The Holy Scriptures abound in stories of miracles, from the
beginning to the end, from the first instant of creation, when God
called all things out of nothingness, when the Spirit moved upon the
face of the waters, and God said, "Let there be light." [Gen.1]
From the beginning to the end, when God will make a new heaven and a
new earth: "And I, John, saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem,
coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for
her husband...And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make
all things new." [Rev. 21] From beginning to end,
miracles of creation and re-creation. "I am Alpha and Omega,
which was, and which is to come, the Almighty." [Rev. 1:8]
And between the beginning and the ending, there is the on-going
miracle of existence and life and thought; for not an atom of
creation and not a fragment of conscious life could for one instant
continue if it were not sustained by that eternal thinking and
willing which is God's providence. Even in our folly and
perversity, we are held in life. "It is by the Lord's mercy
that we are not consumed; for his compassions fail not, they are new
every morning." The celestial orbs proclaim that providence:
In reason's ear they all rejoice,
And utter forth a glorious voice,
For ever singing, as they shine,
'The hand that made us is Divine.'"
[Joseph Addison, Paraphrase of Psalm 19]
All
that is miracle: the being and acting of God in the world: and it is
in the context of that recognition that we should understand all the
miracle stories in the Scripture. But the stories of the
miracles of Jesus, have still deeper dimensions which we ought to
consider.
Jesus' miracles are signs of God's presence and power in him, the
divine Son and Messiah. Remember how when John the Baptist, in
prison, heard about the works of Christ, he sent two of his
disciples to ask Jesus, Art thou he that should come or do we look
for another? And Jesus answered and said unto them, Go and
show John again those things which ye do hear and see: the blind
receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and
the deaf hear, the dead are raised up and the poor have the Gospel
preached to them. [Matt. ll.2f] The miracles are signs
of Christ's messiahship and the coming of God's Kingdom.
But the miracles of Jesus have yet a further dimension, when our
attention is focussed not on the miraculous deed itself, but on its
spiritual significance. Thus, Jesus cured the blind and the
deaf and the dumb, thereby signifying his power to open dull minds
to the truth of God, and to rouse dumb spirits to speak God's
praise. He feeds the hungry multitude, and shows that he is
the true bread, the word of God, to nourish fainting souls. He
heals the lame and shows God's power to speed our pilgrimage to him.
He stills the stormy seas of our confusions and despairs. He
heals the sick and raises the dead, and thereby shows that he is our
re-birth, our health, our resurrection to new and endless life in
the Spirit.
Because the miracles are manifestations of the presence and saving
power of God in Christ, we read the stories in the season of
Epiphany: they manifest the power and wisdom of God for our
salvation. But we read them again in the Trinity season,
because they have yet a further dimension of meaning. As the
first half of our Christian year sets before us what God in Christ
has done for our salvation, so this second half of the year, this
long Trinity season, is concerned with the realizing of that
salvation in us, in the building up our our spiritual life as
individuals and as community. That is the point of all our
Scripture lessons in this season, and that is a dimension of the
miracle stories: they are not only signs of what God has done and
does for us, but also indicators of how the grace of God is
fruitfully received in our lives.
Finally, we should consider for a moment the implication of these
stories for our own spiritual life, and really, the practical
application is pretty obvious: we come as outsiders, as aliens, with
nothing in our hands to purchase our salvation, but only trusting in
God's mercy to heal the maladies of our sinful souls; we come,
putting aside all pride of independence, and all preconception as to
how God is to heal us, trusting only in his all-seeing wisdom.
And we are truly healed when we live our lives always to the glory
of God, in thanksgiving.
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