POWERFUL DEEDS - MIRACLES
After He had given out the new law of the
imitation of God, Jesus came down from the Mount.
One cannot always remain on the heights. The moment we
arrive on the summit of a mountain we are anticipating to descend. Every ascent
is a pledge of descent, a promise to come down again. He who has something to
say must make himself heard; if he always speaks on the summits, few will stay
with him; it is cold on the summits for those who are not all on fire; and his
voice will reach few. He who has come to give, cannot ask men, weak lungs,
tired hearts, nerveless legs, to follow him upward, hobbling along to the
heights. He must follow them down to the plain, into their houses; he must
stoop to them if he is to lift them up.
Jesus knew that exalted teaching on the heights would not
suffice to spread the good news to all. He knew that men need less abstract
words, picture-making words, narrated words, words almost as tangible as facts.
And He knew that even these words would not be enough.
The simple, rustic, coarse, humble people who followed
Jesus were men whose lives were based on material things, men who could only
understand spiritual things slowly, with great effort, through material proofs,
signs and material symbols. They could not understand a spiritual truth without
its material incarnation; without evidence simple enough for them to weigh,
evidence stated in the terms of the everyday world. An illustrative fable can
lead men to moral revelation; a prodigy is to them confirmation of a new truth,
of a contested mission. Preaching, made up of abstract sayings and clichés, and
left these imaginative Orientals unsatisfied. Jesus had recourse to the
marvelous and to poetry: he performed miracles and spoke in parables. For many
moderns the miracles recounted by the Evangelists are a compelling reason for
turning away from Jesus and the Bible. Their shriveled brains cannot take in
the miraculous; therefore, they reason the Gospel lies, and if it lies in so
many places none of it can be believed. It is out of the question that Jesus
can ever have raised the dead: therefore, His words have no value.
The people who reason in this way reason hostile. They
give to miracles a weight and a meaning much greater than that which Jesus gave
them.* If they had read the four Gospels they would have seen that Jesus is
always reluctant to perform miracles, that He does not feel this divine power
of His is of supreme importance. Every time that He finds a fair reason for
refusing, He refuses; if He yields, it is to reward the faith of the sorrowing
man or woman who calls on Him; but the Gospels show that for Himself, for His
own salvation, He never performs miracles. He performs no miracles in the
wilderness with Satan, none at Nazareth when they wish to kill Him, none at
Gethsemane when they come to arrest Him, nor on the cross when they challenge
Him to save Himself. His power is only for others, to benefit His mortal
brothers.
There are many who ask for a sign, a sign from Heaven, and
a sign to persuade the unbelievers that His word is the true word: "An evil and adulterous generation seeks
after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the
Prophet Jonas." (Matt. 12:39) What is this sign? The writers of the
gospel who wrote after the resurrection thought that Jonah emerging the third
day from the whale symbolizes Jesus emerging the third day from the tomb, but
the rest of what Jesus says shows that He meant something else. "The men of Nineveh shall rise in
judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: because they
repented at the teaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is
here." (Matt. 12:41) Nineveh did
not ask for signs and wonders: it was converted by the word alone. Men whom
Jesus cannot convert by truths infinitely greater than those announced by
Jonah, are below the level of the men of Nineveh, idolaters, barbarians.* Faith
must not rest on marvels and wonders alone, nevertheless let us remember that
faith—though it is higher and more perfect when achieved without miracles—can
by its very fervor accomplish miracles. Hardened hearts, locked shut against
truth, are not converted even by the greatest miracles. "If they hear not Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be
persuaded, though one rose from the dead." (Luke 16:31) He was
neglected and rejected by the cities which were the scenes of the greatest
prodigies. "Woe unto thee, Chorazin!
Woe unto thee, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works which were done in you had
been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, in sack-cloth
and ashes." (Matt. 11:21)
Jesus never held that miracles were His exclusive
privilege. When they came to tell Him that some man was driving out Demons in
His name, He answered, "Forbid him
not." (Mark 9:39) This power was not denied to the disciples. "Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers,
raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give."
(Matt. 10:8)
Even charlatanically motivated wizards could perform wonders
which seemed miracles. In His time a certain Simon was doing miracles in
Samaria; even the disciples of the Pharisees performed miracles. But miracles are
not enough to enter into the Kingdom. "Many
shall say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Thy name and in
Thy name cast out devils, and in Thy name do many mighty works? And then will I
profess unto them, I never knew you; depart from Me, all ye workers of
iniquity." (Matt. 7:22-23) It is not enough to cast out devils, if
thou has not cast out the devil in thee, the devil of pride and greed.*
Even after His death men will see others perform
miracles. "For there shall arise
false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders;
insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect."
(Matt. 24:24) I have put you on your guard: do not believe in these signs and
these wonders until thou shalt see the Son of Man. The miracles of false
prophets do not prove the truth of what they say.
For all these reasons, Jesus abstained, as often as
possible, from working miracles, but He could not always resist the pleadings
of the sorrowful, and often His pity did not wait for the request. For a
miracle is an attribute of faith, and His faith is infinite, and that of the
believers very great. But often, as soon as the healing was complete, He asked
the ones He had healed to keep it secret. "See
thou tell no man; Go thy way." (Matt. 8:4) Those who do not listen to
the truth of Christ, because they are troubled by the miracles, should remember
the profound saying which was addressed to Thomas, "Blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed." (John 20:29)
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