Needing a Miracle... Advent Day 4

Sweetheart, you want to hear about a miracle? My husband across the ocean tenderly asks our daughter over skype.

Yes, please, Daddy. Please, I need one. It's an honest polite cry. It's almost desperate. 

We have all been there once or twice in our journey. Needing a miracle that is. Needing to know that the God who fed the thousands, will still feed me today. To know that the God who healed the woman with the bleeding disease will still heal today. We know He can. It's just if He will?

My husband's oral chemo drug that he's on is hurting his kidneys. The Thai oncologist wants him off his medication to give his kidneys a break. I'm not thrilled about that. But the kidney specialist here says his kidneys may never recover. What are you supposed to do? When you're making a decision between bad and worse. When you're tempted to say to God, why are we talking about this in the first place? I hate the c word. Cancer. But the fear of it returning again can be cancer of my soul. Threatening to eat away all hope, the shreds of faith that remain. Maybe that's worse. Fear can be the biggest enemy. The writer of Psalm 143 speaks to this. He understands, "rescue me from my enemies,  I run to You to hide me." Amen. You hide me. 

The people of God were needing a miracle, too. They needed a Savior to come and deliver them. They had cried so long, collectively they had cried for thousands of years. God, do you hear?

But you see if I just am looking for the big miracle, like healing from cancer forever, the no more medication, no more ct scans or blood draws, no more holding my breath for test results kind of miracle, then I might miss those small miracles that come. Like kidney function returning to normal. As my husband curls up in the emergency room after a blood draw, the miracle is that his test results reveal his kidneys are back to normal. Like strength to endure the 3 hour flight to my parents' home where he can seek medical care for his back. Like the five minutes he can stand and walk around today after 4 days of not being able to sustain any position other than kneeling in prayer. The miracle is a faith that is still clinging to God.

Yes, please, I want to hear of a miracle. 

Hearing this builds faith. In the community of God we each speak our tiny miracles, and by doing so we call out faith. We say, hang on. He is coming. Emmanuel, He is mighty to save. We say when you can't hang on I will hang on for you. When hoping is hard, we hope for one another. And slowly, we see the miracle. Broken people calling out faith in one another. That's a miracle. 

   photo courtesy of my daughter who has the gift of seeing tiny miracles 

I