“What the gospel does is make the miracle routine and the routine a miracle.”
Eugene Peterson
More and more, the thing that seems most true in life is the and of things. God can do miracles—more than we imagine possible—and at the same time, God is present in the most mundane, routine parts of our everyday lives. Of course, not everyone will receive the miracle they are hoping for, and not every problem will be solved, but God does break through into our lives in startling and ordinary ways.
Frederick Bencher often wrote about this. In his autobiography, he writes about a tough time in his life. His daughter was ill, and things were not going well. One day, he was sitting in his car, parked by the side of the road. The burden was heavy upon him, and suddenly, out of nowhere, a car came down the road. As it passed by him, he could not help but notice its license plate. Buechner writes, “ [It} bore on it the one word out of all the words in the dictionary that I needed most to see exactly then. The word was TRUST.”(1)
I recall having a similar experience. It was a dark, foggy morning. I was on the way to the hospital with a loved one who was ill. It was a time of uncertainty. I remember very clearly approaching a stop sign near the hospital. As we slowed to stop, all I could see through the fog was the car in front of us. It had a white bumper sticker: “Prayer changes everything.” Then I looked closer as the car remained still, waiting for the car in front of it to pass. Next to the bumper sticker, the car’s license plate said PRAYR. At that moment, a feeling of love and grace showered over me. I knew that God was breaking through to me.
Buechner also writes, “I don’t know what it means to love God. Really, I’m not at all good at it. But I think one of the things it means is, just as in the case of loving anybody else, you stop and watch and wait. Listen for God. Stop and watch and wait for him…Be open to the possibility that God is with you in ways that, unless you have your eyes open, you may never glimpse…Draw near to him as best you can.” (2)
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Frederick Buechner, Telling Secrets: A Memoir
Frederick Buechner, The Remarkable Ordinary: How to Stop, Look, and Listen to Life