.
• 2:43
  The one of the most challenging times in my life.
• 2:48
  I had made some mistakes and they had led me to a pretty terrible experience in my early 20s where something pretty rotten happened to me and it threw me into just a tailspin.
• 3:03
  I Literally spiraled out of control.
• 3:06
  I couldn't hold a job because I couldn't hold a job.
• 3:10
  I didn't have any money, which meant I couldn't pay my rent.
• 3:12
  So then I ended up couch surfing and going from friend to friend's house and just trying to figure out my life.
• 3:20
  I hit all rock bottom.
• 3:24
  And I had decided that my life was in so much turmoil that maybe God had turned his back on me.
• 3:32
  And so I decided to turn my back on him.
• 3:35
  She turned her back on God because she thought he wasn't there.
• 3:39
  But God is more persistent than our pain.
• 3:42
  He often uses the smallest, most normal voices to call us back into the light.
• 3:48
  For Bonnie, it was a three year old niece who asked the one she couldn't ignore.
• 3:55
  And one day my cute little niece said to me, bonnie, why do you hate God?
• 3:59
  She's like three.
• 4:00
  And she asked me this question.
• 4:02
  I'm like, I don't hate him.
• 4:04
  And she's like, well, then why don't you come to church with us?
• 4:08
  How do you respond to a 3 year old and try to explain everything that had just happened?
• 4:13
  And so I agreed.
• 4:14
  For some weird reason, I was like, okay, I have no good excuse to tell her.
• 4:19
  I guess I'm going to.
• 4:21
  And I walk into the church and it was as if the whole church knew that I was coming.
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  Every single song was about God's love and how he rescues us and how no matter what you've done, he loves you.
• 4:35
  And then the pastor gets up and gives the most beautiful sermon about the prodigal son.
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  And I look over at my sister as I have tears streaming down my face.
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  And I said, emily, did you tell him I was coming and tell him my story?
• 4:52
  And she goes, no, I swear I didn't say anything.
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  And in that moment, I knew.
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  God knew.
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  I knew he knew who I was.
• 5:00
  I knew he knew what I was dealing with.
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  God knew Bonnie's story before she even whispered back to him.
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  He could see her in her darkness and was waiting for her to come back.
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  The miracle was God invited Bonnie back through a toddler and a sermon.
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  But the real loop closing M happened when Bonnie finally stopped running and started talking fast forward.
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  I asked my sister to borrow her car.
• 5:27
  And I go to this beautiful park and I sit in this car and I just start crying and I just start pouring my heart out to God.
• 5:36
  And I'm like, where have you been this whole time?
• 5:41
  It's been almost three years and I have not felt you at all.
• 5:47
  Are you even really there?
• 5:50
  And almost Immediately, I felt this, like, warm blanket wrap around me.
• 5:59
  And I knew that Jesus was putting his arms around me.
• 6:03
  And I felt peace and comfort.
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  And I just sobbed and cried.
• 6:08
  And it was the ugly kind of cry where you can't even breathe.
• 6:14
  And then after I kind of calmed down, I heard as if it was a voice in my head.
• 6:21
  It wasn't an audible voice.
• 6:23
  I just felt as if Jesus was saying, I've been here all along.
• 6:30
  Your back was just turned to me.
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  And I understand you're angry.
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  You're hurt.
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  What happened to you is tragic, and it should never happen to anyone.
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  And I'm so sorry for what happened to you.
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  But I can heal it.
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  I can heal you.
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  You are not so far gone that you are out of my reach.
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  I am willing to repair it if you're willing to let me.
• 7:01
  And that led to.
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  I don't even know.
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  I think I was in the car for, like, three hours.
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  I kid you not.
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  Just pouring out my heart and hearing him and talking to him and working through all the things that I was.
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  Deal.
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  So I want to testify today that you are not out of reach.
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  You have not gone too far.
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  There is no depth that he can't reach.
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  He will pull you out and he will come to you because he's already there.
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  It's us who sometimes needs to turn around.
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  I've been here all along.
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  Those words change everything, don't they?
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  Bonnie simply had to turn and remember God and how to hear him again.
• 7:50
  God's voice was a feeling of peace and a mental clarity that could heal tragic wounds.
• 7:56
  She simply had to turn around and acknowledge the one who had been standing beside her in the dark the whole time.
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  So, my friend, if you're in your own personal belly of the whale today, know that God isn't waiting for you to surface.
• 8:13
  He is right there in the deep with you because he loves you.
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  As it says in Jonah 2, 9, salvation is of the Lord.
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  He hears you.
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  He sees you, and he is ready to wrap that warm blanket of peace around you if you will.
• 8:32
  Just turn around.
• 8:34
  If you're ready to stop the ugly cry and start the holy dialogue again, we have a guide to help you find your way back.
• 8:41
  You can download our roadmap to Revelation, six steps to hearing God in your daily life.
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  And listen to the bundle that comes with it.
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  The Receiving Light and Revelation.
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  Audio meditation to help you prepare to hear God in your life today.
• 8:58
  And you can get these for free by clicking the link below.
• 9:02
  When you feel like God is silent, go to Step six the Evening Review and use that sacred log to look back through the divine lens of heaven and ask God to show you the tiny miracles where he's actually
• 9:14
  been showing up in your life while you were looking the other way.
• 9:17
  Even on your hardest days, God is leaving fingerprints.
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  And if you feel like the adversary is blocking your view, turn to page 6 of this download and use the Cast out the Adversary prayer to clear your spiritual space and be able to hear God more clearly.
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  So, my friend, God is near to you and your broken heart.
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  He hears you and he is with you.
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  Abide with him and until next time, may you arise.
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  Do it God's way.
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  God Strong if today's episode helped you feel a little closer to God, please like and subscribe.
• 9:52
  It helps us grow and ensures Heaven's whispers stay at the top of your feed whenever you need them most.