A greater miracle

In the latest Conversation Magazine, Lydia Maingi looks at the controversial ministry of Dr Owuor. One of the feature of his rallies is the presence of 'signs and wonders' and particularly healing miracles.

However, miracles, healings and prophecies can all turn out to be worthless (Matt. 7:22; 1 Cor. 13:1-3) or demonic (Mat. 24:24 Rev. 13:12-15; 16:3-14).

As John Piper and many others have pointed out, there is one thing that cannot be faked – rejoicing in Christ in the midst of suffering. Peace beyond all human understanding. A miracle that can only be produced by the Spirit of God.

When Paul prayed for his suffering to be removed God did a greater miracle – sufficient grace – boasting in weakness (2 Cor. 12). When the apostles were given 39 lashes (Acts 5:40) and they went off ‘rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonour for the Name’ (Acts 5:41) was that not a greater miracle than the healing of the lame man in Acts 3?

Joni Eareckson Tada – confined to a wheelchair after a diving accident as a young woman – said, “God didn’t heal me physically – he did a greater miracle – he kept me in a wheelchair and put a smile on my face.”

When I hear someone testifying to how Christ has brought them to a place of complete assurance and contentment in Him, how he is their joy in the midst of continuing pain or singleness or childlessness – then I praise God for a far greater miracle than a testimony of healing or marriage or conception.

(You can hear Joni speaking on suffering here.)

Comments

Holding together restlessness and optimism

Piper has a great section in his Marks of a Spiritual Leader where he holds together two vital biblical leadership virtues: 1. RESTLESS Spiritual leaders have a holy discontentment with the status quo. Non-leaders have inertia that causes them to settle in and makes them very hard to move off of dead center. Leaders have a hankering to change, to move, to reach out, to grow, and to take a group or an institution to new dimensions of ministry. They have the spirit of Paul, who said in Philippians 3:13, “Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead. I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” Leaders are always very goal-oriented people. God’s history of redemption is not finished. The church is shot through with imperfections, lost sheep are still not in the fold, needs of every sort in the world are unmet, sin infects the saints. It is un...

Everlasting gobstopper theology

The idea here is that there are layers to Christ's fullness and when the biblical authors present Christ to us they might only explicitly refer to one layer but as they do that the underlying layers are also implied. Or to put it another way, the glory of the underlying layers shines through the layer that is presented to us. That might sound strange, abstract and not particularly helpful but let me try to explain. The incarnation implies the pre-existent Word When John identifies "Jesus Christ has come in the flesh" as the key test of orthodoxy, Augustine asks (Homily 6 on 1 John) how can this be when so many heretics happily affirm the humanity of Jesus but deny his deity? Augustine then asks us to dig a bit deeper and consider: From whence did he come? "Was he not God?" Simon Gathercole demonstrated (in his 2006 book, The Pre-existent Son ) that Jesus' phrase in the synoptic gospels, "I have come", implies divine pre-existence. So whenever we ...

A prayer for the summer

LORD God, our God, the Maker of Heaven and Earth, our Father, as your children in the northern hemisphere enter this season of the academic year, please give us fresh grace to walk, stand and sit aright. May those of us who enjoy running and walking in your creation give thanks to you for that privilege but not be as concerned about the daily step count on our trackers as in taking practical steps this summer in kindness, in compassion, in forgiveness, in building others up, in pleasing the Lord - steps of progress in gracious, sacrificial, Christ-like loving (Ephesians 4-5). May those of us who look forward to getting out of the city give thanks to you for the privilege of travel but not ultimately be as concerned about the physical location in which we stand (whether "beneath the boughs" or on a hot and sweaty tube train) as about our location "in Christ" - the address of every spiritual blessing, complete forgiveness, intimate sonship, total security (Ephesians ...

Looking at Christ

Search This Blog