Are miracles possible?

What the Bible says

Before asking whether miracles are possible, it helps to ask what the Bible means by the word. John does not call Jesus' miracles marvels; he calls them signs. A sign is something that points beyond itself. At the wedding in Cana, where water became wine, he writes:

Jesus performed this, the first of His signs, at Cana in Galilee. He thus revealed His glory, and His disciples believed in Him.

John 2:11

The point is not to astonish but to reveal the glory of the one who acts and to lead people to trust him. At the end of his Gospel John states his purpose outright.

Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in His name.

John 20:30-31

There is a second thing to notice. Scripture does not picture a God who stands outside a sealed machine and occasionally reaches in. Nature was made by him and is held by him.

He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

Col 1:17

On this view the sunrise and the birth of a child are already God's steady care. A miracle is the same God acting in an unusual way, for a purpose. When Jesus drives out demons, he explains what it means: "the kingdom of God has come upon you" (Luke 11:20). The miracle is not a hole in the system but a visible announcement that the King has arrived.

Nor does Scripture present miracles as available on demand. When some scribes and Pharisees asked for a sign, Jesus answered:

A wicked and adulterous generation demands a sign, but none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.

Matt 12:39

The sign of Jonah is Jesus' own death and rising: as Jonah was three days in the great fish, so the Son of Man would be three days in the earth (Matt 12:40).

The church's witness

The church has believed in miracles, but it has never asked anyone to believe everything. Matthew Henry, on Matthew 12, draws a distinction: "Signs were granted to those who desired them to confirm their faith, as Abraham and Gideon; but denied to those who demanded them to excuse their unbelief" Matthew Henry. An honest wish to believe is met; a demand for a reason not to believe is not.

Jerome notes how odd the scribes' request was. "They require a sign of Him," he writes, "as though what they had seen were not signs" Jerome. Someone who has already seen much and not believed may not be moved by one more. Jesus says something similar in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, where Abraham says that those who do not listen to Moses and the Prophets "will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead" (Luke 16:31).

Chrysostom, on the miracle at Cana, asks why Jesus waited until the jars were filled with water before acting. His answer is that creating from nothing would have been the more wonderful miracle, but changing something already present was easier to believe: "The latter miracle would be the more wonderful, but the former would be the more easy of belief" Chrysostom. God does not overwhelm; he works in a way that can be trusted.

On the relation of miracle to nature, Augustine said in the City of God that a miracle is not against nature but against what we know of nature. The real Lord of nature is God, so our known rules are not the whole of his working.

In the original languages

John's word for a miracle is sēmeion (σημεῖον), "sign." It stresses meaning over spectacle. John records about seven such signs, and each one shows who Jesus is. To see the sign and miss where it points is like looking at the finger instead of at what it points to.

In Acts 2:22 Peter describes Jesus as "a man certified by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs." Three Greek words stand behind this. Dynamis (δύναμις) is power, a mighty work; teras (τέρας) is a wonder that astonishes; sēmeion is the sign that means something. One event can be all three, but the New Testament almost never uses "wonder" alone. Astonishment is never the point; what it points to is.

Common objections

"A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature, which are established by uniform experience, so it is always more likely that the witness is wrong." This is the heart of David Hume's argument in his Enquiry concerning Human Understanding Hume, Of Miracles. Hume did not claim to prove miracles logically impossible; he argued that human testimony could hardly ever be strong enough to make belief in one reasonable. It contains something true. People misperceive, exaggerate and are deceived, and nearly every religion has miracle stories that cannot all be right. Christians can agree with Hume's warning, and the church has often tested claims of the miraculous.

But there are difficulties. First, if "uniform experience" is to rule out miracles, we must already know that miracles have never happened, which is exactly what is in question. Many philosophers have argued that Hume's reasoning is in danger of this circularity. Second, laws of nature describe what happens when nothing intervenes; they do not guarantee that nothing will. The laws of motion do not say that nobody may pick a billiard ball off the table. Third, how probable a miracle is depends on whether God exists. If there is no God, a man rising from the dead is nearly impossible. If there is a God who made the world, his acting specially for a special purpose is not strange. So the verdict on a miracle depends not only on the quality of the testimony but on the worldview we bring to it.

"If miracles happen, why are they not obvious today? Why does God not let everyone see?" This is an honest question. Scripture itself shows that miracles were not constant. They cluster around Moses and the exodus, Elijah and Elisha, and Christ and the apostles, times when God began something new in the history of salvation, and even then they came by God's will, not on request. In Jesus' hometown he "did not do many miracles there, because of their unbelief" (Matt 13:58). Many believers read this not as limited power but as a sign that miracles belong to a relationship of trust. Many Christians believe that miracles still occur, but they differ about how often and in what form.

"What is the test case?" Christians take the resurrection as the test. It is the very event Jesus called the sign of Jonah. A reader who cannot yet accept other miracle stories can start by weighing the evidence for this one honestly; see Did Jesus really rise from the dead? If the resurrection happened, the other miracles stop being impossible; if it did not, the rest of the Christian claim loses its force.

Going further

To believe in miracles is not to think the world is chaotic. It is to believe that nature is orderly because its Maker is faithful, and that the faithful One can act in his own way when he chooses. Faith grows less from astonishment than from trust.

You might ask yourself: did I draw "miracles cannot happen" from evidence, or did I bring it with me? If God exists, what would it be reasonable to expect? Is the sign I am asking for meant to help me believe, or to confirm a reason not to?

To read further, see Did Jesus really rise from the dead?, Why did Jesus perform miracles? and Do science and faith conflict?