Bible Miracles – the Challenge and Proof of God’s Existence

In our cynical Missourian, “show-me,” era that we live the idea of miracles is thought of as a far-fetched impossibility.  As children we were told that Santa brought us gifts on Christmas; the Easter Bunny would hide money-filled eggs throughout our homes on Easter morning; the Tooth Fairy would exchange our early molars and canines for golden dollars right from the US Mint.  Reality sets in at varying ages for us depending on if we have older siblings, and eventually we all uncover that the early miracles that we believed were not true and our world inevitably comes crashing in.  I cannot point to this as the only culprit of American cynicism, but it definitely plays a part in conditioning young adults and old to become doubters of miracles.  Miracles, in the context of Christian faith, are both proofs for and against believing in Christ as the Son of God and the Bible’s authority for our lives.  The outrageousness of miracles and the “fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me” attitude is one of the greatest challenges to the faith in the minds of many cynics. There are other challenges regarding the authenticity of miracles.  For many the belief that God or His enabled servants having the ability to thwart the natural order is seen to be unbelievable.  Yet, miracles are documented in the Bible.  Coming to terms with the many accounts of the altering of natural events to produce a miraculous outcome is a stumbling block for people to believe that the Bible is reliable. 

            The greatest challenge in believing the miracles of the Bible is that they no longer appear to be the normative.  From Herbert Lockyer’s book, “All the Miracles of the Bible,” he describes this as the disappearance of miracles.  This is a challenge and a proof to the documentation of miracles as fact because people who do not have a relationship with God do not experience Him in their lives.  There is no fingerprint of God left behind in the experience of the unbeliever to point to evidence of his existence, but in contrast, to the believer, evidence of his existence is confirmed regularly as the Spirit of God indwells His children (Ephesians 1:13-14) and moves within their hearts.  Therefore, for the believer who experiences God’s power, presence and peace, they find it natural to believe God performed miracles, but for the person who feels distant from God, this is more difficult to believe. 

            The disappearance of miracles will be the centerpiece as I frame the arguments against and for the reality of miracles.  First let me state that I cannot prove that God exists and that He performs miracles using logic alone.  Belief requires faith.  Faith combined with reason strengthens faith as you examine your walk with God in your faith journey.  Nevertheless I can provide reasons for the ancient miracles I will outline and illustrate why they no longer appear in the physical realm as they occurred in the Old and New Testaments. 

            To begin we must first look at the obvious fact that the distribution of miracles do not occur in such a widespread fashion as they were documented to occur in Scripture.  To begin we must first define what a miracle is.  Webster’s definition of a miracle is, “An event or effect in the physical world deviating from the known laws of nature, or transcending our knowledge of these laws; an extra-ordinary, anomalous, or abnormal event brought about by super-human agency.”  Interestingly, the phrase, “knowledge of these laws,” in this definition is a prevailing argument against historical accounts of Biblical miracles as many contemporary scientists attempt to distill miracles such as the great exodus of the Israelites crossing the Red Sea into a non-miraculous abnormal natural occurrence.  The explanation many modern scientists give for this miracle is that there was a shift in the Red Sea’s level where the Israelites crossed enabling them to escape the Egyptians.  As the trailing Egyptian army came to that same point in the Red Sea the waters rose swallowing them up and devouring their chariots.  This explanation would coincide with Webster’s definition as transcending the primitive Israelite’s knowledge of nature and shifting water levels that appeared to not occur regularly.  They would deem this event as miraculous and thus Moses would document it for later generations, but upon our modern examination whereby knowledge of geology is more sophisticated we have another explanation for the event.  For instance, the waters lowering allowing the Israelite people to cross just so happened to be a natural occurrence.  When examining the Biblical account regarding the crossing of the Red Sea in Exodus 14:16 you read that Moses raised his staff and stretched out his hand over the sea to divide the water so that the Israelites could walk through the sea on dry ground.  This clearly does not state that the water levels just lowered enough to allow them to pass through it.  In other words, the water level was not 6 to 18 inches.  Exodus 14, verse 22 then states that there was a wall of water on their left and right throughout the night as they passed through.  This would indicate that something happened that has never happened before and no scientist today could explain this in natural terms.  This is one example of many how detractors of miracles attempt to explain the Biblical miracles as being non-miraculous since God does not openly operate like this in our day.   
            To give an explanation why miracles of the Bible have ceased we will look at the distribution and purpose of the Biblical miracles.  The distribution of miracles by God accomplished a specific purpose.  Like the crossing of the Red Sea, the Bible documents miracles in times of crisis when God’s intervention was necessary for Him to achieve his ultimate purpose.  This flows in concert with the ultimate theme throughout the Bible.  God creates man, man inevitably falls, and then God intervenes to provide a way of redemption and salvation.  God’s plan for restoring man’s relationship with Himself continues to require His intervention, but the early stages of building the infrastructure for His people required a unique work of God.  John MacArthur describes this in detail in his book, “Charismatic Chaos.”  MacArthur states that Most Biblical miracles happened in three relatively brief periods of Bible History: First, in the days of Moses and Joshua God performed many miracles, signs and wonders.  Second, during the ministries of Elijah and Elisha miracles were abundant and third, in the time of Christ and the Apostles.  These three periods, MacArthur explains, only occurred for a hundred years or so.  Yes, there are other miracles documented in the Bible.  Jonah was preserved in the belly of a great fish, or Daniel in the furnace, but these were singular instances that did not occur for long periods of times.  Each of these events did have a means to an end in accomplishing a greater purpose, but in the times of Moses, Joshua, Elijah, Elisha, Christ and the Apostles the occurrences of miracles were longer lasting.  These three periods when miracles were abundant also had a special purpose in revealing new eras of revelation by God.  MacArthur writes that with Moses and Joshua miracles were performed validating the giving of the Law.  Elijah and Elisha introduced the prophetic office or the prophetic age.  Christ and the Apostles established the church and the New Testament revelation.  This is important in understanding why God does not perform miracles presently as He once did in these times.  The disappearance of miracles in our current age has an explanation.  You cannot discount miracles as myth because God does not work the same way now as He did during these special revelatory periods.  As He established His nation, His prophets and His church miracles that would authenticate His work and His leaders were essential.  Would the Israelites have followed Moses into a desert had they not known a being greater than any man was working through him?  Many disciples abandoned Christ in His earthly ministry.  Would He have had any if He had not performed any miracles?
            So far I have explained how the miracles God performed in pivotal eras recorded in Biblical history authenticated His work.  So why does God not continue to work in this way?  Some would say that if God would just continue to work miracles in plain sight, maybe recorded on You Tube, then everyone would believe?  Miracles have never produced mass waves of believers.  In the desert an entire generation of Israelites died in unbelief.  This was the same generation who witnessed more miracles than any Old Testament group of people.  They witnessed the ten plagues, the provision of manna out of dew and water from a rock.  The Israelites saw God single-handedly protect them from ravenous people, yet they died in unbelief.  In John 6 after Jesus fed 5,000 people with five loaves of bread and two fish the Jews demanded further signs from Jesus to authenticate His lordship.  There are several examples to cite and the point is the same.  Miracles do not lead people to Christ.  Faith leads us to Christ.  It is a gift from God and the vehicle that propels us to believe that God can wash us clean of sin, restore us from the effects of sin and our value is realized through His blood shed for our sins.  Faith enables us to know that He is God and can do anything He wills.  When times get tough and we do not see relief in sight, faith helps us endure to the end believing that although I am not prospering now, a time will come when I will.  Faith is not asking for that miracle because we need proof, but because we need provision and when God does not answer our prayers the way we would like, faith reminds us that our ways are not like God’s ways.  We endure to and hold fast to His promises and accept what we cannot change and love God through hardship.  Faith is the greatest miracle ever produced.  John 20:30-31 states, “Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.  Being born spiritually dead, we are raised to life in His name.  Thankfully He still does miracles. 

Bibliography

Charismatic Chaos, John MacArthur

All the Miracles of the Bible, Herbert Lockyer