The Lord prefers to work in the world he created in predictable and ordinary ways. Sure, he still works miracles, but a miracle is by definition something out of the ordinary. A miracle requires norms and predicable patterns such that we expect a certain result but get another. Otherwise we would never note a miracle because it would seem to be just another chaotic result of chance in a world entirely made up of the same kinds of events. Rather than a world of chaos, the Lord created an ordered, structured world. In the realm of nature, God prefers to work through the laws he established, through chemical reactions, weather patterns, and gravitational forces. He does not have to work this way. He chooses to do so.
In the Church, he does the same thing. He prefers to work through frail, fallen men to continue exercising his authority in the Church. Jesus established an organized Church with hierarchical leadership. He instituted sacraments so he could come to us in sensate ways, in ways that we as body and soul composites need. Jesus promised that when two or three of us gather in his name then he would be present there too, every single time, like clockwork. He does not have to work this way. He chooses to do so.
In evangelization, he does the same thing. The Spirit inspired missionaries, beginning with the Apostles and continuing down to the present day, to leave the world they know, to enter unknown cultures, to bring the Gospel to every single soul. He inspires people to volunteer at soup kitchens, to visit nursing homes and prisons, to pray outside of abortion clinics. He inspires neighbors to check in on one another, family members to invite their lapsed members back to Mass, students to share their faith in a public school. He does not have to work this way. He chooses to do so.
In our families, he does the same thing. Spouses reflect devoted and self-sacrificial love. Parents provide a living image, however imperfect, of the Father and form their children’s moral character and prayer practices, even if only unconsciously. Siblings sharpen their human skills of living in community in imitation of the Holy Trinity. He does not have to do it this way. He chooses to do so.
God loves mediation. He is all about working through someone else to accomplish, however slowly, his grand plan for humanity’s salvation. Think of Noah, Abraham, David, and Elijah. Think especially of those who at first simply could not understand that the Lord wanted to work through them, even to the point of pushing back against him with their excuses: Moses, Gideon, Jeremiah, etc. Even when they think he must be joking, that he couldn’t possibly really mean me, that I am not trained or equipped or capable, the Lord is persistent in his choice. He does not have to do it this way. He chooses to do so. He chooses you, yes even you, to achieve his greatest works today.
We can struggle at times to believe that God is working in our lives. Perhaps even more difficult to believe, the Lord is working through us to reach the people around us: our spouses and siblings, our coworkers and friends, our neighbors and the strangers we encounter each day. Every now and then he does work directly, outside the realm of mediation, in a textbook miracle. But ordinarily, day in and day out, he prefers to work in and through the ordinary, in and through you and me.