“Do you believe in miracles?” Al Michaels provided the world with this famous sound bite when he called the 1980 U.S. Olympic Men’s hockey team’s improbable victory over the Soviet Union. As the final 10 seconds ticked away, he asked this rhetorical question and answered it at the buzzer: “Yes!”
Do you believe in miracles?
Yes!
But was it really a miracle in 1980? Was it a miracle when the 2004 Boston Red Sox finally broke the Curse of the Bambino and won their first World Series in 86 years? What about that Christmas when it was so cold outside and you prayed for a parking space near the front of the supermarket and one opened up just as you turned the corner? Was that a miracle? Or the time that guy at work found out he had cancer, and then everyone was praying, and when he went back the doctors said the cancer was totally gone, was that a miracle?
Sometimes people say that a miracle is when God intervenes in the world. But this assumes that God isn’t active in the world on a regular basis. Others say we can make our own miracles by looking within ourselves and calling upon the hidden resources of our own mysterious humanity.
For the sake of accuracy, one might say that a miracle occurs when God — who is always at work in our world — deviates from His usual pattern and does something extraordinary. The more extraordinary it is, the more confidently we can say, “That’s a miracle!”
The 1980 U.S. Olympic Men’s hockey team outplayed their Soviet opponents. The 2004 Red Sox made some good trades, stayed healthy and played well down the stretch. People eventually leave the store, relinquishing choice parking spots.
Cancer, that’s closer to what we’re talking about when we discuss miracles.
Healing the sick, walking on water, raising the dead, feeding thousands with five loaves of bread and two fish, these are miracles for sure.
If you believe in miracles.
That’s the question we’ve got to start with: Do you believe in miracles? Not coincidences. Not random events. Real. Bona-fide. Miracles.
Do you believe in miracles?
If you do, seeing miracles happen is just a matter of refining your definition, knowing what to look for and understanding the purposes of God’s miraculous activity. But if you don’t, no amount of experience or evidence will be enough to suffice. There were witnesses to the resurrection of Jesus who lied about it and never put their faith in Him (Mt 28:11-15).
Those of us who do believe in miracles are wise to remember that God’s purpose is not merely to help people. God has a purpose far deeper than that. He means for us to look beyond the miracle — to the Miracle Worker Himself.
Prayer
Lord God, I live in a time when skepticism, naturalism and secularisation have gripped my culture as never before. More than any other ideology, Christianity has become the target of media, entertainment and our educational system. But rather than wring my hands over these things, I gladly acknowledge that this comes as no surprise to You, and that the real issue is one of the heart and the will. You have provided enough evidence to satisfy the minds of those who make You the source of their trust, but You have also allowed enough ambiguity so that unbelievers can rationalise their disbelief. You have given us the dignity of choice, and those who choose to humble themselves under Your mighty hand recognise that You can and have intervened in miraculous ways in human history. I thank You that You have displayed Your greatness and beauty most clearly in the person of Your Son.
In Jesus’s name, Amen
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