The Middle of the Miracle

By Jessica Fuentes

Have you ventured into any grocery store this past week? The long checkout lines, empty food shelves and severe shortage of toilet paper have been hot button topics amongst our community and our nation. It seems like every time I turn around there’s something new that we’re all being encouraged not to panic-buy, and so we panic-buy it before everyone else can panic-buy it. 

Or maybe you’re one of those doomsday preppers or hardcore couponers and you’ve had a stockpile ready for weeks. Maybe what you’ve experienced this week isn’t a madhouse of a grocery store, but what feels like a madhouse of your personal life. Maybe your business is experiencing closures, your job is closing its doors, or your children are out of school for the foreseeable future. Maybe you’re scrambling to find childcare so that you can go back to work, or you’re trying to work from home while refereeing arguments over who gets the TV remote or who took what toy from who. Maybe 14 days of self quarantine with your spouse has you questioning God’s design for marriage, as you’re faced with each other's quirks and pet peeves for extended periods of time. Maybe your life just feels like a mess. That’s okay, I think we’ve all been there. We may all be there right now.

Psalm 9:10 says “Those who know your name trust in you- for you, Lord, have never forsaken those who seek you.” Finding ourselves in the middle of a mess can cause us to take our eyes off of Jesus and forget that we’re in the middle of a miracle. A virus isn’t strong enough to stop God from moving. It isn’t powerful enough to reverse the finished work of the cross. It isn’t convincing enough to cause the Lord to forsake us. So while we focus on what’s messy in our lives, we are missing what’s miraculous. Miracles aren’t just the acts of raising people from the dead or causing the blind to see. Miracles can be found in the everyday. In the good and the bad, in the order and the disorder. Maybe the miracle today was watching a teen help an elderly woman in the grocery store find toilet paper. Maybe the miracle was a timely word of appreciation or encouragement from your spouse or your boss when you felt like you were at a breaking point. Maybe your kids played together peacefully for a few hours, and we all know how that can feel like a miracle. 

I encourage you today to find the miracle in the mess. It’s similar to when you buy a new car. You may have never noticed how many Ford Fusions there are in your area until you bought one. This is because we tend to find what we’re looking for. I encourage you to find the miracles. They may not be as hard to see as we think they are.

Father, we thank you for the finished work of the cross. We thank you for your son Jesus and the comfort we have knowing that the end of our story is already written, and the victory is already ours. We thank you for not just securing our future, but for being ever present help in the right now. We focus our hearts on you today, and ask you to reveal to us the miracles in the mess. We praise you for all that you are- the comforter, the healer, the provider. We love you, Lord, and we love each other. Amen.

Jessica Fuentes

Grace City Worship