February 9, 2025 Fifth Sunday after Epiphany
Isaiah 6:1-8, [9-13]; Psalm 138; 1 Corinthians 15:1-11; Luke 5:1-11
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord. Amen.
Please be seated.
We live in very uncertain times. The threat of trade wars in North America, wars in Ukraine and the Holy Land, and the upcoming elections in Germany are making many people uneasy. The people in Judea and Galilee in Jesus’ time also had much to worry about: Roman occupation, periodic uprisings, brutally high taxes, self-centered elites. Many Jews longed for the coming of the Messiah, who they believed would put all things right. Why is God waiting so long to rescue us, they asked? For many people, God seemed so far away, just as God does for many today. But God wasn’t far away. God the Son became incarnate in the man Jesus of Nazareth. He lived and walked with the people on earth, making His plan of salvation a reality.
Both today’s Gospel and epistle readings recount miracles of Jesus. Luke tells us about one of Jesus’ early miracles, in which He filled Simon Peter’s nets with fish. In the epistle, Paul tells the Corinthians about Jesus’ greatest miracle, His resurrection and subsequent appearances.
Did Jesus really perform the miracles reported in the New Testament? The Enlightenment philosopher David Hume defined a miracle as a violation of a natural law and argued that our uniform experience is that natural laws are never violated. Accordingly, he asserted, no account of a miracle can be credible. C.S. Lewis disagreed with Hume’s definition. “I use the word Miracle to mean an interference with Nature by supernatural power.”[1] Even if we assume that natural laws cannot be violated, and I see no compelling reason why God can’t violate the laws He created, Lewis’ broader definition of miracles allows them to occur. For example, the law of gravity predicts that if I drop a coin, it will fall to the ground. So, if I drop a coin and it lands in my outstretched hand, does the coin violate the law of gravity? No, I simply intervened in its fall. If God created the Universe, He could certainly intervene in the process of natural laws.
There is good reason to believe that miracles not only occurred in Jesus’ day but continue to occur today. New Testament scholar Craig Keener has written a two-volume scholarly work on miracles and a shorter follow-on book. Both works are carefully researched and documented. One of the most striking examples is Delia Knox, who was injured in a car accident and was confined to a wheelchair for more than 22 years. Her healing in a revival service was captured on video.[2] Church leaders and members vouch for her paralysis and healing.[3] If you want to see the video, go to YouTube and enter “Delia Knox healing.” Were all the events described in Keener’s book real miracles? I’m not sure, but they’re well documented. It’s hard to believe that these were psychosomatic illnesses.
Now, I’m not calling for Christians to reject modern medicine in favor of faith healing. Modern medicine is one of God’s great gifts to humanity and should be received with thanksgiving. But even today’s medicine has its limits.
Why don’t we see more miracles today? Craig Keener believes healing miracles are more common in Africa and Asia than in the more secular West in part because people in the majority world are more open to the possibility of miracles. Matthew 15:38 tells us that Jesus did not do many miracles in his hometown of Nazareth “because of their lack of faith.” Also, God uses miracles to get people’s attention and add credibility to His message. In many parts of the world, the Gospel is just getting established, and so God may use miracles to add credibility to this new teaching. We see this reflected in the New Testament. Jesus used the miracle of the full nets to persuade Simon Peter to follow Him, which was a critical event in Christian history. The book of Acts shows that miracles accompanied the apostles, which lent credibility to the new message and so persuaded many of them to come to faith.
The epistle reading gives us what is probably the first written account of the greatest miracle of all: Christ’s Resurrection. Paul probably wrote 1 Corinthians in 53-54 AD, that is, about 20 years after the Resurrection. But 1 Corinthians 15:3-8 goes back much earlier. Scholars believe it is a creedal statement that Paul received from Peter and James when they met in Jerusalem three years after Paul’s conversion, which would place it within five years of the Resurrection.[4] Since the passage was already in the form of a creed, N.T. Wright argues that it was probably formulated within two or three years of the Resurrection.[5] This means, the belief in Christ’s bodily Resurrection could not have been a legend: There was simply not enough time for a legend to develop, and most of the eyewitnesses were still around. New Testament scholars consider it strong evidence of what the earliest Christians believed. Let’s take a closer look at this passage.
“Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures.” Paul is saying that Jesus, the Messiah, died to redeem us from sin and that it was in accordance with the scriptures. N.T. Wright argues that Paul is not referring here to individual proof texts from the Old Testament but to “the entire sweep of biblical narrative,” which has been fulfilled in Christ.[6] The creed continues: “and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures,” which again refers to the entire sweep of the biblical narrative. Jesus’ death and Resurrection fulfilled God’s overarching goal in the history of Israel, which was the plan of salvation. Paul continues: “and that he appeared to Cephas (Peter), then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers and sisters at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.” The resurrected Christ didn’t just appear to a small group of insiders but to many of his followers, many of whom still lived and could testify to what they saw. Jesus also appeared to His brother, James, who was an unbeliever prior to the Resurrection.
Paul continues: “Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me has not been in vain.” Acts chapter 9 tells us that the resurrected and ascended Jesus appeared to Paul, who was traveling to Damascus to arrest believers and take them back to Jerusalem for punishment. Christ forgave Paul, a persecutor of the church. Accordingly, Paul writes, “I worked harder than any of them — though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.”
Christ’s Resurrection from the dead is the most important event in human history, and its significance is broad. It means Jesus’ sacrifice for our sins was accepted by the Father, and so we are reconciled to God. It means that death and the grave have been defeated, and so those who are in Christ will rise with Him to eternal life. It means the powers and principalities that for so long controlled the world have been defeated. It means that the reign of God has been inaugurated on earth, so Jesus is Lord, and Caesar isn’t. That includes today’s Caesars. Of course, we live in what theologians have called the “already and not yet” era of history. The reign of God has already begun, but the powers of evil are still with us. God’s people still have much to do, spreading the Gospel, making disciples of all nations, and working for freedom, justice, and peace for all.
The world today seems totally out of joint and chaotic, and we have no idea what the future will bring. Many of us experience chaos and uncertainty in our daily lives. Some of us may have suffered terrible loss and are unable to understand why. But Romans 8:28 tells us, “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.” We should remember Jesus’ words at His Ascension: “And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matt 28:20). Jesus’ life, death, and Resurrection show that God is not far from us but is always with us. And our God is a powerful God, as His miracles show. As Paul writes, “If God is for us, who is against us?” (Rom 8:31). Ultimately, no one. Not even Caesar. Amen.
[1] C.S. Lewis, Miracles: A Preliminary Study, (San Francisco; CA: HarperSanFrancisco, 1996), 5.
[2]“Delia Knox healed and she sings at Bay Revival 2010” YouTube video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNg7GWnXV_c&t=580s Accessed on Sep. 9, 2023, 2:30 p.m. (CET)
[3] Craig S. Keener, Miracles Today, (Grand Rapids, MI, 2021), 51-54
[4] Gary R. Habermas and Mike Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus, (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 2004), 52.
[5] N.T. Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of God, Vol. 3 of Christian Origins and the Question of God,(Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2003), 319.
[6] Ibid., 320-321.