Family and church pray to resurrect 2-year-old California girl pronounced dead
A Northern California family and megachurch congregation are praying for a 2-year-old girl to be resurrected after the toddler stopped breathing and was pronounced dead over the weekend.
“We’re asking for prayer,” the girl’s mother, Kalley Heiligenthal of Redding, wrote on Instagram this week. “We believe in a Jesus who died and conclusively defeated every grave, holding the keys to resurrection power. We need it for our little Olive Alayne, who stopped breathing ... and has been pronounced dead by doctors.”
Heiligenthal and her husband, Andrew, called first responders and tried to revive the girl at home Saturday morning, but Olive was taken to a Redding hospital, pronounced dead and taken to the Shasta County Coroner’s Office, the Redding Record Searchlight reports.
Christian Post described Kalley Heiligenthal as “a worship leader and songwriter with Bethel Music,” which is affiliated with Redding-based Bethel Church.
Patrick Blewett, dean of A.W. Tozer Theological Seminary at Redding’s Simpson University, said resurrection attempts aren’t common in other branches of Christianity but “this fits more into Bethel Church and into what they’re teaching,” according to the Record Searchlight.
Bethel Music and other supporters of the family created a GoFundMe page hoping to raise $100,000 for the family, explaining that “along with the overwhelming shock and devastation of losing their daughter are the unforeseeable expenses the Heiligenthal family will incur, medical and otherwise.”
That fundraiser brought in more than $40,000 from more than 600 donors as of Wednesday.
“We are asking for bold, unified prayers from the global church to stand with us in belief that He will raise this little girl back to life,” Heiligenthal wrote on Instagram. “Her time here is not done, and it is our time to believe boldly, and with confidence wield what King Jesus paid for. It’s time for her to come to life.”
Bethel Church, which has other congregations across the country, wrote to its half-million Facebook followers on Sunday “asking you, our global church family, to join with us in prayer and in declaring life and resurrection over ... Olive Alayne!”
Congregants shared video on social media that apparently shows multiple days of worship.
Kalley Heiligenthal wrote in an Instagram post Monday that “Day 3 is a really good day for resurrection” and said “we are overwhelmed with gratitude by your outpouring of love for us and faith for Olive.”
“There are references to resurrection in the Bible, and we believe that with God, nothing is impossible, even things like resurrection,” Bethel Church spokesman Aaron Tesauro said, per the Record Searchlight. “Although at Bethel, this is the first public gathering of prayer for resurrection that I have seen in the over 10 years I’ve attended the church.”
According to the Christian Broadcasting Network, congregants “shared videos on Instagram of Kalley herself leading worship on Sunday [and] boldly declaring that God will revive her daughter, with the church passionately echoing her cry for the Holy Spirit to move.”
This story was originally published December 18, 2019 at 3:12 PM with the headline "Family and church pray to resurrect 2-year-old California girl pronounced dead."
