The Miracle Box

    Psalm 127:3 – “Children are a gift from the Lord.” (NLT)   Ephesians 2:10 – “For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. (NIV)    Fifty years ago, most couples married relatively young, compared to today. This was true for my parents. They were both twenty-one at the time. My mother was a strong believer in Jesus Christ and she brought my father to God through their relationship. And as most couples did back then, they also immediately began to try to have a family. However, after a few of years of trying it just wasn’t happening. In fact, after five years, they ended up going to a doctor and having tests run. The doctor’s sad conclusion was that they would never be able to have children.    This was devastating news to both of them, but my mom accepted the situation with grace. She believed in God having a plan for them and that He would do what was best in His own tim...

  The Christian Indie Publishers Association announced today that my book, A LITTLE FAITH: A FATHER'S MIRACLE STORY OF FAITH, HOPE, LOVE, AND A MICRO PREEMIE won the 2021 Christian Indie Award for Best Biography/Memoir. I'm very honored and humbled for the book to get this kind of recognition from peers, readers, and publishers. Thanks everyone for all your support. All glory to God! You'll find more information on the book at https://www.beliefbooks.com Blessings, Bob 

  "Proven Wrong by God. Again."        We lay there in the pitch-black living room sprawled about on couches and chairs. A bunch of 17-year-old boys chilling after a night of “going out.” It was 3 am.   We were now ruminating on the general topic of girls, girlfriends, and marriage. I declared into the dark something like, “I can’t see any good reason to get married.” I can’t remember if anyone commented back. Maybe everyone else was asleep. I continued with assurance however, “That’s not for me.”        It was the first of many times that God would prove me wrong. Eighteen months later I was at the altar saying, “I do” to the woman I’ve been married to for eleven years and share three wonderful kids with.        That summer of my negative proclamation about marriage, I took a job at a new pizza place that had opened in a local shopping center. They were hiring lots of high school kids as hosts and servers...

Did you ever read a story in the Bible that made you sad? This one did to me. Matthew 13:54-58   - Coming to his hometown, Jesus began teaching the people in their synagogue, and they were amazed. “Where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers?” they asked. “Isn’t this the carpenter’s son? Isn’t his mother’s name Mary, and aren’t his brothers James, Joseph, Simon and Judas? Aren’t all his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all these things?” And they took offense at him. But Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his own town and in his own home.” And he did not do many miracles there because of their lack of faith. Every time I read this I feel sad. At first, I wasn’t sure why. I do remember reflecting on those people in Jesus’ hometown and thinking, How could they not believe in Him when they saw all this? Miracles! Healings! Amazing teaching! As I thought about it though, I realized many of us sometimes do the same thin...

  The Man Who Just Showed Up   Immediately after graduation from college I got my first job. I was twenty-two and was slated to be the director of a chapter of InteVarsity Christian Fellowship on a college campus in a small city in North Carolina.   Now that I had a job, I wanted to build some equity, so with a little help from my parents I bought a small run-down house in a rougher part of my new town. As it turns out, it was a lot rougher than I had thought.   My neighbors were very sweet, but across the street was a brothel and I actually took occupancy of my house by removing a prostitute and all her drug paraphernalia. Drug dealers routinely used the sidewalk in front of my new house to do their transactions. I often heard gun shots. The neighborhood was full of abandoned houses. I was the only white person for blocks.   The house itself was a real renovation project. No electricity. No running water. It should have been a tear-down, but bein...

Many years ago, when I was a graduate student at Wheaton College in Illinois, I worked as a waitress at a restaurant, paying for my tuition and apartment out of my job so that when I graduated, I wouldn’t have any debt. With that arrangement, there wasn’t a lot of extra money. In fact, one year, it was coming up on Christmas and I had no way to get home to Massachusetts to be with my family. I had a car, but it was not in good enough shape to get all the way home. I didn’t have a ride either, but there was a bus going to Boston from Wheaton in a couple of days. I worked all the shifts that I could get at the restaurant, saving up my tips, and hoping to get enough for that bus fare. The night before the payment was due for the bus to reserve my seat, I paid my bills and ended up with no extra money at all. In fact, I got down to the point, literally, where I had one dollar. It looked like I was going to have to spend Christmas by myself in my apartment. I was praying about it a ...

                                                                   Photo by Szilvia Basso on Unsplash   There are many modern miracles which we've been sharing here on The Miracle Blog, but of course there are many recorded in the Bible as well. One of my favorites is from Mark 9:17-27. 17 A man in the crowd answered, “Teacher, I brought you my son, who is possessed by a spirit that has robbed him of speech. 18 Whenever it seizes him, it throws him to the ground. He foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth and becomes rigid. I asked your disciples to drive out the spirit, but they could not.” 19 “You unbelieving generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy to me.” 20 So they brought him. When the spirit saw Jesus, it...