The Miracles of Jesus

When the Pharisees criticized Jesus miracles. Remember the lie that he actually performed them versus denied the source of his power said that he was doing these things through the power of Satan, but at least they recognized that the power that Jesus manifested while he walked on this earth was superhuman was extraordinary and was attended by miracles to renew your mother this Thursday.

Many people today reject the Bible's authority because they have a hard time accepting all the miracles there too far-fetched to be credible. They say Jesus appealed to his miracles as proof that he was sent by God today Dr. RC scroll helps us understand these miracles and why we can believe that indeed he had the power to perform. How's it possible for a person to listen to the radio, watch television, read about putting people on the moon avail themselves of computers. Modern technology and antibiotics and still believe in the miracles of Jesus. That's a question raised by one of the most important critics of the New Testament record in the 20th century, Rudolph Bultmann. Bultmann believes that the record of account of the life of Jesus that is found in the pages of the New Testament is one that is cloaked heavily in mythology and one of the reasons for the rejection of the authenticity and inspiration of the New Testament is that because so much material in the New Testament centers on the historical claim of miracle that we know for example that miracles are recorded in the Old Testament, but there is not a consistent constant pattern of the working of miracles throughout the whole history of the Old Testament, but rather the appearance of miracles in the historical text tend to be clustered in certain crucial times, and most significantly, at times when a major revelation of God is being brought before the world. One of the heaviest centers of the cluster of miracle that we find in the Old Testament Scriptures is in and around the life of Moses and we remember in the Old Testament that the reason why Moses was invested or endowed with the power to perform miracles is because of the extreme difficulty of the task that had been given to him by God.

Remember that when God commissioned Moses and told him to go to Pharaoh and say let my people go, and to go and tell the people of Israel to follow him. In this Exodus experience. Moses sent how are they going to know that you are speaking to me, and that the word that I will be proclaiming will be your word and remember, God said Moses put your hand in your cloak, and he did and reported out it was leprosy support in there again and reported that the second time it was Kleenex to take your staff and throw it on the ground and he did and it turned into a snake.

He said not reached on pick it up and it turned back into a stick and we know the contests that Moses had with the magicians of Pharaoh's court.

We see the same marvelous display of the supernatural.

With the advent of the new age of prophecy with the appearance of Elijah and Elisha in the Old Testament, but you don't read about miracles performed by David or by Solomon or by Jeremiah or by some of the greatest people who appear in the Old Testament, but even with Abraham. Do we read of Abraham's performing miracles, so there has to be some reason that God had in history to cluster these miracles. The way that he did. But there is no place where we see such a heavy concentration of miracle, then when Jesus appears on the earth one literary critic of the New Testament, said one thing is unmistakable and that is that the record of Jesus is a record that is a Bley's with miracles. The question is do we trust them are the true 19th-century naturalism denied them wholesale 20th century neoliberalism. As I mentioned with the Bultmann categorically deny the historical reality of these miracles. In fact, one of the elements of so-called higher criticism or form criticism is by looking at various passages in the New Testament and seeing the literary form in which they occur in one of the things that they form critics have done is they have examined the miracle stories to see if there is a pattern that is repeatable and they have noticed such a pattern of the so-called miracle stories where a severe problem like a disease or malady or affliction is first described the scum of the before and after of the before-and-after story and then the actual work is performed.

That is the miracle.

The result of which is some kind of deliverance or rescue, and then the characteristic response in this pattern is one of amazement or astonishment when you learn Greek in seminary, one of the first words that you have to learn in the Greek language is the word found that sigh, which means to be astonished and the reason why it's one of the first words you learn is because the high degree of frequency of the occurrence of this word in the New Testament. Every time Jesus walked around.

It seems that the response to people to his to his behavior was one of astonishment. Now I think that's important for us to realize when we consider the New Testament record of the miracles of Christ because we have a tendency to judge the first century church and the writers of the Scripture from a rather Olympian posture of cultural arrogance from our day.

We say all these people are prescientific their primitive, their credulous and gullible when they lived in a world where they took miracles for granted. Do a word study frequency study of the word astonishment get in touch with the response of Jesus contemporaries to his power, and to his display of power people and never seen anything like it.

I don't care what period of history people lived in seeing somebody raised from the dead, who was dead, and in tomb for four days was not commonplace and people in the first century were not so gullible as to swallow hook line and sinker.

Every report of somebody's being raised from the dead after being in a state of physiological decay people in the first century were not stupid. They were not dummies, neither can it be justly set of them that they were unscientific or even prescientific. Now they didn't know what is known in our day. Scientifically, just as we don't know what presumably will be known in the next centuries scientifically and they may look at us with the same kind of arrogance and say how naïve we are with the some of the views we cling to. But the fundamental issue here with respect to the New Testament record surrounding the works of Christ is the question of whether we believe there is a God who has the power to create a universe actually hello once that's established in the only question is is it this God who is manifesting his endorsement of this person who is displaying these powers that are recorded. You know it's interesting that the first century critics of Jesus never denied that he was doing miracles that were so obvious that the Pharisees denied the source of his power said that he was doing these things through the power of Satan, but at least they recognized that the power that Jesus manifested while he walked on this earth was superhuman was extraordinary and was attended by miracles. Now before we look at it had an example or two of miracles. I want to ask the question what were the functions of miracles in the New Testament why miracles and why don't we have them all over the place today not saying don't get me wrong I'm not saying that God is not working in an extraordinary way. Today we don't have the blaze of miracles of peopling, raising the dead Messer assignment was written about in the New Testament.

Why do we have that. Why is the beginning of Jesus life and always through his life to his resurrection. Why are these events surrounded by the manifestation of miracles we remember, Nicodemus came to Jesus at night and in his introductory remarks to Jesus. He said to him, teacher, we know that thou art a teacher sent from God or you would not be able to do the things that should do now that was a very important insight from Nicodemus and Nicodemus understood his Old Testament understood that God did not perform miracles willy-nilly, nor did ministers in the Old Testament have signs in their studies that set expect a miracle because of a miracle was something that one readily expected the extraordinary nature of that would be lost if it were commonplace. I hear people speak in the vernacular talk constantly.

The site of the birth of a baby is a miracle. Every time I see a baby born I say it's a miracle/I don't usually say anything but I am tempted to say no it's not it's it's a marvelous thing and is something to which we should never be a new word that we should always in the sense be amazed by the majesty and mystery of human birth the human verse occur every single day.

They don't require the extraordinary direct immediate visitation of power that God displays in a miracle. That doesn't mean that the power of God is not present in the births again. The Bible teaches that the power by which everything comes to pass in this world is the power of God. But there is a difference between the ordinary operation of God's power and the extraordinary work times. He will depart or deviate from the standard normal pattern of the laws of nature which are is laws and set them inside to get our attention with something dramatic and transcendent. That's belongs to the very character of nature and so Nicodemus understood that he said while you're doing things that a person could do only if God were with him when Nicodemus donated think presumably that Satan could do the things that Jesus was doing and Jesus himself appealed to his miracles as his credential.

So if you won't believe my words and believe me for my works sake that we go to the book of Hebrews in the New Testament.

Then we read in the second chapter of Hebrews these words.

Therefore, we must give the more earnest heed to the things we have heard, lest we drift away forth the words spoken through Angels prove steadfast in every transgression and disobedience received a just reward.

How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord and was confirmed to us by those who heard him. God also bearing witness, with signs and wonders with various miracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit. We often think of bearing witness to something that only we do that is our task to bear witness to Christ were to bear witness to God but God bore witness to Jesus and the way in which he bore witness to Jesus was by miracles John Locke, the British philosopher once said that the primary function of the only function but the primary function of the miracle in the Bible is to be the credit of the proposer that is to prove the truthfulness of the person who was doing to certify that this person was endorsed by God and was speaking the truth of God. That's why we have to be very, very, very careful about our understanding of miracles because apart from the other functions that they have relieving suffering and so on. In biblical times the one of the primary purposes of the miracle was to prove that this person was an agent of Revelation was somebody speaking, nothing less then the word of God, though maybe somewhat interesting to you that the word miracle does not occur in the New Testament can be somewhat misleading, because what I mean by that is that there is no single word in the Greek that appears in the New Testament that means miracle, smudge lecture on this. The next day, people sent me all kinds of references from the new King James Bible, or other translations where the word miracle occurs in English Texas. I just I understand that that's what's there, but actually there three different words that are used in the Greek text, and what we have done historically is that from these three different words we've extrapolated an abstract concept and we call that concept. Miracle. And so, at times, the translator will translate one or all three of these words by the English word miracle is fascinating to look at the three distinct works because they have little nuances that are important to us in the three words that we find in the New Testament that combine to give us our idea of miracle are the words sign or signs, powers, and wonders only take them in reverse order. We've already seen that one of the recurring aspects of the miracle stories is the response of a basement. These are activities or actions that provoke from the witnesses of them a sense of wonder.

We use the word wonderful and kind of a hackneyed way in our day. Originally, the term wonderful meant full of wonder, something that elicited a sense of wonder was something that was beyond the normal can of human experience and so that word is used to describe the works of Jesus.

They were wonders. He was a wonderworker.

Secondly, they were called powers because what they display is an dimension of power that we normally believe is out of bounds are off limits to human beings. What a person has the power to speak to a wind into a churning sea and save based.

Be still and immediately the call comes to pass. What human being has the power to go to the graveside mausoleum.

The man, as I said is in the state of decay and stand outside of the tomb and otter of verbal commands simply by sight. Lazarus come forth and having that very instant neurons in the brain beginning to charge the heart start to beat. Blood begins to flow again through the vessels the tissues. The fibers to sin use begin to be filled with strength. The man opens his eyes and walks out alive powers that what kind of power is it that enables a person to defy the laws of gravity and the boy and safe to walk on the water or to take water and by fiat by imperative change in constituent life from water to wine kind of person can give sight to the blind by touching hearing to the deaf. Ever seen a miracle worker today restore a limb. Jesus did all of these things and more displaying these powers. But the other word. The word that is John's favorite word is receipt.

The first miracle that is recorded that the wedding feast of Cana were Jesus does change the water into wine. It is called a sign in one sense it was what the evil and adulterous generation sought after. I'm not gonna believe until I see a sign from heaven, so I'm not gonna believe until I see the Pierce marks on his body and I put my hand in the wounds of his body before they ask. They were asking for a miracle they wanted something that was so manifest so clearly the power of God so clearly something that only God could do that, then and only then would they believe in Jesus rebuked people for that sort of thing and at the same time, told us that that generation were so wicked that even if one came back from the dead. They wouldn't believe no matter how many signs Jesus did perform. They wanted more. This is not enough Jesus risers loci greenery given to you, except that which was given to Jonah and that was the resurrection pulses to the Athenians when he goes to Marcel.

He said these former days of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all men everywhere to repent. Because he is appointed a day, by which he will judge the world by this one that he has proven to be who he claimed to be by the resurrection from the dead. It's as if God was saying to us if the resurrection of Jesus isn't enough to prove to you that this is my only begotten son, and I can say anything greater you're not going to say anything more because I have given the credit of the proposer. I have surrounded the life of my son with manifest and manifold demonstrations of my power.

I have given the sign of who he is and that's why these miracles are extremely important for us as we read them and when you read them and read the New Testament and you see a miracle story. Ask yourself immediately. What is the significance of this. Or to put it more deliberately. What is the sighing Bacon's this this class about this person called that's Dr. Hersey's role in a message from his overview of the entire Bible series called dusty glory and helps us tie together the major themes and events that we find in the old and New Testament this week on Renewing Your Mind were concentrating on the life and work of Jesus.

We can agree that this teaching is critical. Today more than ever and look at your ministries recent state of theology survey we found that 58% of evangelicals in the United States believe that Jesus is a created being. When we as Christians misunderstand the foundational truths of the faith is no wonder that we find the church in a state of confusion.

This series is a valuable resource to help you shore up your understanding of biblical truth is I mentioned this is a special edition set that includes a bonus disc with all of the audio files for the series, plus a digital edition of the study guide helpful, especially if you plan on using the series in a group setting. So again request dusty glory with your gift of any amount or number again is 800-435-4343 and her online address is Renewing Your Mind.a word before we go. I like to remind you of our upcoming Mediterranean study crews since October 17 through the 29th will have the opportunity to visit some iconic biblical locations including Rome, Athens and Jerusalem shall hear biblical teaching from Dr. W. Robert Godfrey and Nathan W. Bingham, a limited number of cabins are available, but you want to sign up soon.

For more information go to Lincoln here.org/events will tomorrow. Dr. scrollable focus on the question who did Jesus claim to be. We tend to think that Jesus calling himself the son of man was an expression of humility when in fact it was a claim to divine so I want you to notice this when he heals on the Sabbath day and is rebuked by his enemies. He said I did this you may know that the Son of Man is Lord of the seven please join us Friday for Renewing Your Mind