Common Day Miracles

I am totally convinced that we as Christians are so oblivious to the things around us that we are constantly missing every day miracles. Yes, I believe that miracles happen today. The Holman Illustrated Bible Dictionary defines miracle as, Events which unmistakably involve an immediate and powerful action of God designed to reveal His character or purposes. We are constantly being barraged with images, sounds, technology, information, and just noise in general that we don’t see the miracle. We don’t hear the miracle. We have become so immune to the wonder of who God is and how he works that we take things for granted.


For example, every time a healthy baby is born is an everyday miracle. Do you know how many things can go wrong on just one chromosome much less multiple chromosomes at the same time? Do you know how often babies are born without necessary parts or malfunctioning parts?

The fact that you were able to hear your alarm this morning, move your body to turn it off, grumble about getting out of the bed requires your brain that never sleeps or stops working to utilize your ears to hear and distinguish what was heard. Your brain then has to send messages to your arm and hand to turn the blasted alarm off. Then your brain processes thoughts and moves your vocal folds by forcing air from your lungs. Do you know how many people on this earth cannot do those things?

We have become so entitled-oriented that we actually believe that we deserve to hear, see, breathe, and move on our own. We have become so self-reliant that we have factored out the grace of God in our daily survival on this planet.

But what if God put big miracles in your life? Someone healed. A gift out of nowhere. A provision without notice. Do you feel entitled to those? Do you think you could ever get used to seeing people miraculously healed? Do you think you would ever become mundane about the work that God is doing in the lives of fellow believers?

In Acts, the Holy Spirit has been doing miracles through Paul. If Paul used a kerchief to wipe his sweat, someone would take that sweaty kerchief to someone who needed healing, and they were healed! When I was a kid I remember watching Elvis Presley do a concert on tv from Hawaii. I remember him wiping his face with those scarves and then throwing them in the audience. Women would fight for those things and swoon! REALLY!? His scarves never healed anyone of anything.

In Acts 20, Paul was in Troas, and he was planning on leaving the next day, and apparently he still had a lot to say, so he was teaching and preaching into the wee hours of the morning. There was a boy sitting in the window sill about three stories up, and bless his heart, he just couldn’t keep his eyes open any longer. He fell into a deep sleep, and since there was no glass on the window he plummeted to his death. Say what? Have you ever heard this story? It’s true. It starts in verse 7. Talk about a scene stealer! Having taught and spoken in public I’m just telling you it would be hard to recover from something like this. Paul ran down stairs and threw himself on the boy, putting his arms around. Another miracle, the boy was alive. The Bible says in verse 11 and 12 that they went back upstairs and ate and continued talking till daylight. Verse 12 says, The people took the young man home alive and were greatly comforted.

After raising the boy to life, they ate. I don’t think they were ungrateful, but they were used to seeing miracles performed by God through Paul that they didn’t know to expect anything different. Entitlement and expecting are two different things. Entitlement says, I deserve this or you owe me this debt. Expecting means, they looked to God expecting and wanting him to do a miracle. They were comforted by this miracle. My guess is they were grateful too.

Squire Rushnell wrote a book, When God Winks. In it he describes how God let’s us know that he’s with us or guiding us by providing little winks. Doors are opened or closed. Provisions are given or taken away. A person is brought into your life for a reason or a season and then is gone. These are all God’s handiwork revealing some part of himself to you. Are you getting it? Are you seeing it? Are you catching it? If you aren’t, pray and ask God to open your eyes because you don’t want to miss out on these miracles.