Where Have All The Miracles Gone?
November 10, 2007 by TJM Admin
One of my personal favorite quotes is from someone that you may not have heard of, Dr. Delos Mc Kown.
Though often reported, miracles, so-called, are suspect because human beings lack the criteria for discriminating between any divinely engineered event and any rare (even unprecedented), unexplained (at the moment), but perfectly natural phenomenon. So, until distinguishing criteria are apprehended and explicated, nothing that has happened can legitimately be called a miracle.
I often find myself wondering where all of these spectacular miracles have gone? It seems as though what used to be an almost everyday occurrence has fallen by the wayside. “But there are miracles all around us everyday!” (Yes, I can hear you shouting.) What miracles? Those that can be simply explained through natural law? No, not those. I mean MIRACLES. You know, calling down fire from heaven, healing the blind, raising the dead (without the use of a defibrillator, of course) and things of that nature.
I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. -John 14:12 NIV
Greater things than these… Well, let’s see. What miracles did Jesus allegedly perform?
- Water Made Wine: John 2:1-11.
- The Nobleman’s Son: John 4, 48-54.
- The Draught of Fishes: Luke 5, 1-11.
- The Cure of the Demoniac: Mark 1, 23-28; Luke 4, 33-37.
- Peter’s Mother-in-law: Matt. 8, 14-15; Mark 1, 29-31; Luke 4, 38-39.
- The Leper: Matt. 8, 1-4; Mark 1, 40-45; Luke 5, 12-19.
- The Paralytic Cured: Matt. 9, 1-8; Mark 2, 1-12; Luke 5, 18-26.
- The Cure at Bethsaida: John 5, 1-15.
- The Withered Hand: Matt. 12, 9-13; Mark 3, 1-6; Luke 6, 6-11.
- The Centurion’s Servant: Matt. 8, 5-13; Luke 7, 2-10.
- The Widow’s Son: Luke 7, 11-17.
- The Blind and Mute Demoniac: Matt. 12, 22.
- The Tempest Stilled: Matt. 8, 23-27; Mark 4, 35-41; Luke 8, 22-25.
- Expulsion of Devils: Matt. 8, 29-34; Mark 5, 1-20; Luke 8, 26-39.
- Jairus’ Daughter: Matt. 9, 18-26; Mark 5, 21-43; Luke 8, 40-56.
- The Woman In the Crowd: Matt. 9, 20-22; Mark 5, 24-34; Luke 8, 43-48.
- Two Blind Men: Matt. 9, 27-31.
- The Mute Spirit: Matt. 9, 32-34.
- Five Thousand Fed: Matt. 14, 13-21; Mark 6, 34-44; Luke 9, 12-17; John 6, 1-15.
- Jesus Walks on the Water: Matt. 14, 22-33; Mark 6, 45-52; John 6, 16-21.
- The Canaanite Woman: Matt. 15, 21-28; Mark 7, 24-30.
- The Deaf Mute: Mark 7, 31-37.
- Four Thousand Fed: Matt. 15, 32-38; Mark 8, 1-9.
- The Blind Man: Mark 8, 22-25.
- A Possessed Boy: Matt. 17, 14-21; Mark 9, 13-30; Luke 9, 37-43.
- Tribute Money Provided: Matt. 17, 24-28.
- The Man Born Blind: John 9, 1-38.
- The Mute, Lame, and Blind: Matt. 15, 29-31.
- A Woman Cured: Luke 13, 10-17.
- The Man with the Dropsy: Luke 14, 1-6.
- The Raising of Lasarus: John 11, 1-44.
- Ten Lepers: Luke 17, 11-19.
- The Blind Men at Jericho: Matt. 20, 29-34; Mark 10, 46-52; Luke 18, 35-43.
- The Fig Tree Blasted: Matt. 21, 18-22; Mark 11, 12-25.
- The Servant’s Ear Healed: Luke 22, 49-51.
- The Draught of Fishes: John 21, 1-14.
Wow! A little of everything in there from producing some pocket change to raising the dead. What works could you do greater than those? After all, God said it, you believe it and that settles it, right?
Oh, I know! Why don’t you pray for the immediate regeneration of an amputee’s limb? THAT would be cool. Oh, Oh even better! Why not go after something globally; like, say, the complete remission of cancer worldwide! Or even AIDS? In Jesus’ name, of course. That is, if you don’t believe that AIDS is God’s way of killing off all the homosexual heathen.
Wanna really get people to believe in the crap you’re peddling? Try some of those suggestions.
Are those miracles in the same league as Moses parting the Red Sea, Joshua asking the sun to stand still, Hezekiah requesting the sun to retrogress?
To the modern scientific mind, miracles are figments of imaginations from ages past. They come from times out of which arose many myths, fables, and legends. They were for the benefit of the nation, but they are not historical. They are unscientific and unworthy of meaningful thought in view of modern scientific enlightenment.
Dan Barker writes in http://atheism.about.com/od/bookreviews/fr/LosingFaith.htm :
“Everyone knows that the Bible contains accounts of miracles, and that alone is enough justification for any rational person to conclude that there may be better uses of one’s time than studying Scripture. (And, no, this is not an a priori dismissal of the supernatural. It is the same criterion Christians use in valuating other religions. How many Baptists believe that ancient Roman amulets cured diseases?)
Most believers are compulsively addicted through repetition to the idea that their Bible is the greatest, most important, most inspired book in the world, and therefore the miracle accounts must have … credibility; but the rest of us are under no obligation to feel that way. Many believers have been taught that Scripture is the ultimate measure of truth, never imagining that the Bible itself might come under a higher measure of truth, under the scrutiny of reason. [...]
Most religionists, who are normally quite capable of analyzing everyone else’s ideas with careful precision, suspend the rational process when they approach their own beliefs, Suddenly, everything is possible, even probable, “The Bible says it, I believe it,” some say. We who doubt are accused of an “a priori bias” against miracles or a “prejudiced denial” of the supernatural when we are merely following the process that all humans use to learn anything.”
A Cambridge University professor says many of the Bible miracles can be explained by science:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/cambridgeshire/2967039.stm
Robin Williams having a little fun with miracles:
http://www.yoism.org/?q=node/352
[Reply]
You want miracles? I got cher miracles right HERE!!!
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f171/cynatnite/1599078.gif
Who knew the pope was one of the Super Friends???
[Reply]
What about unprecedented incidents occuring seconds after one’s praying.? And thirty very stunning incidents, which can only be named “small miracles” ?
SMALL MIRACLES by Askin Ozcan, ISBN 1598001000 (Outskirts Press) gives detailed account of these unbelievable occurences
in the life of the author. They can not be co-incidents.
http://www.outskirtspress.com/smallmiracles
Available at all major internet bookshops.
[Reply]
@askin, an excerpt from the website you posted:
“I couldn’t go to my fiance’s birthday party without a present! I thought of not going to the party, but Anne was waiting for me and probably told her friends that I was coming. It would be a big disappointment for her. I was thinking on the sidewalk about what I should do. Time was running out! Suddenly a big truck stopped in front of me at the red light. Then it took off at the green with such speed that its back doors opened and a parcel flew out to the road. I wanted to take the parcel, but I was afraid that someone might see. But, there were only two persons around, one on a side street about a hundred yards away, the other on the main road about two hundred yards away. I went to the middle of the road and picked up the parcel. My first thought was to put it into the mailbox on the corner, but as I inspected the parcel, I noticed the address was ripped off. It could neither go to the addressee nor to the sender.”
==================================================
(snark)
Not quite turning water into wine or raising the dead, now is it? So essentially this could be called: “The Miracle of Being in the Right Place at the Right Time?” Or, The Prodigal Present?” How about: “The Miracle of the Box of Fake Rolexes?” Actually, I was surprised after having seen the author’s picture, that the cops weren’t there handcuffing him the moment his fingerprints were on the box:
http://outskirtspress.com//BOOKCHAIR/author.jpg
But anyways, the message of this “miracle” seems to be that its okay to steal someone else’s property if it falls off a truck. Jesus must have wanted him to have it, obviously. Otherwise he would’ve made sure they truck doors stayed closed. Like manna from heaven.
Why not do the right thing? The legal thing? Take the box of merch to a police station and report what happened. I’m sure the owners will love not having to lose the income from which they feed their families and pay their bills. But instead, this Christain miracle allows for the exoneration of the thief in breaking the Sixth Commandment in order not to appear to be a cheap bastard in front of his fiance and her friends. Hallelujah!
Its good to see that god has his priorities straight….
(/snark)
[Reply]
[...] Please provide verifiable video footage of you doing a miracle that is greater than any miracle that is attributed to Jesus. For a list of miracles he supposedly performed and reason for this particular challenge, please read this. [...]
TRACKBACK where-have-all-the-miracles-gone
[Reply]
TRACKBACK where-have-all-the-miracles-gone
A few weeks ago, my Pastor died after a long illness and despite much prayer by all of us. In my initial distress, I decided to search the internet to see what has been published on the topic of miracles. I googled the words, “where have all the miracles gone”. One of the earlier hits on the list, underscoring its popularity, perhaps, was this blog posting ……
[Reply]
You are the brick! Reading stuff like this written in the way like this is a great pleasure for me.
[Reply]
answer to de swiss on nov 15
I see no reason your non-existing cops should have hand -cuffed me after I picked up that box, as there were no addresses of the sender or the receiver on the box - both were considerably ripped off. If there was any address at all, on the box, I would have put it in the mail box right there. I didn’t know where the big truck belonged to either. Under these circumstances what I did was normal. If I took the box to a police station which was miles away,
an impossibility anyway, as busses didn’t work everywhere in that snow, the police would have taken my name and address and return the box to me after the prescribed time, as no one would
claim it anyway. Police don’t even have resources to deal with the mentally ill who attempt to insult academicians and authors judging them from their portraits wrongly. It is your mind and its
preconcepts and complexes which should be “hand cuffed”.
[Reply]