Question of the Day - How can we know if God has spoken? There’s so many religions with so many claims? Why believe one over the other?
Last Episode: If God exists, then miracles are possible
Next Episode: The New Testament is Reliable…
What is a Miracle: Lexham Bible Dictionary- Miracle (δύναμις, dynamis). An event that defies common expectations of behavior and subsequently is attributed to a superhuman agent; an occurrence that demonstrates God’s involvement in the course of human affairs.
This Episode - Miracles are used by God to confirm His message to mankind. So, why believe one religion over another? I believe God has given us many signposts leading to himself. We are not left to wander in a jungle of uncertainty. He has created a path to know Him. He has given signs that say - Here’s the way, walk in it to know Me. I’ve revealed myself in many ways.
General Revelation/ Special revelation.
Back to miracles. The Bible is full of events that reveal miracles. Supernatural events that over and over again communicate one message - God is there. He is not silent. He reveals Himself in history in a way that’s unmistakable so we can know him, love him, and worship him. Here’s a few key instances where God used miracles to reveal himself.
With Moses:
Signs for Moses
4 Moses answered, “What if they do not believe me or listen to me and say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you’?”
2 Then the Lord said to him, “What is that in your hand?”
“A staff,” he replied.
3 The Lord said, “Throw it on the ground.”
Moses threw it on the ground and it became a snake, and he ran from it. 4 Then the Lord said to him, “Reach out your hand and take it by the tail.” So Moses reached out and took hold of the snake and it turned back into a staff in his hand. 5 “This,” said the Lord, “is so that they may believe that the Lord, the God of their fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—has appeared to you.”
6 Then the Lord said, “Put your hand inside your cloak.” So Moses put his hand into his cloak, and when he took it out, the skin was leprous—it had become as white as snow.
7 “Now put it back into your cloak,” he said. So Moses put his hand back into his cloak, and when he took it out, it was restored, like the rest of his flesh.
8 Then the Lord said, “If they do not believe you or pay attention to the first sign, they may believe the second. 9 But if they do not believe these two signs or listen to you, take some water from the Nile and pour it on the dry ground. The water you take from the river will become blood on the ground.”
10 Moses said to the Lord, “Pardon your servant, Lord. I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.”
11 The Lord said to him, “Who gave human beings their mouths? Who makes them deaf or mute? Who gives them sight or makes them blind? Is it not I, the Lord? 12 Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.”
13 But Moses said, “Pardon your servant, Lord. Please send someone else.”
14 Then the Lord’s anger burned against Moses and he said, “What about your brother, Aaron the Levite? I know he can speak well. He is already on his way to meet you, and he will be glad to see you. 15 You shall speak to him and put words in his mouth; I will help both of you speak and will teach you what to do. 16 He will speak to the people for you, and it will be as if he were your mouth and as if you were God to him. 17 But take this staff in your hand so you can perform the signs with it.”
The New International Version. (2011). (Ex 4:1–17). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.
With Jesus:
Jesus Comforts His Disciples
14 “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. 2 My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. 4 You know the way to the place where I am going.”
Jesus the Way to the Father
5 Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”
6 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7 If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”
8 Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.”
9 Jesus answered: “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work. 11 Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves.
The New International Version. (2011). (Jn 14:1–11). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.
THE BIGGEST MIRACLE OF ALL IS THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST - WE WILL GET INTO THAT!
SO WHY DOES GOD USE MIRACLES????
Without a sign from above are are left to our own faculties….
Endless religions
Endless scientific theories
Endless uncertainty
Endless philosophical ideas
The only thing we know for sure is that we don’t know anything about God for sure!
SO GOD USES MIRACLES
To reveal His identity
To reveal His truth
To reveal His salvation
WHAT’S THE RESULT
Light shining into darkness
Truth clears the fog of uncertainty
Man knows his maker
Salvation and Reconciliation
A peek into the world to come
NEXT WEEK --- HOW DO WE KNOW THE NEW TESTAMENT IS RELIABLE????
JOIN THE CONVERSATION + SHARE WITH OTHERS + RATE AND REVIEW ON ITUNES
