The New Testament records that Jesus and members of the early Church performed miraculous works. These miraculous deeds produce awe and wonder in us as we read of them. These miracles also produce questions within us, such as: How were they performed? Why were they performed? Did all the believers in the early Church perform miraculous works? Were the miracles to be an on-going phenomena in the Church? Or, rephrased - Should we expect to witness and perform such miraculous works today?
Different religious groups would provide different answers to these questions. However, we want to see what the Scriptures actually teach on this subject. The answers are found in the Word!
I. Miraculous Power Came From Holy Spirit
There is evidence that Jesus’ ability to work miracles was due to the Holy Spirit working through Him (Matthew 12:28). There is no doubt that it was the Holy Spirit of God that empowered early Christians to perform miraculous deeds - 1 Corinthians 12:4, 7-11, “Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit…For to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, and to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit; to another faith by the same Spirit, and to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, and to another the effecting of miracles, and to another prophecy, and to another the distinguishing of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, and to another the interpretation of tongues.”
II. Purpose of the Miraculous Gifts
Many of our questions concerning New Testament miracles are answered when we come to understand their purpose. Miracles were not performed because they were entertaining or just spiritually ‘cool’ to perform. The Scriptures make it very clear that miracles or miraculous abilities had specific purposes.
A. Receive the Inspired Message.
First, it was through the miraculous working of the Holy Spirit that the Apostles and Prophets received the teachings of the Christian Faith. Before He ascended, Jesus had foretold that His teachings would be miraculously revealed to the Apostles and Prophets by the Holy Spirit. John 14:26, “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, Whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you.” John 16:7, 12-14, “But I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you….I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you.”
B. Confirmation of Divine Commission.
The second purpose of miracles was to prove that the person was sent by God to declare His message. The miracles bore witness to the Divine Commission of the messenger and the Divine origin of the message being delivered.
1. The miracles Jesus performed provided Divine proof that He was the long-awaited Messiah and new Lawgiver. Acts 2:22, “‘Men of Israel, listen to these words: Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs which God performed through Him in your midst, just as you yourselves know.’” Jesus, Himself, spoke of His miraculous works as bearing witness to His Messianic claims.
John 5:36, “But the testimony which I have is greater than the testimony of John; for the works which the Father has given Me to accomplish--the very works that I do--testify about Me, that the Father has sent Me.” John 10:24-25, 37-38, “The Jews then gathered around Him, and were saying to Him, ‘How long will You keep us in suspense? If You are the Christ, tell us plainly.’ Jesus answered them, ‘I told you, and you do not believe; the works that I do in My Father’s name, these testify of Me…."If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me; but if I do them, though you do not believe Me, believe the works, so that you may know and understand that the Father is in Me, and I in the Father.’"
2. The miracles performed by the Apostles were to prove that they were, indeed, commissioned by the Lord to proclaim God’s message. The miracles confirmed that the message was from God.
Mark 16:14, 17-20, “Afterward He appeared to the eleven themselves as they were reclining at the table; and He reproached them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they had not believed those who had seen Him after He had risen….‘These signs will accompany those who have believed: in My name they will cast out demons, they will speak with new tongues; they will pick up serpents, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.’ So then, when the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God. And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them, and confirmed the word by the signs that followed.”
Acts 14:1-3, “In Iconium they entered the synagogue of the Jews together, and spoke in such a manner that a large number of people believed, both of Jews and of Greeks. But the Jews who disbelieved stirred up the minds of the Gentiles and embittered them against the brethren. Therefore they spent a long time there speaking boldly with reliance upon the Lord, Who was testifying to the word of His grace, granting that signs and wonders be done by their hands.”
Hebrews 2:3-4, “how will we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? After it was at the first spoken through the Lord, it was confirmed to us by those who heard, God also testifying with them, both by signs and wonders and by various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit according to His own will.”
III. Miracles Were Exclusively Performed By Apostles and Their Immediate Disciples.
There is the mistaken notion that all members of the early Church possessed and performed miraculous gifts of the Holy Spirit. Paul plainly refutes this idea in 1 Corinthians 12:29-30, “All are not apostles, are they? All are not prophets, are they? All are not teachers, are they? All are not workers of miracles, are they? All do not have gifts of healings, do they? All do not speak with tongues, do they? All do not interpret, do they?”
Actually, the direct endowment from God to perform miracles was only granted to the Apostles. They alone received power from on high. The Apostles were an exclusive group. Paul says to the Corinthians (2 Corinthians 12:12), “The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with all perseverance, by signs and wonders and miracles.”
The only other Christians who were able to perform miracles were those upon whom the Apostles laid their hands. Acts 8:9-20, “Now there was a man named Simon, who formerly was practicing magic in the city and astonishing the people of Samaria, claiming to be someone great; and they all, from smallest to greatest, were giving attention to him, saying, "This man is what is called the Great Power of God." And they were giving him attention because he had for a long time astonished them with his magic arts. But when they believed Philip preaching the good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were being baptized, men and women alike. Even Simon himself believed; and after being baptized, he continued on with Philip, and as he observed signs and great miracles taking place, he was constantly amazed. Now when the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent them Peter and John, who came down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit. For He had not yet fallen upon any of them; they had simply been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they began laying their hands on them, and they were receiving the Holy Spirit. Now when Simon saw that the Spirit was bestowed through the laying on of the apostles’ hands, he offered them money, saying, ‘Give this authority to me as well, so that everyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.’ But Peter said to him, ‘May your silver perish with you, because you thought you could obtain the gift of God with money!’”
Philip performed miraculous works because the Apostles had laid their hands on him (Acts 6:5-6; 8:5-8). Even though Philip could perform miracles, he could not empower others to do so. Only the Apostles could grant the measure of the Spirit that enabled miraculous works.
This is important because it helps us to understand two important truths - 1. Only those who had direct contact with the Apostles ever had a chance to receive any miraculous gifts of the Holy Spirit. 2. Once the Apostles and those upon whom they had laid their hands died, the miraculous gifts of the Holy Spirit ceased to exist in the Church.
IV. Miraculous Gifts - A 1st Century Phenomena.
The miraculous gifts of the Holy Spirit existed during the infancy of the Church. By the time the last Apostle died, the purpose of the gifts had been fulfilled. The teachings of the Christian faith had been fully revealed through the Apostles and Prophets to the Church and, by extension, Mankind. Moreover, their message was received as Divinely inspired and was bearing fruit throughout the world.
It is interesting that the miraculous gifts were actually fading within 25-30 years after the Church was established. This is not surprising because Paul said they would soon disappear in 1 Corinthians 13:8-13, “Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part; but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away. When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.”
Here, Paul speaks of the state of the Church at the time of the writing of this Letter (AD 54-55). Different men had received the gift of miraculous knowledge of the Christian teachings and the miraculous gift to prophesy or reveal inspired messages. To each was revealed just a part of the entire Gospel Message. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Paul, James, Peter, Jude and others were receiving and transmitting parts of the message but the parts had not yet been brought together to form a full and complete revelation. Like an little child whose knowledge is fragmentary, the Church’s knowledge and ability to speak the whole counsel of God was still incomplete. When the perfect comes, this state of partial knowledge and understanding will no longer exist.
What is this “perfect” that is to come? The Greek word translated “perfect” is ’to teleios’.
Some interpret this word as describing Christ at His second coming. This is impossible because the word is neuter in the Greek rather than masculine. In other words, rather than referring to a someone, it refers to a something.
Some believe that it refers to the perfect state we shall enter in Heaven. This, too, is impossible because Paul states, in verse 13, that when this ’to teleios’ comes, there still will abide "faith, hope and love". Certainly, we will find love abiding in Heaven; however, there will be little need for faith and hope. Faith and hope are necessary until we get to Heaven.
Some have believed that the ’to teleios’ is godly love
manifested in the life of the mature Christian. This, too, is impossible because love, the Greek agape, is feminine in gender while we have indicated that ’to teleios’ is masculine.
In the New Testament, ’to teleios’ is primarily used to convey the meaning of completeness. Paul is saying that which is in part will be done away when the parts are combined to form a whole, a completeness. That is, when all of the partial revelations are received, written down and combined together, they will form one wholly complete revelation. The entire revelation of truth - the New Testament Scriptures - will have been delivered to the Church.
With a complete revelation given to the Church, it reaches a state of maturity. As Paul says in Ephesians 4:13, the gifts are necessary “until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.”
When all of the New Testament is completed, there will be no need for gifts of miraculous knowledge and prophecy. Everything that needs to be known will be in the Scriptures. Furthermore, with no one revealing additional truth, there is no need for miracles to confirm their message. It will already have been confirmed.
Before this they saw God’s will for their lives darkly, like looking into a polished brass mirror which provides a poor reflection. This parallels the period of time when God’s Word was not yet completely available to believers. A picture of themselves relative to truths from God’s Word was reflected to them as ’in a mirror dimly’ - very limited, not as yet a clear reflection until the complete set of New Testament doctrines were set down in writing and disseminated.
When it was complete, they would see themselves clearly as if “face to face.” The time would come when God’s will would be completely revealed and they would, see clearly --as it were, face to face. “Face to face” was a proverbial saying indicating how clearly a thing might be understood. We use similar expressions. “I came face to face with the truth.”
It is significant that there is no mention of miraculous gifts in any of the Epistles written after about AD 55 - Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Philemon, Timothy, etc.
During the ‘hey-day’ of miraculous gifts, Paul healed individuals even with his handkerchiefs. Nevertheless, by the mid and later portions of his ministry, he no longer could even heal his good friend Epaphroditus who nearly died as a result of his terrible sickness (Philippians 2:26-27). Later, writing to his younger friend and associate, Timothy, he advises him to take wine for its medicinal value (I Timothy 5:23). Writing to him another time from a Roman dungeon he mentions that he had to leave his companion, Trophimus, in Miletum because of his illness (II Timothy 4:20). The gifts were already fading into obscurity.
To conclude - the miraculous gifts of the Holy Spirit had their purpose and that purpose was fulfilled in the 1st Century. The Apostles Paul and John warned in their writings that the Apostate Church would one day claim to perform miracles and deceive many. The power behind the miracles would be Satan. (See 2 Thessalonians 2:3-12; Revelation 13:11-18). We live in an age when various religious groups declare that supposed miraculous gifts of the Holy Spirit are being bestowed and performed. Those who know the Scriptures know otherwise.
