Another Thread on Miracles (Lee Strobel book)

I see part of the problem is that you have a view of healing and miracles that is inconsistent with scripture.

Healing and other miracles are done at the prompting of the Holy Spirit; God doesn’t give anyone a magic wand to use as he pleases.

Even Jesus could do no deed of power in his hometown, as Mark records.

6 He left that place and came to his hometown, and his disciples followed him. 2 On the sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astounded. They said, “Where did this man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been given to him? What deeds of power are being done by his hands! 3 Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary[a] and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense[b] at him. 4 Then Jesus said to them, “Prophets are not without honor, except in their hometown, and among their own kin, and in their own house.” 5 And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. 6 And he was amazed at their unbelief.

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I understand it really well. I even did a paper years ago in every single miracle in the Torah and New Testament was over 100 pages long. Nothing in those verses you posted stated that Jesus was prohibited from doing them. It was the fact almost none came to him because as stated, a prophet is without honor in his home town”. Those people thought it was impossible for Jesus to be anything more than a bastard from the sticks. So they did not come.

Again, when I have time. I’m hash it out with you. We can go text by text and make comparisons on what was done and what was not done and dig into laying on of hands , apostleship, and so on. I just don’t have time now. So don’t take my silence coming up as being baffled. I’m just busy. I’ll try to engage a little a bit. Here is a good place to start.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.biblegateway.com/passage/%3Fsearch=Acts%2B8:4-24&version=NASB&interface=amp

So I already know all of these answers but I’m curious what you believe.

  1. Is Philip there the evangelist or the apostle? How do we know?

  2. We see Philip carrying out the great commission (acts 2:37-38) and he baptized those that believed. But despite believing, repentance, and being baptized they had not yet received the Holy Spirit. Why is that?

  3. If in acts 2:38 it says when we repent and are baptized into Christ we receive the forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit. But here in acts 8 they did those things and yet the apostles in Jerusalem had to come down to give them the Holy Spirit. Why is that?

  4. Is there a difference between the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and power of the Holy Spirit?

  5. Simon the witch saw that Philip was preforming miracles. Yet the apostles had to be sent down to Samaria to those who believed and were baptized so that the apostles could lay hands on them and they receive the Holy Spirit. What were the apostles needed?

All of those questions tie directly into laying on of hands which is a aspect of miracles.

I look forward to it, as I have seen nothing in scripture which teaches cessation of miracles.

As for your questions:

  1. Offhand, I don’t know which Philip it is, and I don’t think it matters.
  2. Peter was given the keys to the kingdom. He opened the church to the Jews at Pentecost. His endorsement was needed in Acts 8 to open the church to the Samaritans. Peter also opened the church to the Gentiles with Cornelius. These three openings were important.
  3. You have misstated Acts 2:38. It doesn’t say “we…”. This is Peter speaking to the Jews.
  4. Power and indwelling are certainly different things.
  5. The church had not been unlocked for the Samaritans by the one Jesus had given the keys. Peter had to go to legitimize the mission and the inclusion of the Samaritans, just as he had to go to Cornelius and unlock the church for the Gentiles.

And, note, Peter didn’t understand that the church was to be opened to the Gentiles. He had to be given the vision three times.

Also note that miracles do not require a laying on of hands. Many miracles occurred without that.

Nothing in scripture says miracles ceased. When specifically do you think they did cease?

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I liked Eric Metaxas’ book, Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy (but I dislike his politics), so I read his book Miracles: What They Are, Why They Happen, and How They Can Change Your Life, where he interviews people he had personal reasons to trust about miracles that had occurred in their lives. Having had miracles of God’s providence in my own life, I had no reason to distrust the accounts he relates in the book. It’s been several years ago since I’ve read it, but at least one is a miracle of healing.

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I think I can loan it to you on Kindle, if you’re interested. The loan is only good for two weeks, if I remember correctly – I looked into it for someone a year or two ago, but, (if I remember correcty :slightly_smiling_face:) it’s a pretty quick read (way quicker than the unabridged Bonhoeffer :slightly_smiling_face:).

Nuts. Belay that. That title is not available for loan, but I can recommend it to you. :grin:

  1. Actually it matters a lot. That’s why I said it takes a lot of time to work through why I believe it. It will take me hours to systematically work though it and guide you. Hours of work that I don’t have time to go through. Within that chapter, if someone is interested, it lays out which Philip it is.

  2. Again. Not at all. A lot more can be said about the keys also. Catholics have really painted a picture of it that’s not actually there. But that’s not actually what it is about. The reason why Peter, and John, was sent was because an apostle was necessary to be there.

  3. Your statement here makes no sense. It seems more like a emotional toss than anything even remotely attempting to be reason. I’m not quoting acts. I stating the doctrine taught there.

Acts 2:37-38. NASB
37 Now when they heard this, they were pierced to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brethren, what shall we do?” 38 Peter said to them, “Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

The we, is everyone. It’s the great commission after all being carried out from Matthew 28. Teach them to believe and be baptized… Water baptism, baptism of fire, baptism of the spirit, and power of the Holy Spirit all tie into this. You can’t actually understand the power of the spirit of you don’t understand the others. It’s a foundation.

Yes the indwelling is the Holy Spirit is very different from the power of the Holy Spirit. Can you explain the differences?

Had nothing to do with peter having keys. It required an apostle. We see the same thing from Paul to Timothy when he was among the elders.

1 Timothy 4:14
New American Standard Bible
14 Do not neglect the spiritual gift within you, which was bestowed on you through prophetic utterance with the laying on of hands by the presbytery.

2 Timothy 1:6
New American Standard Bible
6 For this reason I remind you to kindle afresh the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of my hands.

At first it seems like a contradiction. But greek clears it up. In 1T4:14 the word with is meta and means among some when we place the stories together we see this. The elders were there with Paul and Paul places his hands on Timothy to give him the spiritual gift known as the power of the spirit. At this time Timothy was already a Christian. No keys was needed. But an apostle was.

Another major theme to understanding this as mentioned is what is the baptism of fire. Many confuse the baptism of fire with a spiritual blessing or something with the tongues of fire in acts 2. But it’s not. Being baptized with fire is being destroyed in the lake of fire.

Matthew 3:7-12
New American Standard Bible
7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8 Therefore bear fruit in keeping with repentance; 9 and do not suppose that you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham for our father’; for I say to you that from these stones God is able to raise up children to Abraham. 10 The axe is already laid at the root of the trees; therefore every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

11 “As for me, Ibaptize you with water for repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, and I am not fit to remove His sandals; He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 12 His winnowing fork is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clear His threshing floor; and He will gather His wheat into the barn, but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”

The entire verse is linking fire as punishment for the chaff.

It’s midnight here and I’m about to go to bed. In the next few weeks I’ll make posts about the various baptisms , and how it all converges on laying on of hands. Outside of the gospels, and after the promise in acts 1 in how the apostles were to await in Jerusalem for the promise which played out in acts 2.

I will place it on my back burner. I’ve read a lot on this. Ultimately what guides my doctrine on this is theology. Theology is how I know that unbelievers were led to Christ by the proof the apostles did.

I used to be a cessationist, and I understand its theological and exegetical underpinnings, but I am not convinced it matches reality. (I certainly don’t think miracles are as common as some make them out to be – God is not a vending machine that we can plug our prayer and faith coins into and expect the desired product.)

I do. Theologically it lines up. Then additionally, no one on this planet can walk into the emergency room and begin to heal the sick and resurrect the dead by laying their hands on them. No instant healings. At best we can pray, and hope it works out if it’s in his will over time. After all, We are all social distancing and wearing masks and not just curing everyone. Or even a fraction of them.

I agree with the bulk of that content, but not the second sentence. I will not say dogmatically that there cannot be instant healings, nowhere, never. The one Metaxas relates pretty much was. And God can work differently in different cultures, too. I understand that more than one Muslim’s first introduction to Jesus was in a [miraculous] dream or vision.

As time permits I’ll flesh out theologically why I’m so certain.

As for the rest there is nothing that can be done. If you believe it, you believe it. I don’t. I don’t believe the Muslim had a dream any more divine than the dreams I’ve had. There are people who sincerely believe that the dead reached out to them in dreams and believe that aliens have contacted them and that they can astral project and talk to beings in Other dimensions and people who believe cards tell the future and live their life off of it and so on.

I’ve watched crippled kids and adults who truly believed in miracles stand face to face with pastors who claimed to have cured others and they never stood up. I’ve watched people who wanted to believe it was real see the same girl get prayed over and healed only to die from the same disease weeks later. I know people who are good people, honest people, and don’t so drugs or have mental disorders and function perfectly fine in life who swear fairies are real and that elves are real and that they’ve seen them and talked with them in dreams and so on. Then the next day they go to the tree in the dream they had and find $100 bill and swear the fairy guided them to it. So a personals understanding of a event only carries so much weight.

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No, I can’t explain the difference. I am sure that many people have theories on the topic, while I find the working of the Holy Spirit powerful and mysterious and doubt humans can fully understand it.

As for the passages in 1 and 2 Timothy, what contradiction did you think that you saw? I see none, and I note these are specific exhortations to Timothy rather than general rules about how things occur.

There are still unbelievers that need proof, especially in areas where the gospel is news and Christians are rare. I have seen many reports of miracles from such places, many from the Jesus Film Project.

Thanks for engaging.

Thank you for your post on dreams.

God still does speak to people in dreams, but few dreams are from God. Just because a person “wants” a dream to be from God does not make it a dream from God. And the fact that some people attribute dreams incorrectly to God does not mean God never speaks to people in dreams.

My wife has had two prophetic dreams. They came to her for protection. In both dreams, she was in an area she did not recognize at the time and was brutally attacked. Later she found herself in those place, places she had never been before, and remembered the dreams and took different actions.

I was with her once when she arrived in the location and immediately recalled the horror of the dream when she recognized the place from her dream. She had never even been in that state before. This was on the campus of Auburn University in 1981. As soon as we drove on the campus she recognized it from the dream. As a result, she did not take the baby and walk back from the football game to the hotel the following weekend. That walk back had been when she was attacked in the dream. The miracle was that she clearly saw the distinctive attributes of Auburn University in a dream without ever being there before and dreaming a football game and specific events.

I have another story about a dream from 1980. My wife went to nursing school with a woman we knew in high school. Some time after graduation, my wife and I headed to my Army training in Arizona. We heard that the woman’s husband had abandoned her pregnant and with two small children already. She was in financial difficulty, to say the least. She went to live with her mother. She did not know us that well, and she had no idea that we were in Arizona.

We felt we should send her some money, and we mailed her $350. That was a more substantial sum back in 1980. While the check was in the mail, she had a dream that she received a letter with money in it from Arizona. She told her mother about it and said “and I don’t know anybody in Arizona.” Then the letter came.

She had pride and did not want to cash the check. Her wise mother told her, “God sent you money and sent you dream to tell you to take it. How can you turn that down?”

But God doesn’t heal everyone. Jesus probably had to step over many sick people to get to the one He healed at the pool near the temple. And God doesn’t send everyone dreams. But those of us willing to see that He still works miracles do see miracles.

I have another story about the prophetic utterance my wife spoke at a critical time, but this post is long enough for now.

I don’t see a contradiction between the two letters. I obviously answered it in the previous post I already sent.

Does not require crazy theories to answer the differences. The gospels and epistles lay it out.

My point was this. You seem to think it’s super clear cut and that I don’t know what I’m talking about. I do. Its clear you should really research all those questions and study the subject out and then maybe discuss it. There are writings outside of the gospel for 2,000 years in this. Early Church fathers have even wrote all about it.

One clue is the fact Jesus states not everyone who says lord lord will be saved and on that day they will say but we did this and that in your name ( miracles) and yet he never knew them. The power of the Holy Spirit is not related to salvation at all. Just the indwelling. I’m not going to be responding after this until I’m able to do the separate posts on subjects that are necessary to understand laying on of hands.

Hebrews 6:1-3
New American Standard Bible

6 Therefore leaving the elementary teaching about the Christ, let us press on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, 2 of instruction about washings and laying on of hands, and the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment. 3 And this we will do, if God permits.

Washings and laying on of hands is a foundational teaching. So many don’t understand it nowadays and that’s why their theology is not truly systematic. They jump into solid food when they still don’t even know how to drink the milk.

Actually, I have been studying it for many decades.

I look forward to your posting the scriptures that you think say that miracles have ceased.

And I will be interested in your opinion of when miracles ceased. Some cessationists choose the death of the last of the original apostles of Jesus, others choose the finalization of the canon, there may be other positions.

What about miracles of providence? You’ve heard me enough times about Maggie :grin:, and Rich Stearns.

I don’t actually know their stories. If someone thinks they have the signs of the apostles as shown by the power of Holy Spirit. So no speaking in tongues, no healing the sick , not resurrection, no prophecies, no casting out demons, no picking up venomous snakes or drinking poison and so no laying on kfnjands.

The stories are posted here at Biologos at those links (they’re short :slightly_smiling_face:). They both contain miracles of God’s providence, but they are not of the sort you specifically disallow. I will not exclude God’s working in other ways, though. I should reread Metaxas’ book. (I don’t remember if speaking in tongues was in it – I’m sure there was a vision and a healing in it.) I agree about prophecies, snakes and poison.

It is quite remarkable that humans have invented language to transfer information from one brain to another using words. Your use of ‘representative’ instead of ‘image’ illustrates the difficulty two individuals may have in expressing emotion-arousing ideas to each other. The N.T. appears to quote Jesus as claiming both (1) “the Father and I are One”; and (2) “the Father is greater than I”. You are much more aware than I of the amount of exegetical effort has been expended to reconcile these two views. I have given up on any attempt to reconcile them intellectually , and remain content to rely on my life’s experience that God is a God of Love, whatever form He takes.

Hope you and your family stays well.
Al Leo

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