Miracles, they're real. Wanna know how I know that? Because of the greatest adventure story ever told.

It all starts with God. The one true God who lives in Heaven? Yeah, that God. Long story short, He crafted each one of us uniquely and intricately to be exactly who we are for His purposes and His glory alone. We were made to be mirrors of His incomparable beauty. How exactly are we supposed to reflect that glory, though? There's two ways — one, by loving God with all our heart and soul and mind and two, by loving our neighbors as ourself.

A life defined by love displays all of who God is. But there's a problem here. We have all fallen so short of God's plan for us to glorify Him. He have found our own idols — money, alcohol, sex, power, vanity, etc. But the biggest problem isn't those actions alone, it's our sinful hearts. What you do defines who you are. So since we are all guilty of our own sins, we are literally dead in our transgressions. We are helpless. The sin inside us has shattered our ability to be mirrors of God's beauty and glory. And it sucks dude.

But the story doesn't end here. This is where the good part begins. Buckle up and hold on tight because the adventure is starting, and just a spoiler alert, there's a happy ending.

So back to God — He makes promises and keeps them. Always. God loves us so much that He made a rescue plan for us. And it all started with a miracle. God made a virgin pregnant. Yeah, you heard me. He made a virgin girl by the name Mary, preggo. Not only was she pregnant though, inside of her just so happened to be the savior of our entire universe! His name is Jesus.

Jesus did the unexplainable. For starters, He performed miracles on the daily. We're talkin' healing the blind, causing the paralyzed to be able to walk, turning water to wine, bringing dead to life, calming a storm, feeding 5 thousand people with a few loaves of bread and pieces of fish, etc. You know, no big deal or anything. Jesus also loved people fully. His life was invested in loving people. Jesus would take days away with folks one on one just to love on them and spend time with them — because He simply wanted to. He came with a message of hope, offering forgiveness and rest to the weary as he taught.

He gathered followers along the way of His journey. Jesus hung out with with murderers, stealers, liars, cheaters, and prostitutes because He loved them equally. Jesus' pure intentions were so simple yet so meaningful — to love and display compassion to all of the broken. But the biggest miracle about Jesus is this: Jesus lived an absolute blameless and perfect life, something that no other person in this whole world has ever done or will ever be able to do.

But because of His claim to be our savior, Jesus was sentenced to death on a cross. He was crucified, which is the most agonizing and brutal form of punishment available. He was mocked, spit on, whipped repeatedly, forced to carry his own heavy cross all the way to where He was to be killed, stabbed in the side, nailed to a cross by his hands and his feet, and left there to die.

On this terrible day, the sky went completely black. And on that cross where He hung, every sin to ever be committed on this Earth in the past, the present and the future, was placed there on that cross, on our sweet savior. He took every single sin and burden down to the grave with Him so that we will never have to pay for what we have done, and at that He said "it is finished". Jesus was then buried in a tomb. That is not the ending though because yet another miracle happened. Three days later, Jesus' tomb was discovered to be empty. Aka His body was no longer there aka the stone in front of His tomb was rolled away aka Jesus rose again and came back to life y'all! For 40 whole days, He appeared over and over again loving on them and filling them with the Holy Spirit and promising them that He would return again one day.

So here's a recap to Jesus' miraculous adventure story in case you missed it: Jesus lived a perfect life so that He could die for all of our sins so that we could be forgiven and some day be reunited with Him again in Heaven. How beautiful is that?!

Now the story doesn't end here either. Jesus did all of this for you. It's your turn to make a move. In order to be able to accept His gift of forgiveness from our sins and everlasting life in Heaven, all you have to do is confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead. And boom — you are saved.

Now that we are free of sin and free of burdens, we have the ability to be one with God again. Our shattered mirrors have been fixed so that we can once again display the beauty and glory that He intended us to do. It is our job on this Earth to use the joy and hope we have in Him to spread His good news to every place and person we possibly can, and there's no greater adventure on this planet than that.

Here's to the greatest adventure story of all time, and the fact that we have the opportunity to be a part of it.

Miracles are real.