Let's pick up where we left off last time with the ever lingering question, "Does God still perform miracles?" Well let me take you back to my college student days. (Which weren't too long ago). It was Winter break and my finances were dwindling so quickly I thought I would have to resort to standing on a corner, holding a sign, and begging for help! I was home for the holidays and my car insurance was due to be paid in the next couple of days.
I stressed, stressed, and stressed so more, knowing that my parents wouldn't have the funds to contribute so I did what I knew best; prayed and asked God to do something!
In order for you to fully get the situation, I had one hundred bucks in my account, my insurance was $117, and I was the type of person who would never ask for help. (Biggest mistake . . . Yes I know).
So, I didn't. Instead I asked the ultimate provider.
About a day later, I came home from my seasonal job and checked the mail. Between the stack of junk mail and bills, I found an envelope addressed to me from a law office out of New Jersey. I opened the envelope, bracing myself for bad news and was stunned to find a check for $120. I truly couldn't believe it. Was this some sort of joke? I read through the letter repeatedly looking for some sign of a scam or invalidity of the check, but it was real. A random $120 check confirmed for a struggling college student that her God was real and that he would provide.
Fast forward about two years and now I'm a teacher. The way I received a teaching position was a miracle in and of itself, or a curse to some; depending on your perspective but that's an entirely different story. Before you roll out the disclaimer banner saying, "Miracles only happen to you," listen to what happened next.
This miracle isn't about me at all but one of my students. Now in order to understand why this occurrence surprised me so much, you have to understand the state I was in. I'd gone to college to be a novelist, graduating at the top of my writing class only to be stuck teaching. Back then, I spent my days teaching and my nights writing young adult novels. I was adamant about becoming a book author and spending my days writing in a quaint little coffee house, but instead I got stuck in a classroom without windows, filled with a bunch of kids with germs. (No offense to my students, that's how I felt my first year).
As I applied to publishing houses, I prayed day and night that God would help me publish my book. For months I checked my email and begged God to answer my prayers but nothing happened.
Absolutely nothing!
I began to believe that God couldn't hear me, that he didn't care, or that he was just plain out ignoring me. That is until the day a student came to me and told me that her mom had been in the hospital dying over the past seven months because she needed a new liver. I gave her a hug and told her that I would pray for her mom; not understanding why she would share that type of information with me. I was just her teacher. She walked away, shoulders sagging and I returned to my desk in tears and started praying. What happens next shocked me.
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