Did you go to church this week and ask God for a miracle? Awesome!! I'm here to tell you that God wants us to ask Him, He is limitless and can do anything we could ask and things we don't even know to ask for. Let me also give you a holy warning that hopefully reassures you in whatever answer you receive. You can't exist on miracles alone.
If you try to jump from one giant miracle to the next,
you'll binge on ecstasy in the miracle moments and starve for the longer moments in between.
Maybe miracles aren't what we should strive for anyway. I know that's confusing because there are TV preachers who base their whole ministries on teaching you how to "get" miracles all the time. They have a whole lot of followers because in our humanity, we WANT instant gratification. There are some people who prey on that.
Miracles are awesome and they glorify God but we often use them in order to prove our faith to ourselves and others. Magic tricks. See!! Look!! God is real, my cancer is gone. Well, the cancer in a Buddhist's body has miraculously left too. What now? God is still real. God is still real and good whether you die of cancer or die of old age. His "goodness" isn't dependent on Him performing the miraculous.
Miracles aren't for that purpose. Maybe what we should want MORE, on a DAILY basis are things like wisdom, endurance, joy, hope, faith, contentment.
Maybe we should highlight miracles when they happen but not spend our whole lives begging for them.
Because do miracles make us happy forever? Do they "do" in us is what we expect? Have you ever met a person who was miraculously healed who never had another problem? Who then floated through life?
One big miracle isn't a fix all or a guarantee of an easy life. Imagine being healed of a brain tumor, celebrating, watching others look at you in wonder and then experiencing the deepest depression for a reason you can't understand (not for any other reason than life is big and confusing and we aren't promised just one hard thing in life). Everyone is screaming you have no right to be depressed your life is the product of a miracle!! And you're like I know I know it's amazing and yet...why is it that before I begged to live...now I'm begging to die and I don't know why?
Oftentimes the following type of thinking happens (with myself and everyone):
If God would just heal my body, everything else would be ok. Everything else would line up.
If God would just heal my finances, everything else would be ok. Everything else would line up.
If God would just heal my marriage, everything else would be ok. Everything else would line up.
If God would just heal my child's body, everything else would be ok. Everything else would line up.
Guess what? God could heal you of cancer COMPLETELY and then your house could burn down. Then what? Are you sure that "everything else would be ok" really means "God is always enough for me no matter what"? Because if God is always enough for you no matter what, then you can pray for a miracle, expect a miracle, but not base God's faithfulness off of how He answers.
IT'S THE HARDEST THING, I GET IT! I AM TERRIBLE AT LIVING THIS OUT!
Maybe we need to switch our thinking from desperation to consistency. Consistency even IN desperation. Contentment in any and all situations WHILE EXPECTING the supernatural AND saying, "But God...we will walk with you and be content in you...no matter what...no matter how you use our story to glorify yourself and bring others to you."
We live in this miracle culture
and while God is a God of miracles,
He's also a God who sustains us in sickness.
We should want the God of miracles
more than we want the miracles of God.
One day our bodies and everything we own on earth will eventually be gone.
Remains of a life.
But God remains.
Isaiah 40:8
His word will never wither away. Ultimately, everyone on earth who has been miraculously healed will die anyway. We need to wrap our minds around an eternal perspective so that when something happens where we cry out to him in agony, "OH GOD, I AM IN A TORTUOUS STATE, HEAL MY BODY/MY CHILD/MY LAND/MY MIND..." we can finish that cry with, "but God...Thy will be done."
If there is any other way, please;
nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.
So pray for the miraculous. Expect it. But you better not let the result of that prayer become your God. God hears every single prayer we've ever prayed. The answers just aren't always what we desire on earth. Seek God, seek God, seek God and thank Him for the wisdom we don't deserve.
On earth as it is in heaven.
No comments:
Post a Comment