Note: As I pen these words, I can see College Avenue filled with cars and bystanders as the Clemson community prepares to celebrate the First Friday parade before the first home football game tomorrow. All day long I have had the events from four years ago on my mind when we all witnessed a true miracle that First Friday. Do you believe in miracles? As these words written three years ago reveal, I sure do! CLG

In just a few hours the Clemson Tigers will begin their football season against a much a less known and inferior opponent, Florida Atlantic. Many are speculating that this might be another miracle season for Clemson, like the one 25 years ago when Clemson won the national championship. That season, Clemson opened with another less known and inferior opponent, Wofford College, a small, United Methodist NAIA school with 1,000 students that would eventually become my alma mater. Part of Wofford’s lore is that their 1981 football team actually led the eventual national champion by a score of 3-0 early in that first game.

As is Clemson’s tradition, the festivities began yesterday with the First Friday parade winding itself past Bowman Field and the heart of campus. For most bystanders, it was the usual parade of cars and a few tractors, fraternities and sororities chanting and cheering, and my friend Sarah Hayes, the reigning Ms. Clemson, wearing her crown and waving her arm until it was about to drop off.

For many local Clemson residents, however, yesterday’s parade was very different than in past years. Rather than having a local celebrity serve as the Grand Marshall, the University asked Caroline Terry, a fifth grader from the Clemson area who miraculously survived being run over by a float during last year’s parade, to serve in this role. Flanked by many of her friends, family and fellow students, Caroline performed well, wearing a big smile and waving her arm until it was about to drop off.

Last year’s parade will long remain a vivid memory for me and many others in Clemson, and the accident raised many puzzling questions. How could such a small body withstand almost a ton of weight sitting on it for close to 30 seconds? How were no bones broken or organs crushed? How, on such a noisy day, was someone able to stop the driver from running over her head just in time? Did the hundreds (if not thousands) of prayers being lifted up that day play a part in the miracle that took place? Why did Caroline survive almost unscathed when we see other young people die in similar accidents all the time?

Of course, the answers to all of the questions remain mysteries, and it is to these mysteries that our faith seeks to speak. I do believe in miracles, in part because I have experienced in my own life events that defy logic, physics or reasonable explanation. My years in ministry have also taught me to believe in the miraculous. As a pastor, I am privileged to hear and witness story after story of people surviving horrific accidents, experiencing healing from disease or deformity, or living on when death was a certainty.

Most of us who have lived long enough understand that these occasions are always times to celebrate and give thanks to God for the precious gift of life. We understand, in part, because we know how often the healing hasn’t come. We understand because we know how often the young person with such hope does not survive the car wreck. We understand because we see disease and death claim victim after victim, day after day.

The Gospels teach us that Jesus’ ministry was four-fold in nature: preaching or proclaiming, teaching, healing diseases and performing miracles. Matthew makes this point early in his Gospel (4:23-25), and then outlines for us examples of Jesus’ teaching and preaching (chapters 5-7) followed by stories of his healings and miracles (8-9:34). He book-ends this early section of his Gospel at the end of chapter 9 with basically the same words from earlier in chapter 4: “Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness” (9:35). It’s as if Matthew is saying to us, “You want a snapshot of Jesus’ life and ministry – here it is!”

While the Gospels tell us repeatedly that Jesus was most concerned about the proclamation of his message and the sharing of his teaching (see Mark 1:38, for example), the Gospels also reveal that Jesus used numerous healings and miracles as a way of establishing his authority, both for the disciples he had called and the crowds who followed him. History reveals that there were many miracle workers in Galilee during that time, and surely many saw Jesus of Nazareth as someone who could give them the physical healing for which they had long hoped. When you read the Gospels, you get a sense that Jesus is concerned that he will be known simply as another miracle worker, not as someone who “taught them as one who had authority, not as the teachers of the law” (Mk. 1:22).

In my mind, I believe that Jesus was most concerned about our receiving, understanding, practicing and sharing his teachings, his way of life. I believe that following in the way of Jesus – loving God and neighbor, forgiving others, loving our enemies, giving generously and anonymously – leads to the kind of life here on earth that God wills for us all. Call it eternal living, if you’d like. And I believe that God gives us the grace to live this way.

But in my heart, I believe that Jesus is still performing the kinds of miracles and healings that we see in the Scriptures. I wish these miracles happened more often…or should I say…I wish that I could see more clearly the evidence of how God is performing miracles around us every day. I know that I witnessed a miracle last year in life of Caroline Terry, and it leaves me believing that God has special plans for her in the years ahead. Who knows, maybe serving as Grand Marshall for this year’s parade is one of the first of many opportunities that she will have throughout her life to tell others, “Let me share with you what God has done for me.”

Will the Tigers have another miracle season like they had a quarter of a century ago? Who knows? In light of Caroline’s story, today I have my mind fixed on other things.

A steward of the mysteries,
lane