GIFTS OF THE SPIRIT – GIFT OF MIRACLES
MATTHEW 14:13-33 –
NOVEMBER 17, 1985
Moses sent ten plagues upon the land of Israel, divided the Red Sea, he struck a rock and water gushed forth. Elijah multiplied a bowl of flour and a jar of oil. Elijah breathed life into a widow’s dead son. He called down fire and rain from the heavens. Elisha asked for a double portion of Elijah’s power, and with that double portion, he also raised the dead. He purified a pot of poisonous stew, he healed Naiman of his leprosy, he caused an iron axhead to float on the surface of the waters. All of these miracles were wrought by the power of God and all these miracle workers were enabled by the power of the Holy Spirit. But at the close of the Old Testament, we have 400 years of divine silence. Seemingly, God was no longer speaking to men, no longer empowering His people. There were no revelations, no messengers, no prophets, no miracles, no miracle workers. What Job had once said of material possessions had now become true of miracles. The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
But then one evening, a star shown upon a small Judean village named Bethlehem and the fullness of time had come, and once again, God was going to speak to mankind. Only this time the message would be flawless because the messenger would be the eternal only begotten Son of God, and along with this message, there would come a power—a power the world had not seen in hundreds of years; a power the world had never seen in such measure. It was said that this messenger spoke with authority, not like the teachers of his day who merely quoted authorities. This messenger healed the sick, cast out demons, commanded the wind, walked on the water, gave sight to the blind, mobilized the lame, raised the dead, and then gave some measure of His power to His apostles and they too, became miracle workers on the earth in the centuries past, and these miracles all but ceased. Today, many people ask “are there still miracles in the world?” and “are there still miracle workers?”
To that I believe the answer is definitely yes. God heals and God performs miracles in every generation and He heals today and He performs miracles today. However, we must understand that the Gift of Miracles biblically is s different than the Gift of Healing. The Gift of Healing has to do predominantly with the restoration of the physical body from affliction and disease, but the Gift of Miracles has primarily to do with mastery over nature and the elements. The changing of water to wine. Commanding the wind and the sea. Feeding five thousand people with five loaves and two fish. Those are miracles. Now the Gift of Healing is very rare and the Gift of Miracles is even rarer.
In my life, I have seen a few people who I believe, by the power of the Holy Spirit, were given the Gift of Healing. But I must honestly say that I’ve never met anyone that I was sure had the Gift of Miracles. Nevertheless, I believe in the Gift of Miracles and I believe there are people in this world with that gift and I believe this simply because the Bible says that, “God gives a gift of the Holy Spirit called Miracles” and God gives it where and when and if He chooses. If we would understand miracles this morning, we need to take a look at the three titles that are given to miracles in the Bible and these comprise our three teachings this morning.
First of all, in the Bible miracles are called wonders. The Greek word is the word terraas. It refers to a person who is amazed. It refers to a person who is astonished. It refers to a person who is in awe. It refers to a person who marvels. Now there are many wonders in this world. Salt itself is a wonder. Salt consists of sodium and it Consists of chloride. Sodium is poisonous to the human body. Chloride is also poisonous to the human body but you combine them and you have something that is indispensable to the human body. The human body cannot exist without salt and that is a wonder. The- alnico magnet is a wonder. It consists of aluminum, nickel and cobalt, none of which are magnetic, and yet you combine them and you have the strongest magnet in the world today, able to lift sixty times its weight, and that’s a wonder. Water is a wonder. It consists of two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen. Hydrogen is flammable. Oxygen burns readily and yet you combine them and you have something which is able to put out fires. That’s a wonder. But all these wonders conform to natural laws. They all conform to the laws of physics. You see, a true miracle is a different kind of wonder, a greater wonder, a deeper wonder. It transcends natural laws as we understand them. When Jesus walked on the water, that did not conform to natural law. When he changed water to wine, that did not conform to any principal of physics that we understand. It is a wonder, and it is for this reason that many people have a hard time accepting miracles simply because they are such wonders.
In the year 1989, the State of Pennsylvania, one of the most incredible events occurred—one of the most incredible events in the entire history of the American Rail System. A train made a 25-mile journey, non-stop, between two stations and in the midst of this 25-mile, non-stop journey, a refrigerator car disappeared from the middle of the train. When the train left, the refrigerator car was there. When the train arrived, the refrigerator was gone. The train did not stop, it did not slow down. The railroad authorities were baffled and they began to search everywhere for this railroad car to try to understand some means by which the car could have disappeared. They found no people who had contrived some clever scheme to remove the car. It was a mystery. They searched a 25-mile stretch of track. They found nothing. They concluded that this truly was a mystery and some people called it a miracle. They said God did it. Though what God wanted with a refrigerator car, nobody knew. But three months later, they found the refrigerator car that had been removed from the center of the train off an embankment on that 25-mile stretch, and down in the midst of a thick clump of trees, and they recomposed what had happened. In the midst of a real sharp turn as the train was descending, the turn was so sharp that the refrigerator car was disconnected from the car in front of it and behind it and could not make the turn and fell off the track, down the embankment and into this section of thick trees in the forest, therefore being hidden. And then, as the train continued down the mountain, the back section of the train caught up with the front section of the train, and the train was reconnected, so it arrived with the refrigerator car missing. The whole mystery had a natural explanation. Some people think Biblical miracles are like that, if we just had all the facts, it wouldn’t be a mystery anymore. If we just had all the facts, we could reconstruct everything and we could see that there’s a perfectly log ical explanation that conforms to natural laws.
William Barclay was like that William Barclay was the famous British theologian and scholar and he believed in Jesus Christ but he just couldn’t accept miracles, so he had to take the wonder out. So he went through the Bible and he continued to try to take the wonder out of miracles. He said the feeding of the 5,000 was no miracle. A little boy brought out his lunch of five loaves and two fish and when he did that the rest of the crowd was convicted because they’d been hiding their brown bags and then they all brought out their lunch and had a picnic. Jesus walking on water, Barclay said was not really a miracle because you see it was a real foggy night and Jesus was really walking by the water and the disciples, by mistake, thought he was walking on the water. And as you go through the Bible you see explanation after explanation like that because he wants to take the wonder out of miracles, but you can’t take the wonder out of a miracle.
When Jesus Christ calmed and sea and rebuked the wind, the disciples said, “Who is this that even the wind and the sea obey Him and they were astonished.” When Jesus walked on the water, the disciples fell down and worshipped Him. They were in awe. When Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead by His great power, the crowds marvelled. They had never ever seen anything like this. A wonder. What God wants us to understand is that unless you are willing to wonder, you will never, ever believe in miracles. Miracles are called teras wonders.
Now secondly, miracles are called powers. The Greek word is the word dunamis from which we get the English word dynamite. We are to understand that a miracle cannot occur unless there is some supernatural power behind it and most importantly, God wants us to understand that just because there is a miracle, it does not mean that the power behind it is from God. In the Bible, miracles are called powers and sometimes those powers refer to events or miracles accomplished by Satan. I know that many of you, particularly those of you with Catholic backgrounds, have heard of Padre Pio, sometimes he’d called Father Padre Pio, though Father Padre is certainly repetitious. But Padre Pio, was born in 1887 in Italy. When he was 15 years old in 1902, he entered a monastery and he became a Roman Catholic priest. On September 20, 1915, he fell to the ground with excruciating pain in his hands and in his feet and in his side. The doctors examined him. They could find nothing physically wrong and as he recovered, they forgot about it and he went on But three years later, on September 20, 1918, Padre Pio fell to the ground again and this time, he passed nut, he was unconscious. They found blood emanating from his hands, from his feet and from his side—in the places where Christ was wounded on the cross. This phenomenon, theologians refer to as the stigmata—bearing the wounds of Christ on the body supernaturally. They could find no puncture marks on his body, no self-imposed afflictions. He simply was bleeding through the skin. They considered it a sign of his holiness and of his piety, and as the years passed, Padre Pio continued to bear the marks of the stigmata, bleeding from the hands, the felt and the side. And through the years, he began to perform miracles and healings and he became famous. He could even travel in the spirit, it was said perhaps Iike Philip did in the Book of Acts. He could simply go from one spot to another spot in a moment in time, allegedly by the power of God.
For instance, in 1917, in World War 1, an Italian general named General Codorna was in his tent with a gun in his hand, about to take his own life. He had just lost a crucial battle at Slavinia, and suddenly in the midst of his tent, Padre Pio appeared and the Father said, “Don’t be stupid. Your life is precious” and he vanished. Now this general, the Chief of the Italian General Staff, by the way, had never seen Padre Pio before but years later, he was visiting central Italy and he came to a church called San Giovanni Retundo which was the church where Padre Pio served, and he saw the Padre and he recognized him as the one who had been in his tent. The Padre confirmed this saying, “Yes I was there and you had a close escape.” But the authorities at the church of San Giovanni Retundo said that the Father had never left the church that entire year but throughout Padre Pio’s life there was story like this, after story, after story, after story. Allegedly he could just appear and disappear. Well, Padre Pio died on September 28, 1968 at the age of 81 and that’s when the real problem becausoman Catholic Chiurch was right in being cautious because not all miracles are wrought with the power of God.
I’m sure that many of you have heard of Uri Geller, the Soviet psychic. He allegedly is able to perform many miraculous things. He exhibits powers, he exhibits parapsychological phenomena, he allegedly has powers of mental telepathy, of clairvoyance, of precognition, of psychokinesis. For instance, psychokinetically he is said to be able to, with the power of his mind, bend a spoon. On BBC broadcast in 1973 in England, in front of millions of people, Uri Geller bent spoons without touching them. He caused clocks and watches to stop and start, allegedly by the power of his mind. Hundreds of phone calls came into the BBC switch ard saying that while they are watching the TV program, metal objects bent in their living room and clocks that hadn’t run in years suddenly began to tick. Now that’s strange if that’s true. Uri Geller was tested at the Stanford Research institute at Menlo Park, California, and they found that he did, indeed, exhibit an inordinate amount of parapsychological ability. People have asked Uri Geller where he gets the power. Uri Geller says, “Well perhaps some of these abilities lie dormant in all people,” but he said, “it cannot be released without supernatural power.” He says, “I’ve always known that there’s some intelligent, supernatural power working in me but I do not know what that intelligent, supernatural power is.” Uri Geller is involved in psychic phenomena, spiritualism, and occultism. He does not believe in Christ. Whatever power is behind whatever Uri Geller does, I do not believe that that power is God. You see, miracles are called powers but those powers are not always from God. In fact, the Bible tells us “if ever you see a miracle and the person performing the miracle does not exhalt Christ, if it does not exhalt the Kingdom of Christ and the work of Christ and serve Christ, then you can know that that miracle was not wrought by God the Father.”
John says, “Beloved, do not believe every spirit but test the spirits to see whether they are of God for many false prophets have gone forth into the world, and by this you know the spirit of God. Every spirit which confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God. Every spirit which does not confess Jesus Christ is not of God. This is the antichrist of which you heard that it was coming and now it is in the world already.” You know the Bible says, “One day there will come a person named antichrist and he will be a miracle worker.” The biblical concept of antichrist is very complex. Sometimes this word antichrist refers to a prevading spirit, diabolical and evil, that is working on the earth through all the generations. Other times, this word antichrist refers to an alignment of nations seeking global power in the consummation of the age, and then still other times, the word antichrist is in the third person singular masculine gender in the Greek and refers to an individual. A person – he. An individual who will seek power or who will head up these nations seeking socio, political, economic power over the earth, and the Bible says this individual will perform miracles. He will dazzle the world. These wonders and powers, the Bible says will be what the Greeks call pseudo—false—but that doesn’t mean that they were phony or that they will be phony. It simply means that they will be for the purpose of a lie, for the purpose of deception and the Bible says that these wonders and powers will be wrought by the power of Satan himself. Of course the Bible also tells us that Jesus Christ will come again in power and great glory and Christ will destroy the antichrist by the power of his appearing and his coming. All power in the heavens and on earth have been given to Jesus Christ but we are to understand this—miracles are called powers, but don’t assume, just because you see something that appears to be a miracle, that it is of God because sometimes the power behind the miracle is evil and fallen.
Thirdly and finally, and we’ll try to do this quick, miracles in the scriptures are called signs, and the Greek word simion and in Greece today this word semeion is used to describe all kinds of signs. It is used to describe road signs. For instance, if you were traveling throughout Greece, you might be near Athens or Corinth or Salonica, you might see a sign and it would say Athens 40 kilometers, that’s a semeion. Now the sign itself is no big deal. It’s not meant to point attention to itself. It’s meant to point attention to something greater than itself. You’re not really supposed to focus on that sign but that sign is merely supposed to guide you, direct you and lead you to a deeper reality—in that case, the city of Athens, and that’s how it is with the miracles. You’re not really supposed to focus on the miracles. They’re not that big of a deal in God’s sight. The miracles are simply meant to guide, to lead and to direct us if they’re of God. They’re meant to glorify Christ and bring us into the fellowship of His Kingdom.
The Apostles worked miracles and those miracles were always done to serve the Kingdom of Christ. They were performed in the name of Jesus Christ to exalt and magnify the Son of God. Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself performed miracles but they were always semeions. They were always signs. They were never flippant. They were always signs. They were always meant to point and direct and guide us to Himself. They were meant to authenticate His person and His nature and they were meant to illustrate truths of His Eternal Kingdom. Jesus said, “I am the light of the world ” He said that right after he restored sight to a man born blind. Jesus said, “I am the bread of life.” Luke tells us that He said that right after feeding 5,000 people with five loaves and two fish. Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life” and He said that as he was about to raise Lazarus from the dead. All of these miracles then were signs. They were all meant to guide, to point, to lead to spiritual truth concerning the nature of Christ and His work in this world. Jesus Christ cursed the fig tree and it withered to the ground, but it was a sign. It was a barren fig tree and it was meant to illustrate a principle of the Kingdom of Christ—that in the Kingdom of Christ barrenness is cursed. The nation of Israel was barren. It was about to be cursed. Jesus Christ caused some of the disciples—Peter, James and John—to make a miracle catch of fish upon the Sea of Galilee early in Christ’s ministry but it was a sign, it was a semeion. He did it for a reason. He wasn’t simply into great fishing. Immediately after the miracle, Jesus said to the disciples, “Follow Me and I will make you fishers of men.” It was meant to illustrate, to guide, to lead to a greater spiritual truth and reality, and that’s how miracles always are if God is behind them.
There are some segments of Christiandom and some people who take the name of Christ who are totally preoccupied with miracles, totally preoccupied with signs, wonders and powers, and they’ve given signs and wonders an inordinate place in the life of the church, not realizing that they’re simply meant to be semeions leading to a greater reality. You see, Jesus condemned those in His day who were constantly seeking a sign. He rebuked those people who were constantly seekinng a sign, saying, “You will not believe unless you see signs and wonders.” The Apostle Paul said, “The Jews seek a sign and the Greek seek wisdom but we preach Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ crucified.” You see, the whole purpose of the power dimension of Christianity is to bring us into fellowship with the living God and with His Son, Jesus Christ. Miracles are real. We should be open to them. We should test them. We should be open to them but we should not focus on them. The greatest reality is Jesus Christ and that’s what a miracle of God, that’s who a miracle of had, is always meant to point to—Jesus Christ.
Now if you were driving up to Denver from the south on 1-25 and you saw a sign that said “Denver 30 miles,” if you saw a bunch of people camped out around the sign, living there, as though the sign were the big deal and the ultimate reality, you probably would think that was ludicrous and that’s how God feels when He sees a bunch of Christians just focusing on miracles. There’s a church in Tennessee, and perhaps you read about this, and with this we’ll close, it’s a small church in the Tennessee Hills really preoccupied with signs and wonders, and their favorite Bible verse is from the Gospel of Mark, sixteenth chapter, verses 9-20, a passage of scripture which says that “the people of God will be characterized by many signs and that these signs would include speaking in tongues, healing the sick, casting out demons, handling poisonous, or excuse me venomous snakes without being harmed and drinking poisonous drinks without being harmed.” I might say first of all that this passage of scripture, Mark 16:9-20 is spurious, it’s dubious, it’s questionable in its authenticity because in some of the original Greek manuscripts, this passage was not there. Therefore, in many of your bibles, that passage is left out. In others of your bibles, the passage is there but it is footnoted. But even if the passage is authentic, and it might be, even if it’s authentic, it’s not meant to say that every individual Christian in the Kingdom of Christ would manifest these signs or should, it’s simply meant to say that the Body of Christ corporately would manifest these supernatural signs, and it certainly is not meant to say we should focus on these things or make these the center of our spiritual life.
But this church in the hills of Tennessee had two pastors who had already experienced many of the signs listed in that 16th Chapter of Mark, but they had never participated in drinking poison and so they decided they were going to do this, it was going to be a great big deal, and all of the people of the church, after church on a Sunday afternoon, gathered outside in the hills of Tennessee and they began to praise God and to sing songs and to say, “Praise the Lord” and “Hallelujah.” The pastors took out a mixture of water and strychnine, poured it into two glasses and the pastor stood before the people as they shouted praises but the praises soon ceased when they saw that their pastors, having drunk the mixture, had fallen to the ground, and the people fell on their knees and they began to pray fervently for the lives of their pastors, and tragically those two men died. You see, you can’t force a miracle. God works miracles. but God does them as semeions. He does them as signs pointing to the truth, the reality and the glory of His Son and the Kingdom of His Son. Miracles are called wonders but God will never perform a miracle simply for the sake of wonder. Miracles are called powers, dunamas, but we should not assume that simply because we see a miracle, the power behind it is God. Miracles are called semeions, signs. They’re always meant to point to the glory of Christ and to the work of Christ in the world. When you stop to think about it the greatest miracle of all occurs when a person is born anew. The greatest miracle of all occurs when an individual on this earth moves from darkness to light, from death to life, from emptyness to meaning, and says “Lord Jesue come into my life. Be my Lord and my Savior,” and by the power of God, the Holy Spirit comes into that person and they become an eternal Child of God. And that’s what everything is meant to lead to including miracles.
At the close of John’s Gospel, the twentieth chapter, John says “Now many are the signs, many are the miracles Jesus did in the presence of His disciples that are not written in this book, but these are written that you might know that Jesus is the Christ and in order that you might know that Jesus is the Christ and that believing, you might have life in His name.” That’s what it’s all about. Let’s pray.