Saturday, October 26, 2013

Dare to Believe


I have said it before but I wanted to make a specific post addressing this: all the scientific facts here are meant to glorify God and they should NOT be the basis of your faith. Sure, we are all afraid of believing in something that is not true but if you truly ARE a born-again Christian, you have FELT the Holy Spirit move within you. This is why we are able to believe in His words, against all odds, against all opposition and ridicule.

Before Jesus called me, I read the words of the Bible and they were meaningless. I did not understand! As I look back, I understand that it took God to open my eyes and call me by name. Now the Bible comes alive for me…it speaks to me within its verses, guides me, comforts me, and warns me. The validity of the Gospels has been established as valid historical documents. I discussed this previously in another post. So for anyone reading this thinking the Gospels are “oral traditions” or unreliable, please go read that post or at least do some research and you will see they are valid documents, whether you believe in them or not.

Invalidating the Gospel is tantamount to invalidating the diagrams of Euclid’s Elements from the Oxyrhynchus Papyri. What is the Oxyrhynchus Papyri, you ask? The Oxyrhynchus Papyri are a group of manuscripts discovered in Egypt by archaeologists near Oxyrhynchus, Egypt (modern day Bahnasa). They date from the 1st to the 6th century AD. Within these manuscripts were found the oldest and most complete diagrams from the textbook Euclid’s Elements. Euclid’s Elements is a mathematical collection of 13 books written by the Greek Mathematician Euclid in Alexandria circa 300 BC.

So it seems God has quite the sense of humor for the non-believers because right along with these ancient manuscripts, they found fragments of Matthew, Mark, John, Romans, 1 John, Hebrews and others. So my point is, regardless of what they contain, they ARE valid historical documents.

Even though Jesus did many miracles, there were many who still refused to believe. They could not accept in their hearts what they were seeing with their eyes.

Here are Jesus’ recorded miracles:

1. Changing water to wine (John 2:1-11)

2. Healing royal official son (John 4:46-54)

3. Exorcism in Capernaum (Mark 1:21-28; Luke 4:33-37)

4. Healing Peter’s mother-in-law (Matthew 8:14-15; Mark 1:29-31; Luke 4:38-39)

5. Healing of the sick in the evening (Matthew 8:16; Mark 1:32; Luke 4:40)

6. Catching large number of fish (Luke 5:3-10)

7. Healing of the Leper (Matthew 8:1-3; Mark1:40-42)

8. Healing the Centurion’s servant (Matthew 8:5-13; Luke 7:1-10)

9. Healing of the paralyzed man (Matthew 9:1-8; Mark 2:1-12; Luke 5:18-26)

10. Healing of the withered hand (Matthew 12:9-14; Mark 3:1-6; Luke 6:6-10)

11. Raising the widow’s son (Luke 7:11-17)

12. Calm the sea (Matthew 8:23-27; Mark 4:35-41; Luke 8:22-25)

13. Exorcism Gerasene (Matthew 8:28-32; Mark 5:1-13; Luke 8:26-33)

14. Healing the bleeding woman (Matthew 9:20-22; Mark 5:25-34, Luke 8:43-48)

15. Raise Jairus’ daughter (Matthew 9:18-25, Mark 5:22-43, Luke 8:41-56)

16. Heal two blind men (Matthew 9:27-31)

17. Exorcism of mute man (Matthew 9:32-33)

18. Healing the cripple of 38 years (John 5:1-17)

19. Feeding the 5,000 (Matthew 14:16-21; Mark 6:35-44; Luke 9:12-17, John 6:5-14)

20. Jesus walks on water (Matthew 14:22-23; Mark 6:45-52, John 6:16-21)

21. Healing in Gennesaret (Matthew 14:34-36; Mark 6:53-56)

22. Exorcism (Matthew 15:21-28; Mark 7:24-30)

23. Healing a deaf man (Mark 7:31-37)

24. Feeding 4,000 (Matthew 15:29-39; Mark 8:1-10)

25. Healing the blind man in Bethsaida (Mark 8:22-26)

26. Healing a blind-born man (John 9:1-41)

27. Exorcism of a boy (Matthew 17:14-20; Mark 9:17-29; Luke 9:37-43)

28. Catching a fish with a coin in its mouth (Matthew 17:24-27)

29. Exorcism of a blind-mute man (Matthew 17:24-27)

30. Healing woman with an 18 year illness (Luke 13:10-13)

31. Healing a man with abnormal swelling (Luke 14:1-6)

32. Healing a leper (Luke 17:11-19)

33. Raising Lazarus (John 11:1-44)

34. Healing Bartimaeus of blindness (Matthew 20:29-34; Mark 10:46-52; Luke 18:35-43)

35. Withering of a fig tree (Matthew 21:18-22; Mark 11:12-25)

36. Restoring severed ear (Luke 22:45-54)

37. Resurrection of Jesus Christ (Matthew 28, Mark 16, Luke 24, John 20, 1 Corinthians 15)

38. Catching 153 fish (John 21:4-11)

39. Ascension of Jesus Christ (Acts 1:1-11)

These are just Jesus’ recorded miracles…His real miracles are infinite. It’s great to be able to show with science that His word is true but where does the trust and faith come in if you always need proof? If Jesus is calling your name today, don’t be afraid. Take a step of faith forward and accept Him in your heart. You will never be the same again.

“Jesus said to him, “Because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” –John 20:29

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