The Bible is Supernatural
“If this is a theistic universe, it follows that miracles are possible. For if there is a God who can act in the world, then it is possible that there can be acts of God.”
—Norman L. Geisler1
Photo by Lonnie Paulson www.lonniepaulsonphoto.com
Christians Believe in a Supernatural God
Do you believe in God? Do you believe in Jesus? The Holy Spirit testifies of the work of Jesus, so I hope you believe in the Holy Spirit. Do you believe in the Bible? Many people who say they are a Christian or say they believe in the Bible believe on their own terms. The Bible which is the word of God is not subjective. The Bible is the absolute word of God. If you are a true believer in Christ, you are rare. Most people will not accept the absolute word of God found in the Holy Bible. Let me share with you what Jesus said about these rare true believers who are very small in number. “Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it” (Matthew 7:13–14 NKJV).
As a Christian you need the kind of faith in Christ that the Bible defines as true faith. “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” Hebrews 11:1 NKJV. True Christians who believe the Bible believe in a supernatural book. You cannot accept the Bible on naturalistic scientific grounds. You cannot explain away the supernatural creation of the universe by using science. You cannot explain away the supernatural event of Noah’s flood by using science. You cannot explain away the virgin birth of Jesus by using science. You cannot explain away the supernatural resurrection of Jesus Christ by using science. As Christians we can back up our faith through the evidence of eyewitnesses from the Bible, Bible prophecy, archaeology, other writings outside the Bible, and even history and science can back up our faith in Christ. This is why I read and study Christian apologetics. I found a quote from a North American theologian I gleaned from one of Josh McDowell’s books, The New Evidence that Demands a Verdict. “Faith does not, however, mean a leap in the dark, an irrational credulity, a believing against evidences and against reason. It means believing in the light of historical facts, consistent with evidences, on the basis of witnesses. It would be impossible to believe in the resurrection of Jesus apart from the historical facts of His death, His burial, and the witness of the disciples” —George Eldon Ladd.2
Skeptics of the Supernatural
Many people who claim they are Christians pick and choose what they want to believe about the Bible. It is hard for a secular world who may say they believe in a God or even Jesus to completely repent of sins and follow Jesus and become a lifelong disciple of Jesus the Christ. One reason is the “would be” believer cannot accept the Bible as the absolute word of God. In a previous blog post I shared how Thomas Jefferson would take some scissors to his Bible and create his own personal Bible. He did not believe in miracles. I doubt he was a Christian. He claimed to be what is known as a Deist. His new bible that he created for himself was called, The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth.3
Many people believe parts of the Bible, but not all the Bible. These people are not true Christians and if they stay in their unbelief will be judged by God in hell. Many people may claim that they are a Christian and say that the Bible should be interpreted by the reader, not the author. To these people the Bible is a subjective book. If these people do not repent of their unbelief they will be judged by God in hell. Many people say if you are sincere about your beliefs even if those beliefs are contra to the Bible, you are in God’s favor. If these people do not change their beliefs and repent, they will be judged by God in hell. Many people believe there can be other ways besides Christ to get to heaven. You could be a sincere worshiper of other gods like Buddha, Allah, or any god you call your own such as “the man upstairs.” If these people do not repent of their unbelief they will be judged by God in hell. Only people who are in a narrow group of people who believe the Bible is the absolute word of God without any exceptions or compromise are in the family of Christ. When you die those who are a disciple of Christ and believe the absolute word of the Bible and have repented of their sins will enter eternal life which is heaven. If you are in Christ, then you are in this small group Jesus mentions in Matthew 7:13–14.
If you do not believe that the Bible is a supernatural book you do not need to believe that God created the heavens and the earth in six twenty-four-hour days. If you do not believe that the Bible is a supernatural book you do not have to believe that a universal flood destroyed all life on the earth and God saved a faithful eight people to repopulate the world. If you do not believe the Bible is a supernatural book you do not have to believe that an eternal Triune God became man to condescend to our level and was born from a virgin woman through the Holy Spirit. If you do not believe the Bible is a supernatural book you do not have to believe that Jesus who was both God and man was crucified on a Roman cross, buried, and in three days rose from the dead. Last of all if you do not believe that the Bible is a supernatural book you do not have to believe that Jesus is coming back again to judge all who will not believe and repent of their sins.
An atheist would not believe in any supernatural events or works of any god. Here is what Richard Dawkins said concerning the supernatural. “The virgin birth, the Resurrection, the raising of Lazarus, even the Old Testament miracles, all are freely used for religious propaganda, and they are very effective with an audience of unsophisticates and children.”4 The average secular historian will rule out any miracles or supernatural events in the Bible. They will refer to such events as unhistorical. They will go as far to claim the Bible as a book of mythology. These atheists make claims that the supernatural is not possible and only natural science can have the answer to unexplainable phenomenon.
The Miracle of Feeding the 5,000 and the 4,000
As Christians we should not be bashful about sharing the miracles of Christ. Our trinitarian God is real which includes part of our natural world, and He is part of the supernatural world. I recently read a blog from the Ministry Answers in Genesis which was titled: The Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes Not So Miraculous Say Scientists.5 The article mentions claims from scientists that the feeding of both the 5,000 and the 4,000 with the fish and bread were coincidental events. The scientists did a study of the Sea of Galilee. They measured the temperature and oxygen and wind speed in the depths of the lake. They looked at data of historical accounts of fish die-offs. In their research they found short periods of time when strong winds pulled enough oxygen from the depths of the Sea of Galilee to leave insufficient oxygen in the water for aquatic life. The result would be a sudden die-off they proposed. This mass of dead fish would make it to the shore and would be collected by the hungry people in the story of the feeding of the 4,000 and the 5.000 in the Bible. In the Bible the people did not gather fish from the shore. Jesus offered a blessing over the fish and loaves. Jesus created this miracle of feeding the large group. Notice the scientists never made mention of the bread. Well, that was a meaningless study. I’m sure the scientists received some sort of grant money too for this waste of time. If they would have read these passages in the Bible, they would not need to conduct the study. These scientists act like children who want to play like they are scientists.
The Bible never makes mention of getting the fish from the lake. All they had for food was five loaves and two fish. The miracle which involves Jesus feeding the 5.000 can be read in Matthew 14:13–21. The people that came to hear Jesus speak lived in the villages which would have been close to the shoreline of the lake. Jesus was speaking in the wilderness far from the shore. The Gospels say it was a desolate place. In verse 15 the disciples came to Jesus and told them it is now evening, and the day is now over, send the crowds back to their villages so they can buy food. The villages were on the shore of the lake. The crowd of people was quite a way from the shore of Galilee. Jesus told His disciples not to turn them away that they should give them something to eat. The disciples said, “We have only five loaves and two fish.” Jesus told the disciples to bring what they had to Him. Jesus told the crowd to sit down in the grass. Jesus took the five loaves and two fish in His hands, He looked up to heaven and said a blessing. At this time a supernatural miracle from God happened that we cannot explain. Next, He broke the loaves and handed them to His disciples. The disciples handed the broken pieces to the crowd. The crowd had more than enough to eat. Twelve baskets had left over pieces of bread and fish. You can also read about this miracle in Mark 6:30–44, Luke 9:10–17, and John 6:1–14.
Let’s look at feeding of the 4,000. You can read about this event in Matthew 15:32–38, and in Mark 8:1–9. This large crowd was there for as long as three days and had nothing to eat. Some of the people traveled quite a way to hear Jesus speak. Jesus did not want to send them home hungry. The disciples had seven loaves of bread and a few small fish. Jesus took these few fish and the seven loaves and gave thanks. Through a supernatural miracle 4,000 people were fed.
Prophet Jonah Swallowed by a Fish
It has been said that the most critiqued miracle in the Bible is the event told of the prophet Jonah being swallowed by a large fish and surviving in its belly three days. There are rare cases reported that large fish, for example sharks have been opened to reveal a human in the stomach. There is a shark called the whale shark that is large enough to swallow a human. Whales which are mammals cannot swallow a human. However, a human could enter the mouth of a whale, but he could not pass through the throat. The throat opening of the whale is far too small. I have heard some people say that Jonah was swallowed by a whale. I don’t know of any Bible translations that use the word whale over fish. The astonishing miracle here is how a human could survive in the belly of any animal for three days and live to talk about it. This is a miracle from God. The acidic digestive juices in the stomach would burn and kill you plus there is no air to breath.
In the ESV Study Bible, Dr Mark D. Futato in his notes on the book of Jonah states that in chapter 1:17 of the book of Jonah the Hebrew word for “fish” when the book of Jonah was written was not as limited in our modern-day language. Dr. Futato claims the Hebrew word used for “fish” could have meant any cold-blooded vertebrate sea creature with fins and gills. It was a general word for an aquatic beast.6
I saw on a You Tube video where a naturalist wanted to experience what it would be like to be swallowed by a large anaconda. He wore a scuba diving suit and completely covered himself and brought along a small air tank. He jumped in the river in front of a prospective anaconda and was swallowed. His team almost immediately cut the snake’s belly open to free him. Even though he was fully covered and in a wet suit and was immediately recovered he experienced several acidic burns all through his skin. So, you see there is a lot of damage that can be done by an animal’s digestive acids through the process of digestion. The man was not in the belly of that snake that long.
My Last Words
The greatest miracle from the triune God was the creation of the universe from the One who was never created. God was the first cause. Jesus who is second in the trinity was right there with God the Father. “Now Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was” (John 17:5 NASB). God is Holy but His created humans would fall into sin. These sinful beings could not enter heaven, because heaven was only for the holy. From the very first sin of Adam and Eve God would create a remedy for sin. This was a promise of a future Messiah that would save sinners like Adam and Eve and their future offspring which would include all who would believe, repent and follow God. God told Adam and Eve, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel” (Genesis 3:15 ESV). As John MacArthur points out in his study Bible in Genesis 3:15, “…[T]he woman’s offspring called ‘he’ is Christ, who will one day defeat the Serpent. Satan could only ‘bruise’ Christ’s heel (cause him to suffer), while Christ will bruise Satan’s head (destroy him with a fatal blow).7
A believer in God before the birth of Jesus received salvation in the belief and trust of a future Messiah which would be Jesus. Job was a follower of God and was born before the patriarch Abraham. Job knew that when he died, he would go to heaven. “For I know that my Redeemer lives, And He shall stand at last on the earth; And after my skin is destroyed, this I know, That in my flesh I shall see God, Whom I shall see for myself, And my eyes shall behold, and not another. How my heart yearns within me” (Job 19:25–27 NKJV).
At the right time in history God through one of the greatest miracles offered His Son, second member of the trinity to become a human incarnation to be born from a virgin woman through the Holy Spirit the third member of the trinity. Jesus here on Earth would testify that He was equal with God the Father. “Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father abiding in Me does His works” (John 14:10 NASB). This is why Jesus could perform not only miracles of healing but could forgive sins. The Pharisees said that only God can forgive sins. The Pharisees did not believe that Jesus was God in the flesh. That is why they wanted Him to be put to death for what they claimed was blasphemy. But through His love, Jesus volunteered to die to save sinners by His blood. His blood was the only blood that could save sinners, because Jesus was without sin and was God in the flesh.
Jesus’ resurrection from the dead was a historical supernatural event that we celebrate on Easter Sunday which Christians prefer to call RESURRECTION DAY over the pagan name Easter. Jesus first came for His chosen people the Jews. As I explained in an earlier article of this blog. The book of Acts in the Bible explains how this small remnant of Jews who became Christians exploded into a large following of Gentiles. Thanks to the ministry of the apostles Peter and Paul. Now we Christians wait for the next miraculous event which will deal with judgement of sinners in the second coming of Jesus as a lion and will usher in the New Jerusalem which you can read about in Revelation 21:9–27. Our greatest joy as a Christian is we win in the end. Justice is carried out by Christ on this sinful world, and we are given eternal life to be with Christ for ever and ever. Amen.
The Bible is Supernatural: End Notes
1) Norman L. Geisler. Christian Apologetics; Baker Book House; Grand Rapids, MI 49516 (1976) p 265.
2) Josh McDowell. The New Evidence That Demands a Verdict; Thomas Nelson Publishers; Nashville, TN 37214 (1999) p 365.
3) D. James Kennedy. Skeptics Answered; Multnomah Publishers Inc; Sisters. OR 97759 (1997) p 31.
4) Lee Strobel. The Case for Faith; Zondervan Publishing House; Grand Rapids, MI 49530 (2000) p 77.
5) https://answersingenesis.org/bible/miracle-loaves-fishes-not-miraculous-say-scientists/
6) Lane T. Dennis, Executive Editor & Wayne Grudem General Editor. ESV Study Bible; Crossway; Wheaton, IL 60187 (2016) p 1688.
7) John MacArthur. The John MacArthur Study Bible ESV; Crossway; Wheaton, IL 60187 (2010) p 22.