Messianic Miracles

My favorite. February 23rd, 2006
This is a sermonette I did for our church's college Sunday school a few weeks back. A student asked for my notes, which are in pencil and generally illegible. Thus, I typed up these notes to try to summarize what I chattered about.

KJ

Messianic Miracles

Jn 20:30-31- says that there aren’t enough books to contain all that Jesus did. So why did the Gospel writers include what they did? Their initial audience would have been Jewish people or “God-fearers” who were Gentiles who knew the Torah extremely well. So, they wrote about what would prove Jesus’ Messiah-ship within the context of their culture and faith. What they wrote was based upon a solid foundation and wasn't just pulled out of thin air.
There were known lists of miracles that the Messiah would do. Verses that refer (subtly) to these include Mt 11:2-6 and Jn 6:25-33

1. Leprosy (Mt 8:1)—detailed description of how to determine if someone had leprosy or if they were cured. From the time that the Law (Torah) was given until Christ, no Jew had ever been healed of leprosy. Miriam, Moses’ sister was healed before the Law was given and Naaman was a Gentile. If someone was healed the priest had to do 3 things: 1) confirm that the healed had actually had leprosy 2) confirmed that the healed really was healed and 3) who did the healing. Once the person doing the healing was discovered then the priest/Pharisees/scribe would do 2 things: 1) observe the Messianic candidate (Mk 2:5-7, Lk 5:17) and then 2) interrogate/interview the candidate—this is what was going on all the time when Jesus was in conversations w/the priests, etc.


2. Demon of Dumbness/Muteness (Mt 12:22-23, Mk 9:17-18)—rabbis and priests did exorcisms at the time of Christ (Mt 12:27) however in order to do this, they had to have the demons’ name. (Remember Jesus and the demons named Legion) However, only Christ was able to cast out demons who caused people to be unable to speak and this is why His disciples could not.


3. Born Blind (Jn 9:1-41) There was a common teaching that physical infirmities were due to sin. Thus the question in v. 3, but Jesus responds that it was so the power of God could be revealed (think the Messiah). The blind man himself states in v. 32 that there is no where in Jewish history where anyone born blind was ever healed. However, the Messiah could do that and he and his parents confirmed that was indeed born blind. Remember the investigation procedure for leprosy. Similar one done here. So, this explains why the man was annoyed and pissy with the Pharisees. They had incontrovertible evidence in front of them and they refused to believe.


4. Raise the dead (Jn 11:1-52) Pharisees taught that a person’s spirit hovered over the body for three days and therefore resuscitation was possible. So, this is why Jesus waited around for 2 days when hearing that Lazarus was sick. John specifically states twice that Lazarus had been dead for 4 days (vv. 17, 39). When asked why He was waiting, He replied again so that God’s glory would be manifest.

After all these things we read that the people were “astonished” and gave glory to God. They would ask, “This isn’t the Son of David is it?” Son of David is a Messianic title. This is why these things are included. These are the important things Jesus did, the things that proved He was the Messiah.