OUR MIRACLES AND THEIRS (A lesson from Exodus)

Blogging Exodus 7: 8-25

  8 Then the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying,

 9 “When Pharaoh speaks to you, saying, ‘Show a miracle for yourselves,’ then you shall say to Aaron, ‘Take your rod and cast it before Pharaoh, and let it become a serpent.’ ”

10 So Moses and Aaron went in to Pharaoh, and they did so, just as the Lord commanded. And Aaron cast down his rod before Pharaoh and before his servants, and it became a serpent.

11 But Pharaoh also called the wise men and the sorcerers; so the magicians of Egypt, they also did in like manner with their enchantments.

12 For every man threw down his rod, and they became serpents. But Aaron’s rod swallowed up their rods.

 13 And Pharaoh’s heart grew hard, and he did not heed them, as the Lord had said. (Exodus 7:8-12)

In their 2^nd round of negotiations with Pharaoh, Aaron threw down Moses’ wooden shepherd’s staff and it turned into a real live snake.  This miracle was a sign to prove to Pharaoh that the God that Moses and Aaron claimed was real and powerful. (Exodus 7:8-13)

In response, Pharaoh called in his own guys who turned THEIR staffs into real live snakes.

The next morning, God directed Moses to confront Pharaoh at the banks of the Nile River, a river considered sacred by the Egyptians.  There, Moses cried out: “The Lord God of the Hebrews has sent me to you, saying, ‘Let My people go, that they may serve Me in the wilderness,’  and ‘By this you shall know that I am the Lord. Behold, I will strike the waters which are in the river with the rod that is in my hand, and they shall be turned to blood’ ” (Exodus 7:14-18).

Not only did the water in the river turn to blood but so did the water in buckets that had been drawn from the river also went blood red.  The fish in the river died and the buckets of blood started stinking. 

And then Pharaoh called in his guys and they turned some water into blood, too. 

A week later, Moses called down a plague of frogs. 

So Aaron stretched out his hand over the waters of Egypt, and the frogs came up and covered the land of Egypt (Exodus 8:6).

And then Pharaoh's guys made frogs appear, too.
And the magicians did so with their enchantments, and brought up frogs on the land of Egypt (Exodus 8:6).

The Bible clearly states that Moses and Aaron performed multiple legitimately God-empowered miracles, and Pharaoh’s “experts” legitimately replicated those miracles through non-divine means.  The BIBLE SAYS that the same phenomenon can be caused by God (a miracle) in one case and in another case reproduced by natural or human methods.

So . . .

When scientists and skeptics “discover” that certain weather patterns can suddenly blow locust over an area that isn’t under God’s judgment for enslaving Jews, or when astronomers hypothesize that the magi’s Christmas star was a comet or rare planetary alignment, or when seismologist create a simulation in which a localized earthquake causes the walls of Jericho to come tumblin’ down ---- believers should calm da’ crap down.

God can direct the weather to blow locust in at just the right moment.  God can send comets or precisely position the planets so that they line up just when Jesus is born.  God can cause earthquakes localized to the perimeter of ancient Canaanite stronghold.  Or, God can snap His fingers (Thanos-style) and make any of that stuff materialize out of nothing.   Either way, it’s still a miracle.  Either way it’s still TRUE.

A scientific explanation no more negates the reality of a Biblical miracle than an Egyptian magician’s snake negates the reality of the snake Moses and Aaron produced.   In fact, the fact that skeptics have to think and calculate and research and to cause or conceive of causes for Biblical-style miracles just proves that those Biblical events were deliberately arranged by the intelligence we call God.

The little miracles (snakes) they make prove big miracle (snake) God made.

For every man threw down his rod, and they became serpents. But Aaron’s rod swallowed up their rods (Exodus 7: 12).

I mean, just think about it. If you believe that God created everything, then not only did He create the stuff that makes up the universe, but He also created the rules by which that stuff orbits, bonds, combusts, coalesces, and evolves.  If you believe that God is the Creator of the universe then you have to believe that the same infinite, omnipotent, omniscient Inteilligence who wrote the 10 Commandments also composed the 3 laws of thermodynamics.  Humans in government manipulate the principles of God's moral laws. Humans in lab coats manipulate the principles of God's physical laws. 

When human beings write a new city ordinance we don't freak out and protest them for "playing God" because the Old Testament Law is a miracle and only God can write down laws.  (O.K. Some Christians might do that but those dudes are crazy and no group of people should be judged by its subset of crazy people.)

Every human invention or discovery, even our tricks and illusions demonstrate a hardwired awareness of something more.    

By the 3rd plague, when Moses called up lice or biting insects, Pharaoh's magicians and wise men had reached the limits of their arts/ science/ abilities. 

Aaron stretched out his hand with his rod and struck the dust of the earth, and it became lice on man and beast. . .

Now the magicians so worked with their enchantments to bring forth lice, but they could not. . . .Then the magicians said to Pharaoh, “This is the finger of God" (Exodus 8: 17-19).

We keep inventing and seeking because even when we think we've done it all, we know deep down that God has already done more and there is this vast realm of possibility beyond what our hands can produce. This is the finger of God. 

So don’t get upset when scientists spend billions of dollars to construct precisely controlled environments in which they are able to stimulate the “spontaneous” combining of organic amino acids.  Their work proves that the only way to create organic amino acids is for an intelligent being to deliberately design and construct specific environmental conditions and then to intentionally introduce specific molecular combinations under meticulously monitored circumstances.  

Every little creation proves the big Creator.

  

 --Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Bailey Tabernacle CME Church in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. He writes the popular blog: A Word to the Wise at www.andersontgraves.blogspot.com

Email: BaileyTabernacleChurch@comcast.net

Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

Follow me on twitter @AndersonTGraves 

Click here to support this ministry with a donation.  Or go to andersontgraves.blogspot.com and click on the DONATE button on the right-hand sidebar. 

Visit the ministry’s website at baileytabernaclecme.org

Support by check or money order may be mailed to 

Bailey Tabernacle CME Church

1117 23rd Avenue
Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35401