Let me say something about that word: miracle. For too long it’s been used to characterize things or events that, though pleasant, are entirely normal. Peeping chicks at Easter time, spring generally, a clear sunrise after an overcast week – a miracle, people say, as if they’ve been educated from greeting cards. I’m sorry, but nope. Such things are worth our notice every day of the week, but to call them miracles evaporates the strength of the word.
Real miracles bother people, like strange sudden pains unknown in medical literature. It’s true: They rebut every rule all we good citizens take comfort in. Lazarus obeyed orders climbing up out of the grave – now there’s a miracle, and you can bet it upset a lot of folks who were standing around at the time. When a person dies, the earth is generally unwilling to cough him back up. A miracle contradicts the will of earth.
People often fear miracles because they fear being changed – though ignoring them will change you also. No miracle happens without a witness. Someone to declare, Here’s what I saw. Here’s how it went. Make of it what you will.
Miracles
Leif Enger, Peace Like a River
As the witness of many wonderful miracles, I can agree that they do change you forever. Especially years later when one remembers the miracle, long forgotten.
Sometimes, I think maybe I am more changed in the years later, in my reflecting, than I was in the time close to the miracle. Do you find that?
The times that I remember a miracle are varied: sometimes I only realize years later that soemthing even was a miracle. It is extremely humbling to see the hand of God at work at a time when perhaps I didn’t even believe that God cared about me.
Other times, a miracle happens and I am so overwhelmed by the moment – perhaps a narrowly avoided car collision or even the good news that the thing in my kid’s mouth is “just a cyst” – that I don’t immediately turn to God in thanksgiving. Hours (or days or even weeks) later, I guiltily realize that I haven’t said “thank you” and I have to beg forgiveness as well.
Other times, I recall the miracle and am just re-touched by the memory of how very closely God holds me in His hand. To me, it is like hearing “I love you” whispered in my ear.
I love the image of miracles as God’s way of holding our hand. I love the image of God the Grandfather, leaning over, picking something up for his little granddaughter, wiping off her scuffed knees.
I too often forget to say “thanks.” I’ll work really hard to make sure I’ve sent my thank you notes to friends and family who help me out all the time, but I will forget to sit down and give God the thank you note of my time and prayer.
Great insight, Michelle!