There is a marvelous miracle described in Willa Cather's book, Death Comes for the Archbishop. In the story, Father Junipero and his friend, Father Andrea, set out on a journey through a Mexican desert with bread and water for one day. On the second day, they are beginning to lose heart when, near sunset, they see in the distance three very tall cottonwood trees. They rush toward the trees and see a little house. An old Mexican comes out of the house, greets them kindly, and asks them to stay the night. Inside the little house the man's young wife is stirring porridge by the fire. Her young son is beside her playing with a pet lamb. The family shares their supper with the priests, then gives them sheepskins to use for sleeping on the floor. The next morning when they awake, the family is gone, presumably caring for their sheep. Food was set out on the table. The priests eat and continue on their way.
When the brothers at the monastery hear Father Junipero's story, they say they know of the place with the three tall cottonwoods, but insist there is no house there. So Father Junipero and Father Andrea take some of the brothers and travel back to the place. The three tall trees are there, shedding their cotton, but there is no house and no family. The two priests sink down on their knees and kiss the earth, for they know it was the Holy Family that had entertained them there. Father Junipero recalled how he had bent to bless the child after evening prayers. The little boy had lifted his hand and with a tiny finger had made the sign of the cross on Father Junipero's forehead.1
Stories like this can make believers out of skeptics. In the book, those who hear about Father Junipero's miracle develop such an affection for this story that it brings them pleasure for the rest of their days. That's what the story of a miracle does. It strengthens faith through the pleasure of just remembering it.
We could also say that a miracle is one of those times when things get out of control in a good way. God interrupts our orderly existence with something wonderful that doesn't fit our notions of orderliness. We need those moments in our memories for when things go out of control in a bad way. For each one of us, there comes a day when we feel like our lives have been hijacked by bad news. We go along day after day doing our best. We raise our children, take our vitamins, get our exercise, and pay our bills on time. The years go by, and we begin to think that we are in control of our lives, that things will turn out okay. We just need to do our best. Then one day everything changes. The blood test comes back positive for leukemia. Our son gets arrested for selling drugs. A big investment goes sour. One moment we feel in control of our lives and in the next we feel trapped inside of a car zooming down a highway with no brakes.
There have been times when I have said, "I think I have lost control of my life." I've heard others say it. But you cannot lose something you never really had. I know I was never really in control. What I have lost, when things go bad, is the illusion that I was in control. It's a hard lesson to learn. We humans come with built-in limitations. We cannot walk on the sea. We cannot fly. We cannot undo tragedy. We cannot control what happens to us. What we can do is to choose how we will react when the bad times come. The Bible gives us some help with that.
When Jesus and his disciples are out on the sea and a storm comes up, the disciples are terrified. Jesus is sleeping. They wake him up and scold him for not caring that they are about to die. Jesus gets up and stretches and yawns and says, "You still don't get it, do you? You don't need to be afraid. You just need faith."
Or take today's story. Jairus, a leader of the synagogue, falls at Jesus feet. He too is suffering from something he cannot control, the mortal illness of his daughter. "Come and heal my girl," he begs Jesus, "so she can live." Then the worst that can happen happens. Word comes that she is dead. Jesus says to this devastated father, "Don't be afraid. Just have faith."
Only two things: don't be afraid and have faith. This isn't just a word for Jairus or for the disciples in the storm. It's a word for us. It's a word for us when we have our noses smashed up against the things in life we cannot control. We want to control our lives and we'd like to control God. If we controlled God, we could get a miracle when we need one. But these miracle stories are not about control. They are stories about what God is like and how God acts. Mark wrote the stories down so that we would know that Jesus was no ordinary man. Mark wanted people to have faith so they would have strength to function when things got out of control. Mark wanted them to know that even when Jesus is gone he still has the power to still the storms of our lives and raise us out of a living death to life again. We have two choices. Either we can be afraid or we can have faith. And, of course, it is never that easy.
Frederick Buechner was right when he said that miracles do not cause us to believe so much as believing brings forth miracles.2 When we believe, we begin to find God in things as ordinary as each other and the world around us. That's possible even when things are bad. When we give up the illusion of control then we can better see God's out-of-control grace.
Thornton Wilder wrote a play titled Our Town. When Emily Webb comes back from the dead to the town of her childhood, she finds all her long-dead acquaintances alive and her mother and father, too. The town is still the same as she remembers it when she was a child. Except for one thing. The sheer beauty and wonder of everything she sees is overwhelming. Every sight and sound, every gesture of love, each tender grace between friends is almost too much for her to bear. She never realized the miracle of her life when she was living it.
Faith is strengthened through the pleasure that comes from remembering the miracle stories. But not just that. When we choose faith over control, we have a much better chance of experiencing those miracles of God's grace all around us right now. Amen.
1. Willa Cather, Death Comes for the Archbishop (New York: Random House, 1927), pp. 277-281.
2. Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking (New York: Harper & Row, 1972), p. 63.