Rational Miracles

Miracles, by definition, are phenomena, welcome phenomena, which stand outside the bounds of what is expected, normal, or natural. They don’t have a scientific explanation and so are attributed to divine intervention. For the materialist, therefore, a miracle is an impossibility, and to believe that they occur is irrational. No matter how extraordinary a phenomenon, it must have a rational, scientific explanation.

Given their presuppositions, I don’t know how materialists would have explained the healing of the man who sat day by day at the Beautiful Gate (Acts 3). Everyone familiar with the Beautiful Gate knew him to be one who had been lame from birth, who was brought to the location so that he could beg for alms. When it came to pass, therefore, that he was suddenly able to stand and leap about they couldn’t deny that it was he or that he was now completely healed. But what brought this about? Why was he suddenly able to walk? The explanation given by Peter wouldn’t have satisfied the materialist. It wasn’t scientific. It wasn’t rational.

Well, actually, that’s not completely true. The healing might not have been scientific, but it was totally rational, for it was done in the name of Jesus.

Prompted by the healing, Peter offers the incredulous onlookers a string of titles and adjectives for Jesus, when put together, provide a perfectly rational explanation as to why the man was healed “by faith in his name.” Jesus, the one those listening had “delivered over and denied in the presence of Pilate,” was the “Holy and Righteous One” who had been glorified (ascended and now seated at the right hand of God, as attested to by the outpouring of he Holy Spirit) by the “God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of our fathers,” who was raised from the dead and shown to be the “Author of life.” He was the “servant” of God, the “Christ” who “suffered” as “foretold by the mouth of all the prophets,” who himself was the one of whom “Moses said, ‘The Lord God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your brothers.’” He was the object of “all the prophets [had] spoken” about the age to come in which the covenant that God made with Abraham that “’in your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed,’” would be realized. Given the reality of who Jesus is, it makes perfect sense that Peter and John, ministering in the power of Jesus could heal the man in the name of Jesus.

The hope is that the materialist (or anyone else for that matter) would reason backwards from the miracle and come to the conclusion that “there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). For some who listened to Peter that was the case. And for those in any age who hear the testimony for themselves, and are willing to weigh the evidence, a perfectly rational response will be to repent and believe.

He Ascended into Heaven

This past Lord’s Day was Ascension Sunday, an aspect of Jesus’ earthly ministry that receives little attention compared to his birth, death, and resurrection. The above title is a phrase from the Apostles’ Creed. The phrase, in the words of Swiss theologian Karl Barth, rounds off “a whole series of perfects: begotten, conceived, born, suffered, crucified, dead, buried, descended, rose again,” and leads into “a new time which is our present time, the time of the Church, the end-time, inaugurated and founded by the work of Jesus Christ.” Therein lies the significance of the ascension. It signals the completion of Christ’s earthly ministry and sets the stage for the work he has been doing through his people ever since.

How is the mission of the church enabled by the ascension? In the first place, it validates the one whom we proclaim. Jesus being taken from their sight in a cloud is a strong echo of previous manifestations of God’s presence. In Scripture, the glory cloud was not an atmospheric phenomenon; it indicated that God was among his people. Secondly, upon his return to heaven, Jesus, as promised, poured out the Holy Spirit upon the waiting church so that it would be empowered to carry the good news to the ends of the earth. Thirdly, Jesus bodily presence in heaven affords the church the great comfort of knowing that our own heavenly future is guaranteed. Seated with him in heavenly places, by reason of our union with Christ, we labor here on earth confident of our own glorification as the King of kings leads us on in God’s victorious plan. Lastly, as we labor our High Priest intercedes for us, providing our justification and facilitating our sanctification.

The significance of the ascension cannot be overstated. It is, in the words of one theologian, “the necessary complement and completion of the resurrection. Christ’s transition to the higher life of glory, begun in the resurrection, was perfected in the ascension.” As such, it is the source of our confidence as we serve in this life the one who possesses a name above all names, as well as a precursor to our own perfection and glorification.

An Ode for Ascension Sunday

At the Name of Jesus
by Caroline M. Noel

At the Name of Jesus
Ev'ry knee shall bow,
Every tongue confess him
King of Glory now.
'Tis the Father's pleasure
We should call him Lord,
Who from the beginning
Was the mighty word.

At his voice creation
Sprang at once to sight,
All the angel faces,
All the hosts of light,
Thrones and dominations,
Stars upon their way,
All the heav'nly orders
In their great array.

Humbled for a season
To receive a name
From the lips of sinners
Unto whom he came,
Faithfully he bore it
Spotless to the last,
Brought it back victorious,
When from death he passed.

In your hearts enthrone him;
There let him subdue
All that is not holy,
All that is not true:
Crown him as your Captain
In temptation's hour:
Let his will enfold you
In its light and pow'r.

Brothers, this Lord Jesus
Shall return again,
With his Father's glory,
With his angel train;
For all wreaths of empire
Meet upon his brow,
And our hearts confess him
King of Glory now.