Expect Miracles
The God I worship is a God of miracles.
It becomes difficult, the older I grow, to believe in miracles. One of the few benefits of age in our youth-worshiping culture is that we develop strong intuition for patterns. Our life experiences and education implant in us an instinct for how things will turn out.
When I was babysitting the other day, I had the privilege of explaining to a very bright child that one of the reasons that babies play with their food is because they're learning. Their muscles are learning how to respond to electrical signals from the brain, and their eyes and fingers are learning about textures and consistencies and weight and gravity. Also, it's fascinating to watch cheerios scatter.
But sometimes our experiences do not serve us well. For instance, people with PTSD have learned incorrectly to anticipate assault, and they become (usually unnecessarily) hypervigilant long after the danger has passed. Anxiety, depression, abuse, and other long-term situations can likewise train our brains incorrectly.
Miracles are precisely those things which defy our understanding of patterns and consequences. We have learned to anticipate the mundane, and this can hamper our exercise of faith.
The God I worship is a God of miracles. He can do things that are unlikely, improbable, and unexpected. Not only CAN he do them, but he does. The subsequent question which taxes faith is "Will he?"
The answer is, unless there is a specific reason otherwise, yes. When we are seeking Christ and we involve Him in our problems, whether mundane or profound, we should expect the rules to change. That does not mean that we become exempt from misfortune, illness, death, or any of the standard fare of mortality, but that we can expect extraordinary aid in overcoming them, in seeing them in their true perspective, and in experiencing the joy that our prophet, President Nelson, described in October, 2016.
Any trial I face, for any reason (whether because of my mistake, someone else's mistake, or nature herself), the Lord has power over. He can move any hindrance, or sanctify it to my good, whether that hindrance is a mountain, a mental illness, or that careless thing I said in Sunday School yesterday.
It becomes difficult, the older I grow, to believe in miracles. One of the few benefits of age in our youth-worshiping culture is that we develop strong intuition for patterns. Our life experiences and education implant in us an instinct for how things will turn out.
When I was babysitting the other day, I had the privilege of explaining to a very bright child that one of the reasons that babies play with their food is because they're learning. Their muscles are learning how to respond to electrical signals from the brain, and their eyes and fingers are learning about textures and consistencies and weight and gravity. Also, it's fascinating to watch cheerios scatter.
But sometimes our experiences do not serve us well. For instance, people with PTSD have learned incorrectly to anticipate assault, and they become (usually unnecessarily) hypervigilant long after the danger has passed. Anxiety, depression, abuse, and other long-term situations can likewise train our brains incorrectly.
Miracles are precisely those things which defy our understanding of patterns and consequences. We have learned to anticipate the mundane, and this can hamper our exercise of faith.
The God I worship is a God of miracles. He can do things that are unlikely, improbable, and unexpected. Not only CAN he do them, but he does. The subsequent question which taxes faith is "Will he?"
The answer is, unless there is a specific reason otherwise, yes. When we are seeking Christ and we involve Him in our problems, whether mundane or profound, we should expect the rules to change. That does not mean that we become exempt from misfortune, illness, death, or any of the standard fare of mortality, but that we can expect extraordinary aid in overcoming them, in seeing them in their true perspective, and in experiencing the joy that our prophet, President Nelson, described in October, 2016.
Any trial I face, for any reason (whether because of my mistake, someone else's mistake, or nature herself), the Lord has power over. He can move any hindrance, or sanctify it to my good, whether that hindrance is a mountain, a mental illness, or that careless thing I said in Sunday School yesterday.
Comments
Post a Comment