Leftover Miracles

When Jesus fed the five thousand with just two loaves of bread and five fishes, after everyone got enough to eat, there were still twelve baskets full of leftovers. I don’t think that Jesus got distracted and miscounted. It doesn’t say what was done with the twelve baskets of food, but I can’t imagine that it was simply thrown away, nor used to flaunt Jesus’s prowess with miracles. No, I’m sure that there were a number of other hungry people that weren’t with that 5000 who were also hungry and in need of miraculous healing. Often when we are praying for a miracle, we are thinking too small. The Widow of Zarephath wanted only to find enough sticks to build a big enough fire to cook her and her son one last piece of bread before they both starved to death. The Lord through Elijah had something else in mind, and blessed her with enough flour and oil for the widow and her son and Elijah to eat until the famine was over. The man sick for thirty-eight years who laid next to the pool of Bethesda wanted only for someone to carry him over to the pool but instead Christ healed him completely. The beggar outside of the temple wanted only a few coins but Peter instead healed him completely. God can and does bless us with not only more than we asked for, but even more than we can imagine. Noah asked for a way to save his family from the flood, but God showed him how to save all of the animals as well. Joseph Smith may have only been asking of which church he should become a member, but God worked through Joseph to restore His church and the Priesthood and provide another testament of Jesus Christ. If we are sometimes struggling to get an answer to our prayers, it might be that we are not thinking big enough. God is the creator of the whole, entire universe. He has all power, both in Heaven and on Earth. The more we strive to bring our mind and our will in alignment with God’s, the more we will see that our original desires and ambitions are so much smaller than what God has planned for us. God is a loving Father whose greatest desire is to help His children become the best version of themselves. When we ask in righteousness, He will give us much more than we originally asked for, because He sees our needs and our abilities much more clearly than we do. We might think we only need a miracle to feed five thousand, but God knows there are a few dozen more who need our help too, so he’ll throw in a few extra baskets for them as well.