miracles

Did You Know?

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The Christmas song “Mary, Did You Know” asks Mary, the mother of Jesus, a series of questions. “Did you know your baby boy would one day walk on water? Give sight to a blind man? Calm a storm? Raise the dead? Restore hearing and health? Save us from our sins? I would have asked, “Mary, when did you know?”

Of course, when Jesus was first born, she had no idea. All she knew was that God had a plan, and she was honored to play a role. But as Jesus was growing up, she had to have seen him do things that other children couldn’t do. I think that is what prompted her to ask Jesus to do something at the wedding when the hosts were running out of wine. She probably didn’t know what he would do but knew he could do something. (See John 2:1-11)

Do you know the power of Jesus? Have you heard of his power and glory? Do you believe? Jesus cares about you and what you go through daily. He is Lord of the extraordinary as well as the ordinary. What are you facing that you need him to step in and do something about? I’m sure you have no idea what he will do but know he can do something.

I have been amazed more than once by how God has worked things out in my life—an unexpected check, a job in an area I wasn’t even looking into, etc. I knew he could do miracles, and because I knew, I asked! What do you need Jesus to do? Ask because now you know.

(“Mary, Did You Know” songwriters: Mark Lowry, & Buddy Greene.)

Copyright © 2024 Mark Brady. All rights reserved.

CSI: Heaven

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Image generated via A.I.

I used to drive fast.  I mean, really fast, or perhaps I should say, “stupidly fast!”  In the early eighties, in Massachusetts, I was driving my Chevette.  Okay, you can stop laughing now.  As I was going up a hill and into a sharp turn to my left, I saw a car coming fast, straight for me in my lane.  It was going to be a head-on collision, and I said to myself, oh, this is going to hurt!  But right before the point of impact, I shut my eyes hard and screamed, “Oh God!”

My car kept moving around the bend in the road, but my body got pushed back into the seat and then forward.  I remember thinking, what?  When I looked in my rearview mirror, I saw that the car was so close behind me that I couldn’t see the license plate.  Did the other vehicle go through me?

Suppose you could go back and examine the scenes of your life.  The ones that astounded you, surprised you or perhaps hurt you the most.  You might be compelled to look for clues to answer those nagging, lingering questions like, “How did this happen?”

If you could dust the scene for fingerprints to find out who was involved, you know, like a crime scene investigator, would it surprise you if you detected God’s fingerprints?

Not that He was the one who did the damage, but that He was there.  Most likely keeping you from being killed or injured more severely.  Perhaps it was he who got you out of there or got you help in a timely manner.  How many times have you shared your story and have heard people respond something like, “Wow, God was definitely with you.”

I think we will all be surprised when we learn how God was involved in our lives.  Either he did it because he loves those who call him Father, or he did it hoping you would feel his involvement and choose to love him back.  Either way, he did it out of love!

“The Lord your God is in your midst;
he is a warrior who can deliver.
He takes great delight in you;
he renews you by his love;
he shouts for joy over you.”
Zephaniah 3:17 (NET Bible)

Copyright © 2024 Mark Brady. All rights reserved.

How Many?

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A friend recommended a good movie for me to watch the other day. He did say it was a tear-jerker, but he failed to suggest I go first to Costco to stock up on tissues! I’ll admit it. I cried my eyes out mainly because it touched several hurts from my past.

The Hill is a 2023 American biographical sports drama film about baseball player Rickey Hill overcoming a physical handicap in order to try out for a legendary major league scout.*

While watching the movie, there was one line that got my attention. “How many miracles do you need to see?” asked Ricky’s mother to his father (played by Dennis Quaid). The line made me wonder about those who struggle to believe in God.

I know God loves everyone. He may not like how they live, but He still loves them. Knowing just how much He loves, I know He has pursued you and others to the uttermost parts of the Earth, trying to reach you. If you were honest and thought back, you would most likely see countless times God has had his hand in your life. How many times he may have saved you from hurt, pain, or even death! How many miracles do you need to see?

“Suppose one of you had a hundred sheep and lost one. Wouldn’t you leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the lost one until you found it? When found, you can be sure you would put it across your shoulders, rejoicing, and when you got home call in your friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Celebrate with me! I’ve found my lost sheep!’ Count on it—there’s more joy in heaven over one sinner’s rescued life than over ninety-nine good people in no need of rescue. Luke 15:4-7 (MSG)

Stop running from God. Stop resisting his love. When an old friend learned that I was a “Christian,” she remarked in disgust, “How many times am I going to bump into one?” It took me a moment to understand what she was saying. But when I did, I responded with, “Well, can’t you see how much God loves you? Every time you disregard one friendship with a “Christian,” God puts another one in your life. He wants to show you his love for you through them!” Sadly, I, too, was thrown away, but I did not take it personally.

“The one who listens to you, listens to me. The one who rejects you, rejects me. And rejecting me is the same as rejecting God, who sent me.” Luke 10:16 (MSG)

Watch The Hill and watch for God’s love in your life. But this time, accept it! God loving us is a miracle in itself!

*via Wikipedia

Copyright © 2024 Mark Brady  All Rights Reserved

Don’t Follow the Recipe

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April made the dinner in the photo the other day. She made sweet and sour chicken that I thought was better than most Chinese restaurants’ versions, and I would know. I asked her how she did it and she replied, “I just followed a recipe.” It’s funny though how you can give 12 cooks the same recipe and the final dishes will all taste differently. Most likely due to each individual’s uniqueness.

A few years ago, while attending a church service that featured a semi-famous man of God, I witnessed individuals taking notes, as if they were there to learn the recipe of how to get God to do the same thing in their lives as He had done for them. They failed to realize the man of God was giving his testimony in hopes to boost one’s faith. Knowing that God did something for one can help you believe that God can do something big in your own life.

When one such note-taker tries to implement the same practice in the exact same way but fails to get the same result they can become disgruntled and dissatisfied with God. Attitudes Satan can use to draw an individual away from God.

Keep in mind, that God is extremely creative. He does things in unique ways. Not because He gets bored, but to exhibit just how vast his power and imagination are. He likes to do things in new ways. He may ultimately do for you, what He did for the man of God, but He will do it in a new, fresh way. In a way that is most likely due to each individual’s uniqueness.

See, I am doing a new thing!
    Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? Isa. 43:19a (NIV)

God’s word assures us He likes to do new things.

Copyright © 2022 Mark Brady.  All rights reserved.

Flakes of God

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As this past Christmas was April’s first in America, she was just as excited when she heard we could have snow. Growing up in the Philippines it would be her first time to see it, feel it, and see its beauty as it covers the ground. As I witnessed her enthusiasm I thought of people who have heard about God, but have never seen him, or felt his presence.

I have known some people that seem to stay on the fringes of God. They might even hear that God is at a certain location doing marvelous signs and wonders, but despite their own need for him, they won’t go.  They might need a healing, a place to live, or a job, but it’s as if they would rather continue to struggle and hurt on their own then accept Him, and truly know what real living is all about.  They settle for only “flakes of God”. They have never sensed his presence or have experienced the peace of his Spirit, and they have no idea how beautiful it is when their sins have been covered as white as snow.

Come now and let’s deliberate over the next steps to take together.
Yahweh promises you over and over:
“Though your sins stain you like scarlet,
I will whiten them like bright, new-fallen snow!
Even though they are deep red like crimson,
they will be made white like wool!” Isaiah 1:18 (TPT)

I heard this morning there is a chance of snow later this week. Hopefully this next front coming through will generate some accumulation instead of only flakes, or flurries, and perhaps provide enough snow so April can learn how to make a snowman, or a snow angel. I’m forecasting there is a move of God coming soon. I sense He wants to make himself known.  He wants to heal, He wants to rule and reign in the life of those who love him. I pray for those who have not ever experienced God in a personal way will seek him, and know for themselves what it is like to have their sins forgiven, and be white as snow.

Copyright © 2022 Mark Brady.  All rights reserved.

It’s Christmas at Denny’s Tonight

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I dream of what my life might have been, if only…

Do you live with regret?  I could, if I allowed myself to.  I sometimes wonder what the church would look like if I had stayed on track and became the pastor I believed God had called me to be.  Would we, the people of the church be an Acts chapter 2 type of church?  Believing in, and walking out the power of the Holy Spirit.  Would we see souls saved daily?  What about signs and wonders?  If only.

But instead, I stopped holding on to, waiting for the promises of God, and I accepted the devil’s substitute for my life, because it was there, now, in the moment.  I just had to believe the lies he was telling me that it was okay.  Kind of like accepting the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden.  As I mentioned in my last blog post, Satan tempts or attacks us where we are weak.

Life didn’t end there, for me, as I imagined it would.  I could have become a shell of a man.  I didn’t.  I received God’s forgiveness, asked that his Spirit not depart from me, and moved on.  That is what one should do when things don’t work out the way we think they should.

I read a post on Facebook the other day.  A young woman just had a child in the hospital, but after returning home her and her husband came down with Covid.  The baby was fine, but had to be separated from his new mother.  The baby’s father had to return to the hospital, this time in the intensive care unit.  The young mother wrote something along the lines of, “We dreamed of hiking in the mountains with a tour guide.  But now we are hiking through this with the Lord as our guide.”

Life is not going the way they dreamed, but her focus remains on target.  On the Lord.

That is the only way to deal with potential regret.  Give it to him, and continue to seek him for guidance, for his leading.  He knows the way.  Life may feel like Christmas at Denny’s, but it doesn’t have to.  It comes down to your perspective.  Your view of life.  Is your current situation a set back?  A delay?  A roadblock, or simply a detour?  No matter what it is, God can speak into your spirit and say, “Recalculating.”  God knows the way.  He will get you through the storm and to the other side.

Trust in the Lord completely,
    and do not rely on your own opinions.
    With all your heart rely on him to guide you,
    and he will lead you in every decision you make.
Become intimate with him in whatever you do,
    and he will lead you wherever you go Prov. 3:5-6 (TPT)

Copyright © 2021 Mark Brady.  All rights reserved.

Looking For Jesus (Part 3)

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Elizabeth.  The Virgin Mary’s cousin.  Elizabeth and her husband, Zachariah were quite old, and childless.  They lived honorably before God, yet while on a normal day, at work, when an unannounced angel appeared to him in the temple of God, he was frightened.  Of course the angel said, “Fear not.”  The angel went on to inform Zachariah that his wife would become pregnant with a son, and he was to name him, “John”.  Then the angel continued and gave him instructions for John and told his life cause was to prepare the people for God.  He returned home, and I’m sure he had a difficult time getting his wife to join him in the bedroom, but soon after Elizabeth got pregnant.

I love how God takes everyday, ordinary people to join him in doing some of his most extraordinary work.  “How?” you ask. “Really?  You don’t think God can use you, that you have nothing to offer?  Watch God.  You’re never too old, too short, too tall, too under resourced, or too anything.  All God needs from you is a willing heart.  One that has been given to him.

I had a similar experience when I was married to my first wife.  In a dream I was told our first “born” child would be a boy, and that we were to name him, “Joshua David”, and he was to be a spiritual warrior.  We lost our first child after 9 or 10 weeks of pregnancy, and sure enough, our first born was a son.  You can bet we had no problem picking out his name.  And I am holding God to his word that my son will be what God has called him to be.

Zachariah, being a priest of Judah, had to have known the heart of God’s chosen people were turning away.  He and his wife had been waiting for so long for God to answer their prayers for their nation and for their own lives, but God did.  They certainly had no idea God would use them and their son to set people free from sin.  In fact, I love what Elizabeth says.

Elizabeth, conceived. She went off by herself for five months, relishing her pregnancy. “So, this is how God acts to remedy my unfortunate condition!” she said.  Luke 2:25 (MSG)

Mary went to see Elizabeth and to announce her own pregnancy.  I’m sure Mary knew what had happened to her cousin, and would have no problem believing her own testimony, because of it.  The scriptures say that when Elizabeth heard the news of Mary the baby she was carrying leaped.

Elizabeth was not only looking for her own son, John, but now of a greater one her son would later say he was not worthy to untie the straps of his sandals.  She too was looking for Jesus.

It seems some people have a hard time accepting and believing Truth.  When they hear how much God loves them and that He gave his only son to die on a cross for them.  I think the reason is they try to figure out God with their natural minds, but God is spiritual.

This Christmas season, and always, look harder for Jesus.  Expect and believe even when it doesn’t make sense.  Look for your healing.  For the salvation of your family and friends.  For the future of your children, or for the financial miracle you desperately need.  Who knows?  You may soon be responding like Elizabeth, “So, this is how God acts to remedy my unfortunate condition!”

Copyright © 2020 Mark Brady.  All rights reserved.