Sermon Tone Analysis

Miracles

Lets talk about miracles this morning.

In The Life Of Jesus series we are looking at some things about Jesus’ life that stick out, things that make Jesus unique as if being God the Son were not enough.

But when we look at some of the things that make Jesus Jesus, we notice that there are things in His life that are consistently different than our lives are.

Case in point to what we are talking about today.

We are going to talk about miracles today.

What are miracles?

How do you define a miracle?

It could be argued that we saw an actual miracle take place on Feb 4 2018 when the Eagles won their first Superbowl over the Patriots!

I experienced a personal miracle in 1986 when I graduated high school!

And yes, those are supposed to be funny and we are supposed to laugh at them but God is still working miracles.

He really is...

And maybe some of you have experienced something that could only be described as a miracle.

God working in a situation and it makes no sense when you think about it rationally.

God did something in YOUR life in a very real and dramatic fashion that cannot be explained by conventional means.

I have heard some of your stories and some of those stories can’t be explained conventionally, they are miracles.

I spent a great deal of time this week looking at different books written by different scholars, all who know so much have forgotten more about Theology than I will ever know, and it seems like all of these scholars arrive at different definitions to what a miracle is.

That’s how you want to start out the week of study.

Trying to nail down a simple definition of a subject you want to talk about only to find that nobody can really agree on it.

Some say that a miracle simply something that God does that is contrary to the laws of nature.

Because that is one thought of the nature of miracles; that a miracle is simply something that God does that falls out of the bounds of the laws of nature as we know them.

This may sound like a good definition until you really start to think about the fact that even the most natural things in natural law really could be considered miracles too.

Consider gravity.

The fact that at this very moment we are sucked down on the planet at precisely the same force at all times depending on the last meal we ate... Is that a miracle?

Or do we really want to say that there is anything that is outside of God’s realm?

Because think about this for a minute.

If you say that that a miracle is God working outside of the laws of nature, then whether you think you are or not, you would be looking at God as a deist, which means that you believe that God isn’t active in the natural world that we live in.

You would look at God as the great clock maker who winds up the clock and lets it run on its own without any intervention.

But we don’t believe that this is who God is.

Maybe there are two different ideas about miracles.

Maybe two different classes.

There is something that is called by theologians providential sustainment.

That is the idea that God is actively involved in every little thing.

Nothing escapes Him.

He UPHOLDS the universe.

That means that God is actively involved in all things.

All things.

So the fact that the earth spins on it’s axis at the same speed at all times means that God is actively involved in that.

It’s not like a crock pot where you set it and forget it.

That means that when you get a cut on your hand and immediately cells rush to that area to bind with each other to make a scab, ultimately to make a scar that this isn’t just a natural process but a miracle.

Look, when you break a bone and set the bone, the doctor puts the bones in place but doesn’t actually do the healing.

Thees are details that are staggering if you think about it.

Staggering.

Which is why people don’t believe.

They can’t figure it out so they won’t believe.

Oh that just doesn’t make sense.

We think we know how stuff works but I don’t think we really do.

I think that we are a little arrogant in the idea that we know so much when I don’t know what that means.

I think that we need to admit that we really don’t know how all this works.

Not to say that we throw away education or not to ponder and try to figure things out.

I just think that we need to give to God what is due Him.

I’m not saying that we go back to the age where an eclipse is some magical event where God is trying to tell us something, but I have no problem with the philosophy or belief that God sets something into motion and keeps something in motion at the beginning of time and can intervene whenever He wants.

So when it comes to miracles, we need to understand that they aren’t coincidence and they aren’t happenstance.

Not to get to technical but I think this is really important for us to understand.

Very important for the Christian.

You can’t just dismiss miracles, whether they are miraculous in our minds or whether it is the normal every day life for us, what we call the laws of nature.

It really is important.

Barclay says.

They are the laws of nature or science.

We must not think, however, that the so-called laws are absolute and that God is somehow controlled or limited by them; for on some occasions God acts in an unpredictable way to do what we term a miracle.

God showed his sovereignty over nature in dividing the Red Sea so the children of Israel could pass over from Egypt into the wilderness and then by returning the waters to destroy the pursuing Egyptian soldiers

If we were to talk about the miracles of Jesus—and there were many, we would really need to be reminded that the miracles of Jesus come from the POWER of Jesus.

We need to remember who it is that Jesus is if we contemplate his miracles.

Do you remember some of the miracles Jesus did?

Go ahead and shout some out to us.

As Christians, as people who may have grown up in a Christian environment it is possible that you don’t even really think about these miracles.

Okay, Jesus fed 5000 people.

Okay.

Oh, Jesus turned water into wine.

I see.

That’s great.

Jesus healed someone of an incurable disease, great.

We get used to hearing these things so much that we possibly miss how big of a deal this is.

God is just as responsible for the everyday normal processes as He is for the miraculous.

Regular, normal nature is not absent of God’s miracle happening every second of everyday.

The natural that you and I have grown accustomed to is just as miraculous as God creating ex nihilo (out of nothing).

So when you experience the miracle of God answering a prayer.

Or if you see God do something amazing, we can look at it is no more a miracle than the every day monotony that we go through.

But we need to understand that that God who made everything also continues to sustain it.

1. Miracles Belong To God

Only God does miracles.

Only God.

He does them to show us His glory and to accomplish His plans.

Lots of people will tell you that they can do magic, that they can do miracles.

Guess what?

They can’t.

They are all frauds, they are all fakes.

Imitating what only God can do.

Remember when Pharaohs magicians tried to duplicate the signs God gave Moses?

Throw your staff down and it will become a snake?

Genesis says that they did the trick but then the staff of Moses that God threw down swallowed all of their staffs.

Real Miracles belong to God.

And listen,

creation is THE miracle.

Out of nothing

Scripture knows nothing of a creation or a history that is at any moment independent of God’s agency.

That means that there is nothing on earth that there is nothing in the sky, there is nothing in the sea or in space that was not created in the first place by God.

He is the creator of you and He is the creator of me.

And yes, God allows the use of human interaction to create people, but ultimately, it begins with Him.

He is the creator and he is the sustainer.