Signs, Wonders, Visions, Tongues etc...

I think OD is getting misunderstood. I think he's coming down toward the middle of this debate - between the two extremes. One side apparently says that there is no way for miracles and such, while the other indicates that there's no evidence for a cessation.

Most Baptists are funny about this topic. They are so afraid of being accused of being charismatic that they don't want to allow for any miracles or feelings. The result is a group of well studied but boring people. I know - I'm one of them.

There's nothing wrong with feelings and emotions, just don't let them override the truth of God's word. And saying that miracles have stopped with the printing of the Bible does seem to limit what God can do on Earth.

I fully agree with those who say the signs and wonders are no longer needed to reveal God. But I won't go so far as to say that they don't happen from time to time. Attributing them to Satan may be inaccurate at best, and possibly blasphemous. I still believe God interacts with man, but for a different purpose now.

 

JAMES2, you sound so very ugly and un-Christ-like in spirit. Yech. Double-yech. Who, really, would be attracted to your message? I say this respectfully.

You might consider reading the following.

______________________________________________

DOCTRINE AND UNITY

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Some who serve the Lord, in dealing with doctrinal differences, remember that they must, as the saying goes, Keep the main thing the main thing. They know that too many times, God's work has gone undone simply because those who truly are His children refuse to accept and work with others who are equally His children through Christ. They are able to not hold as pre-eminent their non-essential points of doctrine for the sake of the weightier matters of the gospel. These know that they can have a united front on the many tenants which are unanimous among them. They do not fruitlessly quarrel over non-essentials--especially in the watching eyes of a dying world.

These also know that hoards of people are dying daily and falling into an eternal damnation that is utterly horrible beyond full description, but that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world to die on the cross, and wills rather to save them. These faithfully tell and send others to tell of Him and relate with their brethren in such a way as not to add to the number being daily damned.

Others (who may or may not belong to the Lord), rather than serving the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, serve the god of the Doctrine of their Denomination--a religion that the Scribes and Pharisees, if they were here today, would be well pleased with. And that is just the problem. They are here today, only in a different time, under different names, worshiping different doctrines.

The Scribes and Pharisees sacrificed the work of the kingdom of God--namely, to bring the Name of God to all the Gentiles--to their god of Doctrinal Correctness. They erected as pre-eminent the non-essentials in lieu of the weightier matters of the law. Truly, in their thinking, if they could just believe every point of doctrine right, they would themselves be right. And it was into this heretical religion that the Son of God pronounced his most scathing rebukes.

Tragically, as a result of their continued impenitence, they were cut off and tragically disinherited from being the agency of God's Name upon the earth. Jesus warned them this would happen: "I tell you, the kingdom of God will be torn from you and given to a nation bearing the fruit thereof."

Today, the situation is often little different. Present day Scribes and Pharisees sacrifice the work of the kingdom of God&--namely to bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ to all the nations--to their own god of Doctrinal Correctness. They erect as pre-eminent the non-essentials in lieu of the weightier matters of the gospel. In their thinking, too, if they can just believe every point of doctrine right, they will themselves be right. If Christ were here today, I fear that He would be similarly mirroring many of His scathing rebukes toward them. It is terrifying to think how these, like the Scribes and Pharisees of old, will likewise be cut off and tragically disinherited from being the agency of Christ's Name on the earth. Indeed, if these continue in their impenitence, God will be forced to raise up others to keep New Testament Christianity alive on the earth. Jesus similarly warns them, as those of old, "Say not, 'We are children of Abraham;' for I tell you, God is able even from these stones to raise up children unto Abraham."

Let's be of the former group. The Lord and the world await our united response.

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© Copyright 2001 by The Luke Project
lukeproject@lukeproject.org

[ February 26, 2002, 03:10 PM: Message edited by: LP ]

 

Ovrdose:
Amen!!
James2

 

Golgotha:
I guess I'm missing something. Are you talking about the miracles that Jesus performed? I'm the one stating that they ONLY miracle I know about going on today is when God Regenerates someone by His free gift, and brings that person from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light.

If you are saying that is not a miracle, fine, we would certainly disagree on that. If you are saying something about other so-called "miracles" then debate someone else. I'm not advocating other miracles.
James2

 

LP:
"You sound ugly and un-christian." Really? Are you saying that because someone points out the failings of the modern-day church that they are "ugly, and unchristian?" Well, then I guess I'm in good company. I believe they called Martin Luther, Calvin, and all the other reformers the same thing. Otherwise, I have no idea what you are talking about.

"Unity" at the expense of sound doctrine and truth is not a virtue.
Not many would be attracked to my message? Pleaasee!!! My message has nothing to do with anything. The message is the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ. That's what is at stake here. Not some feel-good, bring the numbers into the church so we can have a emotional, hand-clapping, jumping for Jesus meeting.
I can't say it any clearer, so that's it from me. Read a good book on the basics of the faith -- maybe A.A. Hodges or Luther, Calvin, James White, etc. I am NOT attacking anyone personally. I'm trying to show that the whole purpose of the Christian is -- not for personal salvation -- but to GLORIFY GOD. It's God's glory that is important, not man's "feelings."

I praise God for regenerating the fallen, depraved sinner, justifying him by faith, bring him from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light.
James2

 

Glory Bound:
Can God do miracles? Of course He can. He's God. Does Satan do miracles. Of course he does. He can appear as an angel of light, and does. I'm not saying that all so-called present day "miracles" are from Satan. I'm saying beware of all these false claims of "miracles."

I'm getting tired of saying it, but we have the written WORD of God. He gave it to us so we can know Him. We don't need anything else. I realize that the majority disagrees with me -- that's why we have all these mega-churches that tell people how wonderful they are are growing like leaps and bounds. Tell people that if they are not REGENERATED and headed to hell, well, that tends to reduce the membership of the church. I'll take small and sound doctrine, to large and feel good.
James2

 

Hi James2,

regarding miracles, I just wanted to state my opinion that God can, and does, still perform miracles today. Not for all of the same reasons He did prior to the formation of the Bible, however.

But your statements appear contradictory:

This seems to indicate only one miracle is acceptable by you.

James2:

Well, either the "miracles" are from God or Satan. Is God limited to one form of miracle, or not?

Personally, I tend to be skeptical regarding claimed miracles, and I think we both can agree that many claim things that are either fake or can be explained another way. But there have been a few things I can't explain, and since I don't know all, I simply put those things into a category of things I don't have an explanation for.

James2:

Do you have a persecution complex? As far a the majority disagreeing with you - they disagree with me, as well as most of the others here on this board. The majority of people who claim to be "Christian" do not hold the same values as most of us do. That's a shame, but shouldn't be a surprise.

The issue of miracles is an interesting question, but it's not one that should divide any of us here.

 

Glory Bound:
Let me try again. God can do miracles. Does He, other than Regenerating a depraved sinner? I don't know. I've never seen one or had one verified. Does Satan perform miracles. He can certainly appear to.
Alot of people seem to think so. I'm saying I don't KNOW of even ONE VERIFIED miracle, other than being born again, since the Apostles. That's all I'm saying. I'm not sure what miracles have to do with anything to start with. (I guess that's another discussion).
No, I don't feel like I am being perscuted. I'm only addressing Christians here, and from my experience, I seem to be in the minority about miracles. Most Christians I talk to think they see miracles every Wednesday night at the local "healing service." (Not most baptists, thank God).
Once and for all. God can do whatever he wants to. If he wants to perform a miracle He can. I just haven't seen any or had any verified. (Other than being born again). I don't know, maybe I'm just not making myself clear. Forgive me.
James2

[ February 26, 2002, 05:17 PM: Message edited by: JAMES2 ]

 

JAMES2,

This was Jesus: "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth." Grace, not snarliness.

Even in your more or less giftless theology, the fruits bring authentication to the messenger (and they do). None of us will get anywhere significant in proclaiming any part of Christ's message, except we also do it in Christ's winsomeness and spirit.

Bottom line: Sometimes one can be so "right" that they disqualify themselves to actually be right.

That's what I am saying.

 

You will now know of someone: myself.

In 1981 I came down with an auto-immune disorder. Essentially, an auto-immune disorder is when your body's immune system attacks your body's own normal tissue as foreign matter that needs to be destroyed. Your body, in short, eats itself up from the inside. Doctors determined that what was causing my condition was the environment--ANY environment, things like common dust, common dirt, common every day things that no one else even gives any thought to. But to my body, it was the hugest deal. There was no cure for me, except to perhaps have me live in a sterile bubble, like pre bone-marrow recipients go into some time. And since my life was never immediately threatened, that was not an option anyway.

In 1985 I was saved. Soon, I found out that God could heal me, where doctors could not.

But I also found out that God was not Someone up in heaven jumping to do my bidding whenever I asked Him for healing, or whenever I claimed a few verses that I had biasly extracted from the Scriptures in my favor, all the while hoping for an easy way out of my situation.

I found that God had an eternal purpose in allowing my affliction, and He intended to use it for my eternal good and glory.

Six years of my Christian life passed, and God allowed me to suffer under my "thorn's" weight. The preassure of it, from living long with it, was no small thing, even as the physical symptoms were not. But He used these to give me incentive to allow Him to work brokeness into me, and to get me to lose my life.

It was excruciatingly difficult, at times. When I disobeyed in allowing God to work brokeness into me, He would turn and use my "thorn" to increase the pressure on me until actually pleaded for another opportunity to follow through! He indeed "hedged me in behind and before, and laid his hand upon me" (Psalm 139:5).

I soon met the woman who would be my wife. This was all the more difficult, since I knew marriage would not work with my condition. Yet, I felt God promise to me that I would marry this woman, and have a family too. The passage in Romans about Abraham was illumined to me:

God also made promises to my wife.

But the whole notion of marriage would have to die as as seed in the ground before God would breath life into it.

For the three years following, I was geographically far away from my fiancé, and we could not communicate, could not marry. God placed me in that situation. In the meantime, a man that should have been my friend had betrayed me--a persecutor who God rose up to bless me. Meanwhile, God allowed my phyical thorn to continue on. It all accumulated by this time into a weight which seemed to bring me to the very edge of my ability to endure, and seemingly even beyond.

The suffering God allows is to get at something in us. It is Adam. And Adam only goes if we die. And dying is not something we naturally do. We only die if we have the motivation to die--a motivation more significant than external things. We need eternal eyes, coupled with pain, to die.

Through all the years since I was saved and had my thorn, I met...many? most? some?...of God's objectives in allowing the affliction. I was broken, much dead, was formed into a very different person by it. In measure, I died--not just some dry positional death, but experientially--and, in measure, Christ was formed.

Then, I will never forget it. While standing in my kitchen one day, God covered me with His presence in a way that is really beyond words. I began balling and balling under the hand of God, because I knew what He was abut to do. He divinely healed me of my affliction.

I married several months later and have been free from the affliction--my thorn, my auto-immune disorder--ever since then. It has now been eleven year since I was healed.

Now, you know someone who has had God do a miracle--a miracle of healing, in this case.

`

[ February 27, 2002, 01:16 AM: Message edited by: LP ]

 

LP:
Praise God!! I'm glad that you were healed. Like I said, I've never seen a miracle or had one verified to me.
If yours was a miracle, and seems like it was, then amen!

I'm not trying to put God in a box and say He NEVER does miracles. I'm not God.
That's a great testimony you have, and I wish you well.
God Bless
James2

 

Brethren,

God heals people today as He always has. God's power has not ceased. However, the gift if healing is administered in a different way now. Man cannot lay hands on people and command them to be healed. If they could, why could Paul not heal Epaphroditus in Philippians 4? This tells me that sometime between the outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost and the time of the writing of this letter, the apostolic method of healing ceased to exist.

"Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord:" (James 5:14)

Why would this be necessary if all the minister had to do was lay hands in the sick and heal them instantaneously?

Grace, mercy, and peace - Christopher

 

Kiffin,

I attend a Primitive Baptist church, and this past Lord's day a visiting elder spoke and told about how a glowing being came to him in his room and told him 3 times to preach. He is 84 now.

I do not know what all Baptists believe about God not directly dealing with people, but Primitive Baptists DO NOT!

 

You might consider the arguments I made on page three, which answer this as invalid. It is context and need, not a past point in history that is determinative. More on this as I move along....

Again, it is context and need.

You said, "the gift of healing is administered in a different way now." That impies that healing only happens one way and in one context now--"healing is administered in a different way now," you said, which also implies the other way was left behind. But consider instead that healings occur in a duality of contexts, each appropriate to where it is administered, and each with its mode and method.

The first is James's context, which is that of the household of faith. Epaphroditus and Paul--same context. They had all already received the message of the gospel. That is one context, one need.

The second is where Christ said miracles would follow believers as they went into all the world to preach the gospel. That comprises a very differnt context where the need is different--the context of going to where the gospel had not yet been named, and by inferrence, where the need was for Divine athentication to the "new" message and messenger--new to the audience, that is. Here is a crucial point: That context and need still exists in the world today.

So the approach in how "healing is administered" is all related to context and need, of which there are two. In the one context, the James paradigm is to be controlling, in the other, miracles might be expected--we need to be very cautious about drawing an inpenatrable line between the two, however. Here is another crucial point: When the context and need for miracles ceases, the miracles will cease. When the context and need for miracles ceases because the world is sweepingly evangelized is perhaps when "the perfect" will have come. That is a future point in history in which OUR actions are, in part, perhaps determinative: are we going to regions where Christ is not named as we should?

"But we have the Bible, now!" it may be contested. "That is 'the perfect.' So divine attestations are not needed!"

Yes, we have the Bible, but so what? Let me quickly explain before you get ruffled.

What about divine attestation TO THE BIBLE--to the message we give FROM IT? "Who Sez that book is anthing but mere words?" it might be said. "And how are WE to know that YOU are really that book's messenger," it might also be said. What about divine attestation TO US as its messenger?

Hence, Divine attestations sometimes need to be brought to bear upon the Bible and its message, and not the least, upon its messenger.

Now,

The subject of the church and medicine is one of my "specialties," in a manner of speaking. Yet, I also believe the gifts operate and healings can occur (obviously).

The James passage actually could and does include in it the option of miraculous healing, as well as healing via aleipho (i.e., oil, which equals medicine), though the later is obviously to be the normative means for dealing with sicknesses in the household of faith, as already argued.

Here is a sermon I've done if you want more--this is a subject that is RARELY touched upon accurately.

That You May Be Healed: Biblical Foundations for the Church's Role in Medicine - An Examination of James 5:14-16

`

[ February 27, 2002, 12:55 AM: Message edited by: LP ]

 

Thank you James2!

The miraculous is the property of God. God does do the miraculous. The problem is that most people's definition of "miracle" today is so broad that it is blurred with anything mystical.

What is an example of a miracle? Well...
*Jesus changing water into wine.
*Jesus restoring Malcus's ear.
*Peter healing the lame man at the Beautiful Gate.

I see PLENTY of people claiming to do these things or hearing about "true" stories, but there is no substantiated proof.

What is our sure word? It is God's Word! I will take that any day!

 

Thank you James2!

What is our sure word? It is God's Word! I will take that any day!</font>[/QUOTE]The operative word here is OUR sure word. PreacherDave has taken the Word, as have I. Very good. But as just mentioned, so what?

See above for what I mean before you get ruffled.

 

I have a question that should go right along with this subject. Did not Peter have an ability in the midst of a worship service to discern truth and when he detected lying lips and a deceitful heart (spurred by pride and coveteousnous), make a pointed statement to Ananias and Supphira and they died. Is not this also a sign and wonder?
Why is it not practiced today?

Kiffin, Please accept apology for "cutting" remarks. The Word is sharper than a two edged sword, I do not want to be.

 

Trusting in biblical miracles and modern day "miracles" are two different things. Biblical miracles are stated as such in the Bible, and for 99.5% of us, that's all we need to know that a miracle occurred.

Modern day "miracles" are harder to verify. We all have heard of claims that were hoaxes. We don't like to get fooled like that.

Then there are testimonies like LP's - from a fellow believer. I think it's wonderful that he's healed and the disease is gone. It's obvious that he believes it was a miracle from God, and I'd be the last to say it wasn't. But realistically, I can't make the same claim regarding it as he can. I don't know for myself exactly what happened. Perhaps there's something regarding the disease that we don't understand yet, and for some reason the disease was wiped out of natural causes.

I've heard others testify much like brother LP has, and I'd be hard pressed to express doubt regarding their experiences. I know of a lady who was waiting for a hip replacement, who suddenly was able to walk without crutches or pain. It happened during a prayer service, when someone prayed for her. She was actually disappointed in a sense, because if there was to be a miracle performed, she had much rather that it be used on her ailing father.

Being a logical person myself, I can't say what exactly happened beyond a shadow of a doubt. But I believe they are probably miracles from God to these people. Why them and not others - I don't know. God knows. I can live with that.

There is a difference between believing in miracles that happen occasionally and believing in miracles that are available for the asking. While God can certainly grant a healing, in the vast majority of cases He chooses not to. God knows best.