Excerpt from Growing Faith One Day at a Time

A smile crosses your face as you view the crystal blue sky, sparkling water, and snowcapped mountains outside your window. After days of soaking rain, you can finally go on your much-awaited hike. Quickly lacing up your hiking boots, you set out.

Squish, squish, squish, your shoes noisily sound as you walk on the saturated ground. With each step that you take, your shoes seem to disappear as they turn brown with the mud seeping onto your shoes. The further you walk, the more difficult it becomes to remove your shoes from the mud until they are so entrenched that you can’t move them at all! You can’t even pull your feet out of your shoes! No one is around, the sun is quickly setting, and the temperature is rapidly dropping!

“Help, I am trapped! I can’t escape the mud!” you shout.
When no one responds, all you can think of is, God, I need a miracle!

MIRACLES! GOD’S SPECIALTY.

All through the Scriptures, we see God working miracles. Let’s look again at the Israelites. Take the example of the Israelites at the Red Sea, Exodus 14:1-31. After 430 years as slaves, Pharaoh releases the Israelites to leave Egypt freely. But soon Pharaoh is sorry that he has let the slaves go, and with his army of 600 chariots, he goes after the Israelites to enslave them again. Hearing the Israelites were camped by the Red Sea, the Egyptians knew that they were trapped. There was no way for the Israelites to escape them now.

But just like they did in the land of Egypt, the Egyptians forgot the power of God. In a situation with seemingly insurmountable odds, only God could help the Israelites. Amid the Israelites’ fear and doubt, God showed His power again and performed a miracle.

BAM!

In an instant, the Lord made a dry path through the Red Sea onto the other side. Just imagine the faith that it took for the Israelites to step into the Red Sea and take the long journey across.

Just imagine their fear that the walls of water would collapse, the shouts as they ran to escape the Egyptians and their surprise that the path was so dry that their shoes, nor flocks, got stuck in the mud!

It would be like a visit to the North Carolina aquarium that takes you down a path with glass walls on either side where you can view the fish, sharks, and other sea life beside you. But I guess the Israelites must have been in too much of a hurry to take in the view.

Flanked by approximately 300-foot walls of water⁷ they hustled safely to the other side. With over 600,000 men plus women and children, this would not have been a sprint because they were loaded down with their flocks and all the goodies the Lord had given them from the Egyptians, Exodus 12:32,35-36.

But with all that God had done, He was not finished yet. Once the Israelites had all made it to the other side of the Red Sea,

BAM!

God returns the sea to normal, and it envelopes every single Egyptian in it, providing dinner for the fishes. So, God not only sets the Israelites free from their bondage as slaves, gives them an abundance of provision and brings them to safety, He also destroys the Egyptians so that they cannot continue to try to harm the Israelites.

Now that’s what I call a miracle!

Whenever we come against seemingly insurmountable odds, let’s remember what our loving God has done and have faith that God can still be victorious no matter what we see or hear.

“Ah, Lord God! Behold
 You have made the heavens and the earth by Your great power
and outstretched arm. There is nothing too hard for You,”
Jeremiah 32:17

REFLECTION

• What did God do for the Israelites in Exodus chapter 14 that showed His power?
• When have you been stuck in the mud with an internal or external struggle? How did God help you get out?
• Do you believe that God is still able to demonstrate that kind of power today? Why or why not? Does your belief align with Jeremiah 32:17?

Since God never changes,
we can trust that nothing is too hard for God
because His power enables Him to do the impossible.

FAITH FOCUS

God is powerful.

“Ah, Lord God! Behold, You have made the heavens and
the earth by Your great power and outstretched arm.
There is nothing too hard for You,”
Jeremiah 32:17

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, write this Scripture on my heart as I read it out loud and write it in my Faith Notebook. Heavenly Father, help me to see
evidence of this Scripture today.

(In my book, you are encouraged to keep a faith notebook where you can record what you see, hear, or experience. This serves as a reminder of the evidence of God’s scriptures.)

I hope you enjoyed this excerpt from my book,
Growing Faith One Day at a Time.
Although I added the photos, the text is the same.

May your day be filled with love and laughter,

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*For information on making Jesus Christ your Savior, email me or visit, http://www.peacewithgod.net/

7 TrueDiscoveries.com
Photo landscape, u_5blle0edt0
Photo sea, iforce
Photo shark, Tomas Nozina