We were finishing up a dinner of sloppy joes and bananas when Esteban came and tugged at my shirt.

"Uh, A.B." he said in a small soft voice.

"Yeah hon?" I said getting down on my knees so I could look in his eyes.

"I'm still hungry."

"Do you want another sloppy joe?" I asked.

He shook his head.

"We have more bananas."

Again, he shook his head.

"I think I might be able to find some jello in the fridge." I tried.

He shook his head one more time and then, in almost a whisper, replied "Uh no…I only like cookies."

I tried not to laugh and went into the kitchen to search out some cookies. How could you say no to a line like that? But later that night I was thinking about Esteban and wonder if his conversation with me is not all that different than the conversation that I have with God.

This past year has been hard. And though that can be interpreted rather mildly that is not what I mean. This year has been hard. The terrors of 9/11, a long painful personal illness, upheaval in the neighborhood, watching my friends struggle with private pain and revisiting the throb of change and loss again and again.

And so I said, "God I'm hungry. I need you to heal all this."

He nodded, He knows our ache, "How about a little trust?"

I shake my head.

"Maybe I could offer you My people to help carry the burden"

Again, I shake my head.

"I can give you courage."

One more time I say no, "Uh no God…I only like miracles. And ones that I don't have to wait so long for."

A miracle is what I want, not because I sinful, selfish or weak but because I'm desperate. A dear friend lost her mother after a long painful illness. We wanted a miracle…for all the right reasons. Another friend lost her perfectly healthy father to that brute cancer. We begged for a miracle. I want God to heal me…because I don't know how to live in this kind of turmoil. Wouldn't I be more effective without it? Perhaps. We were all shocked when one of our former co-workers died two weeks after having her first baby. In our minds this world still needed someone so amazing but God was following a different schedule.

Each one of us waits to be whole. We dream of the day. And in this drought of peace we continue to look to the skies. And in our hands we finger crosses and crucifixes and remember that Jesus didn't stay dead. Neither will we.

All the sickness and shame, anxiety and ache. He lived them out in those dry and lonely moments on the cross. From beginning to end. He knows. And He's made it to the end. For with God, every story ends in victory. Sometimes it's not until you leaf to that final page, but it's all there. God, who is above time, knows the end of our struggle in the same moment that we're living through the heart of it. He comforts us as one who knows the truth and not just wishful thinking.

So we ask for cookies. And that's okay. It's the cry of our heart. Cookies are what we want and we're confident it's what we need. And sometimes we get the miracle, other times we learn to trust or how to share an impossible load with another, making the burden lighter.

I don't give every kid cookies. But I can assure you that no child has every gone hungry at the church. God doesn't always give miracles, but know for certain that his children never have to beg spiritual bread. Ever.

As for Esteban he was satisfied by a handful of animal crackers. And me? Though I'm still tending to some stubborn wounds God has done miracles in my heart, in this neighborhood and in the lives with whom I share these days. We all seem to be holding up. Perhaps better than ever. We asked for cookies, knowing that sooner or later they would come. We're learning to wait and believe. And in the meantime to lean on the trust, strong shoulders and courage that God gives.

God is good. Indeed.