For I will restore health unto thee, and I will heal thee of thy wounds, saith the Lord. . . . (Jeremiah 30:17)

I had dinner with two of my friends from college, Mirielle and Debbie. We met at a Tibetan restaurant and started catching up. We were all struggling to make ends meet and figure out what to do with our futures, but I saw quickly that Debbie had even worse struggles.

As she looked over the menu, she reached into her purse and pulled out a large color-coded card. “What is that?” I asked.
 “It’s the list of foods I can’t eat,” she said. She’d recently been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, and it was seriously restricting her diet.

Only a few minutes later, she mentioned something about a lump on her neck. Her doctor thought it was probably thyroid cancer. At our dismay, she tried to assure us that it would be no big deal to handle.

Then she started talking about her trip to Israel and was bursting with stories about visiting holy sites like the Wailing Wall; sharing in religious rituals; and having conversations with the Israelis she met, whom she thought were deeply spiritual people. Debbie had so much to feel victimized about, but all she wanted to talk about was how close she’d come to God.

Since that day, I’ve prayed for her health, but I’ve also prayed for myself. I’ve prayed for strength like Debbie’s, to appreciate God even when life is painful.

Thank You, God, for Your messengers who direct me back toward You.

I still remember the feeling of near panic that gripped me when I was asked, more than 30 years ago now, to write “a couple of devotionals” for a new book, a collection to be called Daily Guideposts.

The book would be written, the letter from the editors explained, by a variety of authors. “We’re looking for personal experiences to help the reader grow in faith.”

What could I possibly write about? Maybe other authors would have inspiring events to share, but what did my workaday life have to offer?

Cudgeling my memory, I finally recalled once when an elderly neighbor helped me see that days spent diapering babies and preparing meals were more important than I knew. Maybe her words would help other young mothers.

For weeks no more ideas came. Then I remembered a time of deep hurt when I’d come across an apple tree with a huge lightning scar. The tree, still growing, still producing fruit, had spoken to me about keeping on, wounds and all.

Those experiences were the only two I could think of that could possibly have meaning for anyone else, and I wrote them up. But the following year, the request for devotionals came again. How would I ever come up with new ones?

A letter from a friend got me thinking about how I hadn’t liked her at first, and that the change had come not when she did something nice for me but when I did something nice for her. After that I met a bonsai grower whose work taught me something about relating both to plants and to people.

I began to keep an eye out for these little epiphanies and to jot down notes about them. A gum wrapper on the sidewalk. A withered Christmas wreath. A conversation overheard in a luncheonette. Each one, as I learned to pay attention, had some insight to offer.

Still, when I was asked to provide not three or four but 12 devotionals a year, it seemed impossible. Surely these grace-filled episodes could not keep coming! Nobody’s life is that spiritually filled.

But they do keep coming, as affirmed by Daily Guideposts readers themselves. When I did a series on 12 favorite hymns, an alto in a cathedral choir wrote about the spiritual side of preparing to sing: “I’ve learned that praying the words is as important as getting the notes right.”

When I recounted a year-long experiment of thanking God each day for something I’d never thanked him for before, I was overwhelmed by stories of readers’ own experiences of gratitude. The softness of a dog’s fur, a smile from a tired cashier, “all the spots in my body that don’t hurt.” Our workaday lives are exactly where inspiration is found!

By now I’ve written more than 300 devotionals, and on my desk are two fat folders crammed with events, perceptions, observations of the world around me. “Only twelve?” I ask the editor wistfully as each year’s book is prepared.

I’ve learned what every Daily Guideposts writer and reader knows. There is nothing that happens to us, not a thing we see or hear or touch that God cannot use to show us more of himself. Our lives are a daily journey in his company, and Daily Guideposts is where we meet to share our adventures on the way.

Download your free ebook, Daily Devotionals: 7 Days of Bible Devotions to Strengthen Your Faith.

With God all things are possible. Matthew 19:26

Miracles are those biblical God-things of the past, right? That’s what some people believe.

While we may or may not experience the “mountain-moving” kind of miracles in our lifetime–the kind that leave your mouth gaping, your heart throbbing, and your doctor scratching his head in disbelief–does that negate Jesus’s power to accomplish them? Absolutely not!

As a Christian I’ve witnessed Jesus’s miracles in my own life. I’m sure you have too. But at times I may overlook the hidden ones. Jesus may send a God-thing on the wings of pain or interruption. Sometimes He sandwiches miracles into an ordinary day like the filling of an Oreo cookie. What a sweet, creamy surprise when we receive it as a gift from Him!

One problem in not recognizing miracles may be our shortsighted, earthly perspective. We pray for a raise or new job as a cure for our financial troubles and see no answer. But do we fail to connect the dots when repairs, doctor bills, and other usual expenses mysteriously disappear the next year? Sometimes the miracle may even arrive through God’s formation of Christ-like character in our own lives.

Jesus still does the impossible. Even He prayed for a miracle–some other way for His Father to accomplish salvation besides Jesus’s death (see Luke 22:42). But God controlled the power of life and death and planned a greater miracle: Jesus’s death and subsequent resurrection.

We ask and we wait… and then, like Jesus, we whisper that miracle prayer, “But if not… Thy will be done.”

Sometimes God gives us a knowing word. However, trusting God’s sovereignty is perhaps one of the hardest parts of the Christian life. Yet it’s truly where miracles begin.

Faith step: As you think back over the past year in your own life, what are some God-things you recognize as miracles? What are you trusting God for this year?

Weeping may last through the night, but joy comes with the morning. Psalm 30:5

Cancer struck more than 30 friends and family members in a three-year period. Most returned to health, but several succumbed to the disease. Also during that time my dad, mother-in-law, and father-in-law died. Then came the shock of our kids’ youth pastor abandoning his family.

Quite honestly, I hope we never experience another season like that again. The darkness of discouragement threatened to overtake us at times, and I wondered if the night would ever end.

The secret to perseverance, I found, was remembering Scripture’s promises to give strength, hope and peace. It helped to recall Jesus’s commands not to fear, and the reminders of His presence. It also helped to know that, contrary to whatever my emotions said, this night would not last forever.

As surely as the sun rises every day, so morning follows the dark night of grief. Wounds heal. We learn to breathe and, yes, to laugh again.

Perhaps the darkness of discouragement surrounds you. The night’s been a long one, and you doubt whether tomorrow’s dawn will ever come. Be encouraged, my friend. Morning’s on its way, and it brings joy.

Faith step: Turn Isaiah 61:3 into a prayer:“Father, thank You for promising to comfort me when I mourn. You will give beauty for ashes, joy instead of mourning, and praise instead of despair. Use my difficult situation to plant me like a strong and graceful oak for Your own glory. In Jesus’s name, amen.”

But true praise is a worthy sacrifice; this really honors me. . . . —Psalm 50:23 (TLB)

The personal journal I’ve kept for nearly thirty years began as a challenge. I’d been grumbling about my circumstances, so a friend suggested I write down one thing, every single day, for which I was truly thankful. Even though the first entries were simple, it sometimes took me quite awhile to write, “Thanks, God, for a good night’s sleep” or “I praise You for keeping us safe during the hail storm.” Later, I began to praise God for answered prayer: “Thank You for Patrick’s finding just the right job . . . for guiding the doctor’s hand during my neighbor’s eye surgery . . . for giving me the right words for today’s speech.” Gradually the journal became a record of my walk with God. Looking back, I clearly saw His guiding hand, His presence and His leading in every circumstance, whether joyful or difficult.

I was browsing through last summer’s entries when the one for August 4 leaped off the page: “Thank You for the rain, but it wasn’t as much as we needed.” Whoa! That wasn’t a prayer, it was a complaint! I read on and discovered a disturbing number of complaint-prayers. When I replaced my car after 197,000 miles, I griped about what I didn’t get: “Thank You for the car, even though it doesn’t have a trunk light.” In response to a generous gift to the agency where I work, I’d written, “The money will help, but they could have given twice as much.”

Something was wrong with those entries because something was wrong with my relationship with God. During the difficult times, it was easy to recognize God’s blessings and give praise. But as my life became more stable, I’d begun taking His loving care for granted.

My recent entries are more honest. Yes, I still grumble and complain. But day by day, God is helping me develop the thing that was missing in my previous prayers and in my life—a thankful heart.

Lord, let me honor You with the praise that comes from a truly grateful heart.

This devotional is excerpted from Daily Guideposts Journal.