You are the God who performs miracles; you display your power among the peoples.
—Psalm 77:14
The Power of Biblical Miracles
Miracles are hard to believe in, and they should be. In Matthew 28 we are told that the apostles met the risen Jesus on a mountainside in Galilee. “When they saw him, they worshipped him; but some doubted” (verse 17). That is a remarkable admission. Here is the author of an early Christian document telling us that some of the founders of Christianity couldn’t believe the miracle of the resurrection, even when they were looking straight at him with their eyes and touching him with their hands. There is no other reason for this to be in the account unless it really happened.
Biblical Miracles and the Struggle to Believe
The passage shows us several things. It is a warning not to think that only we modern, scientific people have to struggle with the idea of the miraculous, while ancient, more primitive people did not. The apostles responded like any group of modern people—some believed their eyes and some didn’t. It is also an encouragement to patience. All the apostles ended up as great leaders in the church, but some had a lot more trouble believing than others.
Why Biblical Miracles Inspire Worship
The most instructive thing about this text is, however, what it says about the purpose of biblical miracles. They lead not simply to cognitive belief, but to worship, to awe and wonder.
The Reason for God
Go Forward in Love
A Year of Daily Readings from Timothy Keller
Timothy Keller
Zondervan Books
