The Miracle: A Follow-Up To Thankful On Thursday

In Chapter 2 of One Thousand Gifts, by Ann Voskamp, she discovers that eucharisteo is the cause of miracles.  She points out that Jesus thanked God for the 5 loaves of bread and the 2 fish and then there was the miracle of feeding five thousand.  Jesus broke the bread with the disciples and then gave thanks.  The miracle was that He endured the cross and then rose from the dead. 

She says:

“How there is thanks…and then the mind-blowing miracle!”

“Eucharisteo – thanksgiving – always precedes the miracle.”

As she is on her journey of thanksgiving the sees miracles happen before her eyes. 

Yesterday I shared my prayer.  It was a first for me, the prayer of thanksgiving.  (You can read it here.)  Wouldn’t you know that as soon as I finished my blog the world awoke around me and I was incredibly annoyed.  I prayed to God again… “How can my heart be truly thankful for something one minute and totally annoyed by the same thing just moments later?  God, please help my attitude.  Please change my heart.  Make the thanksgivings true in my life.”

And then the miracle.

I had just gotten home from a couple of errands.  I made a quick lunch and sat on the couch to eat it.  Jason was outside snaking our drain.  He came in and ate with me and then said, “Are you ready to get started on this house?” 

I thought, but didn’t dare say, “Um, what?  Yes, please.”

At 2:00 p.m., or so, Jason led the way by putting away last week’s laundry.  I started by cleaning off the counter.  And then, I moved to the pantry.  I threw away all of our expired items and rearranged the entire thing.  This cleared the way for me to clean out two lower cabinets, one that held paper goods (a point of frustration for me) and one that held tea and coffee supplies (which also didn’t work for me).  I was able to clean out the cabinets by moving and organizing the contents into the pantry.  I then moved to two junk drawers in the kitchen.  They held old magazines, tools from when we moved in 2 years ago and an array of unnecessary cords and other items.  Jason was working on other areas of the house.  By 7:00 p.m. we had 6 trash bags full of clutter that had once been a point of stress in my life. 

I woke-up today with a feeling of lightness about my shoulders, and I saw it.  I saw the miracle that had come from a prayer of thanksgiving for an abundance of food and for a life too full to clean the messes.  And just like that it was done for me.  Today, I thank God for organized cabinets and feelings of lightness that come from empty spaces under kitchen countertops,  and for sunshine and old bread from pantry full that will lead to one of my favorite activities: a trip the the duck pond.  Today I thank God for room to breathe.  I thank God for the miracle.