Turn your scriptures this evening to Hebrews 2 verses 3 and 4. Hebrews 2 verses 3 and 4. I'll be reading actually verses 1 through 4 to give you kind of a background, but the focus of this sermon will be verses 3 and 4. As you turn there, remember that this is the Word of God, inerrant and infallible. Hebrews 2, verses 1 through 4. We must pay more careful attention, therefore, to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away. For if the message spoken by angels was binding, and every violation and disobedience received its just punishment, How shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation? This salvation, which was first announced by the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard it. God also testified to it by signs, wonders, and various miracles and gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will. May God bless the reading of his word. Amen. Maybe I dribbled a little too, I don't know. In the 21st century, there's been a big debate as to the exact nature of miracles and how they relate to Christianity. There are some who say that miracles are the most important thing. You turn on the TV and you see this. In some churches, you're actually judged if you're a Christian or not. The criteria is whether you do miracles or not. If you don't do miracles, then you're not a Christian. And this is on one extreme. Of course, on the opposite extreme, you have those who would say that miracles never happened. Not now, not then, during Bible times. They were made up by the Bible writers. One 20th century theologian said he wanted to, quote unquote, demythologize the Bible, to make it more palatable, to make it more accessible to the modern man, who could not believe in miracles anymore. So he basically gutted the whole Bible out of all its supernatural content, leaving only a bare set of morals. Of course, this is the other opposite extreme. But what is the biblical view of miracles and signs and wonders? Oftentimes, this is a difficult question for us as Presbyterians. We don't really like this question too much. We kind of think that's just too charismatic for us to deal with. We like things orderly. We like things in nothing too miraculous. Well, that's a little bit pejorative, but we always talk about the miracle of salvation, you know, not the miracles mentioned in the Bible, but they are in the Scriptures. So, we have to deal with them. So, what is the exact relationship between Jesus and miracles? Well, in this sermon, I hope to give you that, and in doing so, allow you to see how you must believe in Christ as the only Savior. In order to do this, we need to take a step backwards and kind of view the whole of redemptive history, kind of put miracles in the redemptive context. The Bible is basically about God's mighty acts of redemption. That's like the overall theme of Scripture. You have in the first two chapters of Genesis, the creation account. Then in Genesis 3, you have the fall of mankind. And basically from Genesis 3.15 all the way to Revelation 22, it's about how God redeems his people, how he himself obtains a people for himself. This is the major thrust of Scripture. We see miracles in connection with God's mighty acts, don't we, in Scripture? Exodus story, of course, comes to mind. The ten slaves that God attacks Pharaoh with, those are, of course, miracles. And, of course, the division of the Red Sea. These are all miracles God did to redeem his people. You might also think of Joshua, with the sun standing still and going backwards. This is also a miracle that God did to deliver his people. The greatest of these miracles, of course, is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And that's seen as the miracle par excellence in all of Scripture. But these mighty acts of God, these great acts of redemption, do not stand by themselves. They are not intelligible to themselves. But God has chosen to infallibly interpret them for us through his prophets. God gives us his messengers who interpret these acts of redemption and apply it to the people of God. We know this from Hebrews 1, where in the first verse it says, In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets. It also goes on to say how in these last days he has spoken through his Son, who is the greatest of all prophets. The prophets interpret the mighty acts of redemption that God has accomplished. But then a question arises. How are we to know who the real prophets are? I mean, in both the Old and the New Testament, there are false prophets. So what distinguishes a true prophet from a false prophet? How do we know? Well, first of all, it must be said that we know because we are creatures created in the image of God, and therefore, we recognize His voice. God need not make sure that we know through miracles and things like that, because we can recognize His voice. We are creatures in His image, and the creation itself is enough to reveal Him. And, of course, the written Word of God is enough to reveal Him, too. But we also know that God is gracious, and He... and God gives us these miracles. He gives us miracles through His messengers, through His prophets, to testify to the Word. God is gracious and He gives us miracles through His prophets. His prophets do miracles so that we, the people of God, can know that they have come from God. Let's look at some biblical examples to back up what I've just said. Let's turn with me, if you would, to Exodus 4, verses 1 through 9. I might skip a few verses in there, but Exodus 4 verses 1 through 9, and see the connection between God's prophetic word through his prophet and the miracles that testify to it. Exodus 4, 1 through 9, and of course the context is God is speaking to Moses, and he's telling Moses to go to the people of God with this message of redemption. And Moses wonders, how will the people know that I am from you? How will they know that I am a true prophet of God? Exodus 4, 1 through 9. Moses answered, what if they do not believe me, speaking of the people of Israel, or listen to me and say, the Lord did not appear to you? Then the Lord said to him, what is that in your hand? A staff, he replied. The Lord said, throw it on the ground. Moses threw it on the ground, and it became a snake, and he ran from it. Then the Lord said to him, reach out your hand and take it by the tail. So Moses reached out and took hold of the snake and turned back into a staff in his hand. This, said the Lord, is so that they may believe that the Lord, the God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has appeared to you." Skip down to verse 8. Then the Lord said, if they do not believe you or pay attention to the first miraculous sign, they may believe the second. But if they do not believe these two signs or listen to you, take some water from the Nile and pour it on the dry ground. The water you take from the river will become blood on the ground. And you see here what's going on. God is saying that they will believe you for the miraculous signs that you do. They will know that you have come from me. for who but God alone could do these miraculous signs. So Moses is accredited to the people through these miracles. The people's confidence is built in him through the miracles, these miraculous signs which he performs. And this is how the people might be more assured that Moses is certainly from God. We see a similar thing in Elijah. Elijah, you remember, had his famous showdown with the prophets of Baal. And in a kind of comical routine, Elijah taunts the prophets of Baal because no miraculous sign could be done. But then, when Elijah prays to God, what happens? The fire consumes the altar. And this miraculous sign showed that Elijah was truly speaking through God. Or that God was truly speaking through Elijah, rather. And that God was greater than all the other false gods who were not gods at all. The miracle attested to that. Again, we have to remember, though, that miracles are not to be demanded. They are God's gift to us. They kind of assure us, they build us up in the faith, but they are not necessary. Oftentimes, in our modern culture, people will say, I would believe in God if he would just write it in the sky. Just show me a sign. In fact, the atheist philosopher Bertrand Russell, as some of you might know him, said that as he was dying, someone asked him, if you went before God, what would be your excuse as to why you didn't believe in him? And Russell snidely replied, there's not enough evidence. This kind of thinking is totally wrong. We are not to demand a miracle from God. God need not reveal himself and then confirm his message through miracles. We as his creation can understand his creation around us enough so that we are without excuse. And indeed we have the written word of God. which is clear to us. So we need not a miraculous sign, but God is gracious to us, and He gives us these. If your father wrote you a letter, you would know by the content and the way it was written that your father indeed had written it, because you know your father. In a sense, you are a creation of your father, obviously not ultimately, but in a sense you are, and you recognize his voice, his writing. But how much more assured would you be if you put a signature on the bottom, which no one can duplicate? Again, miracles are kind of like this. They place God's signature on the prophetic word, on His message to His people. And it assures the people that He indeed had written them. Again, it's not something that we demand. Jesus said a wicked and perverse generation demands a sign. but it's something that God gives to us to accompany His Word, to accompany His infallible prophetic message, so that we might know, we might be more assured in our hearts that it is indeed from God. Now that we have seen that, let's go to our Hebrews passage and see more clearly as to what our author this evening is teaching us. Again, I'll read now from verses 3 and 4, and we'll see exactly the context in which the author to the Hebrews writes concerning these miracles. Verse 3, how shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation? This salvation, which was first announced by the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard it. God also testified to it by signs, wonders, and various miracles and gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to His will. In verse 4, we see that God has given his people, again, these signs, wonders, and miracles which testify to what? The message, the message of salvation. And this message of salvation was first announced by the Lord. Now, who is this Lord? Of course, it's the Lord Jesus Christ. And we know from Scripture that Jesus was a man accredited to us by God through miracles. If you turn to Acts 2, 22 for confirmation of this. Acts 2, verse 22. In the context of this is Peter's sermon on Pentecost. And Peter's sermon here, this is actually how he begins the sermon. Remember, he's speaking to Jewish people who know the Old Testament. Acts 2, verse 22. Men of Israel, listen to this. Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. You have to ask yourself now, why would Peter begin this great sermon by affirming that Jesus Christ was accredited to them by miracles? Well, because Peter knows the Old Testament. And Peter knows that his audience knows the Old Testament. And if you'd read the Old Testament, you realize that those prophets of God were accompanied by miraculous signs, by wonders. And so Peter here is saying, look, you believe the Old Testament prophets, don't you? They were accredited to God by miracles. Now, why don't you believe Christ here, who also was accredited to you by miracles. The message of Christ was further ensured to the people of God through miracles. This also comes clear to us in John 10, you don't have to turn there, but what does Jesus say? He says, if you do not believe me for what I say, at least believe me for the miracles. Jesus is not asserting that miracles infallibly prove that He is the Christ, but He is saying that you might not like the content of what I'm saying, but I am doing these miracles, and in the Old Testament, God has shown it to be a pattern that miracles accompany those who truly speak His Word. So why don't you believe me? You believe the Old Testament? Believe in me. I also do these miracles. I also have come from God. And so we see that Jesus did miracles, and they they attested to the validity of his word. Also in verse 3, we see that it was confirmed to us, the message of salvation, was confirmed to us by those who heard him. Now there's some dispute as to exactly those who heard him is, but most likely this is a reference to the apostles. You will know that apostles are ones who sat at Jesus' feet, who had been with Christ. That's why it was so important for Paul to have seen the risen Christ, because one of the criteria for being an apostle was being with Christ. And clearly here, it seems to me that this reference here is to the apostles, and many commentators agree with me here. And we learn from Scripture, too, that the apostles were confirmed, they testified to the validity of their own word through miracles, through miraculous signs. We learn this from Mark 16, verses 19 and 20. Turn there with me, if you would, to Mark 16, verses 19 and 20. The context here is that this is just after Jesus ascended into heaven, and then it goes on to tell exactly what the disciples did after he ascended into heaven. Mark 16, verses 19 and 20. After the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, he was taken up into heaven, and he sat at the right hand of God. Then the disciples went out and preached everywhere, and the Lord worked with them and confirmed his word by the signs that accompanied it." Do you see here the connection between the signs, the miraculous signs, and the word that they gave? The signs accompanied the word. They were given authority by Christ. They were given this sort of power of attorney, if you will. And these signs accompanied them as they had also accompanied Christ to testify to, to confirm their message. We see this also when Paul, in 2 Corinthians, defends all the miracles that he did. If you read through 2 Corinthians, you get to chapter 10. You might think that Paul is the biggest egomaniac ever. He talks about all the great things that he's done. He talks about all the miracles he's done, all the revelations he's received. And if you don't understand the context, then you'll think he's an egomaniac. But the reason why he's saying all this is to show that he indeed is an apostle. And therefore, he indeed is speaking the truth. He's interpreting what Christ had done on the cross infallibly. And therefore, the Corinthian people needed to listen to him. He's doing it for their own sake. He's jealous for them. He wants to present them to Christ as a pure bride. And this is why he's doing that. You can tell even from the message. He doesn't want to do that. He wants to be humble. But he's doing it to show. But he indeed is an apostle, and therefore they need to listen to him. And so we see that in this verse, we see that there is an intimate connection between the gifts of the Holy Spirit and the miraculous signs and wonders, and also the message that they brought, the infallible message, this salvation This message, as the author to the Hebrews says to us. And this is great application to us, doesn't it? If you ever wondered why we don't have gifts of miracles, we don't practice them in church, why we don't speak in tongues or anything like that, it's because of passages like this. These passages show to us the connection between the prophetic word on one hand and the gifts that accompany it on the other. The argument goes like this. In Hebrews 1, it says that Jesus is the final and greatest prophet or revelation from God. Then we see from this verse that the apostles, those who heard him, were given the right to interpret him. They also had signs accompany them. But then we also see that there's a connection between the miracles and the prophetic word. There's an infallible connection here, and when one ends, so ends the other. This is why we don't do those things here as Presbyterians. I know this is a big issue in the church today, and we need to address it. Paul talks about in 1 Corinthians 12 and 1 Corinthians 14 about how we should speak in tongues, and it has to be a good reason why we don't do that now. Clearly, though, the New Testament teaches that that was a foundational, that was a provisional rule. In Ephesians 2.20, Paul says that the church is built upon the apostles and prophets of the New Testament, Jesus Christ being the head cornerstone. And that, we believe, their job was to infallibly interpret the redemption of Christ, just like the Old Testament pattern. We have the act of redemption and its infallible interpretation accompanied by signs and wonders. And when John finishes that last word of revelation, we believe that ceases too. Now, this is a very difficult issue. This is tough for me to say this to you because I have a brother who's charismatic and he doesn't agree with me on this issue. And there is legitimate differences between true Christians on this issue. But nonetheless, this has been the position of the Reformed Church, the basic position, not everyone has agreed, but in general the position of the Reformed Church since its inception. Oftentimes we are accused of quenching the spirit. Oftentimes we are accused of putting God in a box, of being afraid of the supernatural. But brothers and sisters, that is not what we are doing. We believe that it is exegetically It's exegetically weighty that the Word is accompanied by these gifts, by these miraculous signs. And when one ceases, so ceases the other. was asked by his Catholic opponents, why don't you have miracles accompany your word? If what you say is so true, if what you say is so good, then why don't the miracles accompany it? Because that's what it says in the scripture. And Calvin replied, what do you mean? Miracles did accompany my word, but not through me, through the apostles. I'm just saying what the apostles said. I'm not adding anything to that. Indeed, it is the job of the minister to not add anything, but to declare what the Apostle said and apply it to the people of the day, and therefore it is no longer needed that signs accompany them. In addressing this question, it is necessary for us, first of all, to be humble, though. and recognize that there are true Christians who disagree with our position on this. There are true Christians who wouldn't come out with this. Again, I say the reformed, the general reformed opinion is what I just presented to you, but there are true Christians who disagree with us here. So we need to be humble. Even in the Reformed community, there are some who would disagree. So we need to be humble and recognize that we need to have dialogue with Charismatics. Many of them are creedally Orthodox. Many of them agree with the same things that we agree in the main. They believe in the Trinity, the substitutionary atonement, and the two natures of Christ in one person, and the general resurrection of the dead. These are the main things, and they agree with us there. So we need to be humble. These are just Christians with whom we disagree. Secondly, another caveat to this is that God still does what we might call miracles. Again, we believe that the gifts of the Holy Spirit that had to do with Revelation and that which accompanied Revelation, those certain gifts have disappeared. That does not mean we shouldn't pray for the sick. That does not mean that we shouldn't expect God to heal the sick. We pray for the sick expecting God to do things that can only be explained by supernatural intervention. Because Jesus, when he was on earth, he sometimes healed people just because he had compassion on them. And so we should pray to God that if it might please him, if it is according to his will to do what we would call miracles, it's the gifts of these that have ceased, the gifts in specific people that accompanied the apostolic church. And thirdly, We also have to remember that not all things charismatic are bad. Oftentimes, certain good things in the church are guilty by association. Oftentimes, if someone's kind of raising their hand in worship a little, we're like, look at that, the charismaniac over there, what's he doing? Now, I'm not advocating that you raise your hand in worship, but if you do without disruption, I see no problem with it. But again, it's much better to raise your hand and worship and to raise your nose. Clearly, this is just an act of joyful expression. Secondly, things like prayer and revival and evangelism, things like this, are often associated with the charismatic movement, but they shouldn't be merely associated with the charismatic movement, and shame on us if they're only associated with them. We as Reformed Christians believe in the sovereignty of God, and therefore we should be the ones leading the evangelism. We should be the ones leading in prayer. And that's why it is encouraging that we have prayer meetings here at our church. This is not a quote-unquote charismatic thing. This is something that we should be doing and that they're ahead of us on. So brothers and sisters, all that notwithstanding, I do believe that we shouldn't follow them in their continual nature of revelation in the gifts because of what I just presented to you here about the intimate connection between God's prophetic word and also these signs that accompany it, which I believe this passage in Hebrews is teaching here. It is important to address that issue because it's such an important contemporary issue, but let that not detract. from what the author to the Hebrews is also teaching us here. His point is not merely didactic. It's also an admonition. It's also a warning. Let's go back to the text. In the first verse, it says that we must pay careful attention so that we do not drift away. In the third verse, it teaches us That we cannot escape if we ignore this great salvation. And then, the bit about the signs, the wonders, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. You have to ask yourself, why would the author to the Hebrews put that there? What's the purpose? The purpose, I believe, is clear. Miracles testify to the veracity of the Word. But they also increase the judgment of those who would turn away You saw these miracles and yet you turned away. Turn with me to Numbers 14 verses 11 and 12. Numbers 14 verses 11 and 12. A passage that I believe that the author to the Hebrews may have had in his mind when he said this, when he wrote this down. Numbers 14, 11 and 12. The Lord said to Moses, How long will these people treat me with contempt? How long will they refuse to believe in me? In spite of all the miraculous signs I have performed among them, I will strike them down with a plague and destroy them. But I will make you into a nation greater and stronger than they. Do you see his point? Even though God had revealed to them himself to them through these miraculous signs, even though the word of Moses was accompanied by signs, they still refuse to believe. And, brothers and sisters, the word of God in scriptures shows us that the message of Christ was accompanied by miraculous signs. Indeed, they are not to prove again, they're not to prove that it's the word of God, Certainly, as Abraham says to the rich man, if Moses and the prophets aren't enough, then they won't believe anyway. But again, they are in the Word of God. They assure us that it is indeed the Word of God. And therefore, they increase our guilt if we reject it. Pay attention, brothers and sisters. You may not drift away, because not only Is Christ the greatest revelation of God? He was accredited to you by miracles. Let us pray. Lord, we thank you so much that your word was accredited by miracles. We thank you that it is a sure word and that even though you didn't have to reveal it to us, even though you didn't have to accompany it with miracles, you chose to do so because you are gracious. We pray that we would not drift away as the authors of the Hebrews have admonished us. In Jesus' name, Amen.