ON SLOW MIRACLES
Sometime it’s an instant miracle. God parting the red sea. A one-shot testimony, beginning and middle and end all wrapped up in one powerful, redemptive, and faith-filled story.
Sometimes it’s a slow one. Forty years in the wilderness. A meandering story of trials and triumphs over time, chapters started but unfinished.
But here’s the thing: it’s a miracle all the same.
And I don’t think we realize it.
I mean, of course we don’t. A slow miracle doesn’t fit into our cultural definition of miracle. A miracle is an extraordinary event, a surprising and unexpected saving through divine intervention. It is sight restored, relationships instantly healed, angels encountered. It is not, according to definition, feeling, for the first time, the hidden grief you locked away over your childhood abuse. It is not, according to definition, brushing your teeth every day for a week when depression has you in a chokehold. It is most certainly not, according to definition, the daily fight against the temptation to self-harm. It is not, according to definition, the faithful showing up when you want to throw it all away.
And maybe it’s the therapist in me, my training that allows me to see just how big these moments are, but these are miracles. I want to shout it from the rooftop: that thing, that thing that feels so small? It’s a miracle! I want to zoom in on your choice to show up and say: Do you see it? It’s a miracle! I want to buy you flowers when you choose to eat on a day your eating disorder acts up because it’s a miracle. I want to grab your hands when you choose to pray instead of shut down because it’s a miracle.
We like the neat and tidy story of the miraculous. We like the fireworks, the stunning, the surprising. We like the roar of the ocean parting, the sound of the Israelites’ feet marching over the sandy ground to safety.
It’s funny how easy it is to forget that the Israelites were enslaved in Egypt for a few hundred years before this miracle. It’s easy to forget that they wandered for forty years in the wilderness after that, angsty and bored of manna (another miracle) before reaching the promised land and watching the walls of Jericho fall down (yeah, miracle).
It’s our human nature to brush over the painful in between. In our pain we forget that our God is the God of all things, not just big things, and so we lose sight of the slow miracles happening all around us. It doesn’t feel miraculous, to show up to a therapy appointment or to receive prayer from a friend. But I can’t shake that it is, that it is miraculous to partner with God when we’re in the mysterious in between.
So, this is for you if you’re living a slow miracle, if you’re camping out in the space between pain and healing, wondering when God is going to just do the darn thing. He’s doing it right as you read this. And maybe the journey doesn’t look like how you’d expect, or you’re worried he’s forgotten you. The journey never looks like we’d expect (I wish it would), and he hasn’t (he never leaves you). Keep being faithful to the slow miracle. It matters just as much as the big ones.
Questions to explore:
What slow miracles are happening in my life right now?
Where am I longing for God to miraculously intervene? Has he intervened in small ways I haven’t taken the time to notice?
What slow miracles have I experienced in the past?
ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTOR:
Alexandra is a registered clinical counsellor and the Director of Relate Church Counselling. She enjoys reading, practicing martial arts, and embracing slow mornings with coffee. She shares writing and other creative pursuits on Instagram at @alexandrajfuller.
