Miracles.

I’ve been reading through the complete published works of C.S. Lewis this summer, and one of the books I’m working on right now is God in the Dock. It’s a collection of Lewis’ essays, articles, and interviews regarding theology.

In the section titled “Miracles,” Jack points out something excellent: “There is an activity of God displayed throughout creation, a wholesale activity let us say which men refuse to recognize. The miracles done by God incarnate, living as a man in Palestine, perform the very same things as this wholesale activity, but at a different speed and on a smaller scale…God creates the vine and teaches it to draw up water by its roots and, with the aid of the sun, to turn that water into a juice which will ferment and take on certain qualities. Thus every year, from Noah’s time till ours, God turns water into wine…But when Christ at Cana makes water into wine, the mask is off. The miracle has only half its effect if it only convinces us that Christ is God: it will have its full effect if whenever we see a vineyard or drink a glass of wine we remember that here works He who sat at the wedding party in Cana.”

He continues by talking about making “a little corn into much corn” and comparing it to Jesus feeding crowds with just a few loaves of bread and a few fish.

Humans of past ages attributed these activities to gods of wine and Corn Kings. Miracles, however, simply speed up the process. Miracles don’t necessarily defy the laws of nature; they simply defy our understanding of those laws.

I think of Nate Pelz. He was in a huge amount of pain and his life was in danger. The doctors, however, performed surgery and removed the tumor from Nate’s abdomen. The human body can heal itself. Blood clots to protect cuts, blisters form to cover irritated skin, antibodies attack infections. But Nate’s body wasn’t healing quickly, and surgery was the only logical choice in order to save his life. I do believe that God worked a miracle in that operating room, and that Nate is alive (and home) today because of God’s mighty hand. However, I don’t think that God did anything that completely abnormal or inconceivable. God chose to heal Nate through medicine.


I'm not great at conclusions. I never have been. So, this is the end of this post.