Our Heavenly Father is truly a God of miracles. That is one fact that has become blatantly clear to me in the past couple weeks.
One of the references that we use in the LDS church is called the Bible dictionary. It explains/clarifies many of the terms and ideas that are used in the Bible, along with some terms the way they are used in the church. I really like the way that the Bible dictionary describes miracles. The first little bit:
"Miracles:
An important element in the work of Jesus Christ, being not only divine acts, but forming also a part of the divine teaching. Christianity is founded on the greatest of all miracles, the resurrection of our Lord. If that be admitted, other miracles cease to be improbable."
True statement. The Savior's sacrifice to save us from our sins coupled with His resurrection is an event that we call the Atonement. The Atonement is the most crucial part of God plan for us because it makes it possible for us to return to Him. What a miracle!! The idea that one individual could provide us with forgiveness and salvation mind boggling; it's something that I think we may never fully understand.
However when we come to believe that amazing miracle, then indeed "other miracles cease to be improbable." Recently I have seen miracles, such as one amazing instance of healing.
I have a very close friend who suffered from a condition called OCD. Anyone ever watch the show Monk? Yeah they joke around about him having OCD, but when it's in real life it's not so funny. To this friend of mine, things would become inexplicably dirty. It was like a contamination that spread everywhere from object to object. Someones pen might be dirty, then they'd set it on the desk, which would become dirty, then in their backpack, which became dirty and so on. He could clean things when he had the chance, but it got out of control to the point that most places near his home were, in his mind, filthy. He couldn't get away!
Well he and I and others who knew had been praying for him for a while. We had faith that the Lord could cure him. Have you read the Bible? Have you read the Book of Mormon? How many people did Jesus heal? My friend and I both have faith in miracles.
One morning he was looking at a picture of the Savior. Quietly the question came to his mind, "do I really believe in the Atonement?" Right away he responded, "yes."
Boom. It was done. That was it. This condition that had been plaguing him for so long was gone in one instance of the Saviors healing.
Miracles are real and happen more now than ever before.
Hello and good morning Elder Ellison.
ReplyDeleteI had read about Elders and Sisters getting all missiony on teh innertubz on a forum (whewww, that conversation has been fun to lurk and read heehee) and I decided to go and check them out.
So far yours is the first one I have felt like going back in and reading back to the beginning. although really th3e beginning wasnt that far back but still...:D
You write well, use personal anecdotes and thoughts, and tie a lesson into that rather than just blogging the Discussions. well done.
I look forward to reading more, and will definitely keep your blog in mind when non-member friends and family inquire about us.
Be well
Naebug