The Necklace that Saved Our Lives

Have you ever had a moment in life that takes you completely off guard? I had a moment like that last night. Life has been completely wonderful lately, God has been blessing me and I have this wonderful joy. The past couple of days have been a bit rough with some of the relationships in my life, but I knew I could get through them and that the Lord was giving me strength. Anyways, last night my dad and I were driving to our church for some meetings, talking about going on a missions trip together and talking about life in general. My dad is my best friend. I have an extremely close relationship with my parents that I praise God for! Yes, it might sound ridiculous that a teenage girl would be close to her parents, but it is an immense blessing! We were coming up on a road right next to our church's cemetery, when traffic started to slow because a man had hit a deer in the lane on the other side of the road. A man had stepped out of his car, near the deer which was in the middle of the road, so that he could take it out of it's misery. As my dad and I slowly stopped, we sat in our car waiting for traffic to move. We were a minute away from our church, maybe less. My dad rolled down his window to speak to the man near the deer when all of a sudden BOOM! My dad described it as an explosion going off. I didn't understand, I knew we had been hit by another car, but we had been at a complete stop, I was so confused! I broke out into hysterics, just crying my eyes out. Dad kept asking me, "Are you alright? Does anything hurt?" I was luckily fine, only a bruise on my upper thigh from the seat belt, but my dad unfortunately was not so lucky. He complained of his neck and knee hurting. It was so awful to see my dad in pain, he was my sturdy foundation and now he was hurt, I had to be the strong one. I started to collect all of our belongings and I couldn't find my cellphone. It had been in my lap at the time of the accident and I had no idea where it had gone. It could have flown out of the window for all I knew. After probably fifteen minutes of searching I found my phone on the dashboard! Not only had it popped up, but it had also slid onto the exact opposite side of where I was sitting. I slowly started to take notice of all the damage. All of our windows had broken, my dad's chair had broken, our trunk was halfway hit in, it looked awful! I have always called my Dad's car Ruby and had been looking forward to driving her one day! Unfortunately, as my Mom said, Ruby is going to be cremated. The rest of the night passed in craziness between the ambulance coming and my mom and brother coming and going to the hospital and everything. I called close friends to say a prayer for my dad and somehow the word spread far and wide! My brother had posted it on Facebook, but so many people heard the news! Thank you so much to all who prayed for us! I believe in the power of prayer. With all of my heart. My dad had to have a ct scan and an x-ray done at the hospital, but only God could make it so that he was fine! He came home earlier than expected and is fine this morning. We are both a bit stiff, but that is such a relief knowing that either of us could have died last night! Right before we had left to go to the hospital, a witness saw my Dad's cross necklace wrapped around his rear view mirror and said to me, "You might need this." I will never take that necklace off. My dad wants to put it in the next car we get, but I refuse. Yes, the necklace did not save us, it was God. My Savior, Lord, Protector. Only He is the one that saved us. Anything much worse could have happened last night and I am praising Him for my life and also my Dad's. I know there was a reason why our lives were spared. It might just be the perfect timing to happen right before Thanksgiving, because I have never been this thankful for life.
Psalm 103:13-16 As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him; for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust. The life of mortals is like grass,they flourish like a flower of the field; the wind blows over it and it is gone,and its place remembers it no more.