God’s Basic Miracles

Yael Eckstein | September 1, 2023

Picture of a hand reaching up with a cloudy blue sky behind it.

Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.
    Worship the LORD with gladness;
    come before him with joyful songs.
Know that the LORD is God.
    It is he who made us, and we are his;
    we are his people, the sheep of his pasture. — Psalm 100:1-3

Miracles are central to both the Jewish and Christian faiths, and both biblical narratives are replete with miracles. Enjoy this collection of devotional teachings on the nature of God’s awe-inspiring signs and wonders.

When my second child sat up by himself for the first time, my husband and I squealed with joy and clapped our hands in excitement. His big sister, just a toddler at the time, was confused by our strange behavior.

“Mommy, look at me!” she smiled as she sat on the carpet beside her baby brother, struggling to understand why she wasn’t getting the same response. As I gently explained to her why we were so excited about her brother sitting for the first time, it made me think about the things we celebrate and the things we take for granted.

In Psalm 100, King David urges the people of Israel to “Worship the LORD with gladness and come before him with joyful songs.” Why? Because we are His, “the sheep of his pasture.” The reality that He chose us and gave us the ability to serve Him never gets old. And just because it is evident and true every day, makes it no more miraculous than when we first discovered that truth.

God’s Basic Miracles

In Jewish tradition, there are two types of miracles: nes nigleh—a revealed miracle—and nes nistar—a concealed miracle.

Usually, when we think of miracles, we think of the impressive, revealed miracles; the patients who recover from terminal illnesses against all odds, the lives saved from natural disasters in the most impossible of ways, the “signs and wonders” of our lives that make us cry out to God with joy and gratitude as we see in so many passages in Scripture.

But what about all those less obvious miracles we experience on a daily basis? What about the mind-blowing gift that we open our eyes each morning and our complex bodies work as they should? What about the fact that our toddler not only learned how to sit at six months old, but continues to know how to sit each and every day afterward?

Those are the kind of miracles that the psalmist encourages us to remember. When we learn how to cultivate gratitude for God’s basic miracles in life, we have achieved the highest level of spiritual greatness.

Your Turn:

Pay attention and thank God for the basic miracles that take place in your life every day.