A thought on Jesus's miracles
The other morning at Mass something occurred to me about the miracles of Jesus recorded in the Gospels.
So many of them seem to involve casting out demons, raising the dead, curing the deaf and blind, and providing food or drink for people.
The demons are our fallen nature, the control of the evil one when we permit it. We are spiritually dead. Jesus drives out the evil, and raises us from spiritual death to eternal life.
We are all blind and deaf - to God's love, to the beauty of God's creation, to the signs and wonders before our eyes and whispering in our ears, to our own weaknesses. Jesus removes the blockages so we can truly see ourselves and the wonders of God's love.
We hunger and thirst for salvation, and Jesus provides us with the food and drink we need.
So these miracles are all symbolic of what Christ brings us. I suspect the Gospel writers recorded these miracles intentionally because of their meanings and because they fit the messages they were trying to convey - and probably did not record many other miracles Jesus performed because they did not fit in with their narratives.
I wonder what some of those other miracles were?
But back to my point: These recorded miracles are not just manifestations of God's love and power in tended to amaze us. They are lessons for us. They are means for us to consider what God does in our lives day after day.
These ideas have probably been spoken of and written about many many times before by others who are far brighter and holier than I am. I'm still a child in my faith taking one uncertain step after another, but always trusting in Abba.
So many of them seem to involve casting out demons, raising the dead, curing the deaf and blind, and providing food or drink for people.
The demons are our fallen nature, the control of the evil one when we permit it. We are spiritually dead. Jesus drives out the evil, and raises us from spiritual death to eternal life.
We are all blind and deaf - to God's love, to the beauty of God's creation, to the signs and wonders before our eyes and whispering in our ears, to our own weaknesses. Jesus removes the blockages so we can truly see ourselves and the wonders of God's love.
We hunger and thirst for salvation, and Jesus provides us with the food and drink we need.
So these miracles are all symbolic of what Christ brings us. I suspect the Gospel writers recorded these miracles intentionally because of their meanings and because they fit the messages they were trying to convey - and probably did not record many other miracles Jesus performed because they did not fit in with their narratives.
I wonder what some of those other miracles were?
But back to my point: These recorded miracles are not just manifestations of God's love and power in tended to amaze us. They are lessons for us. They are means for us to consider what God does in our lives day after day.
These ideas have probably been spoken of and written about many many times before by others who are far brighter and holier than I am. I'm still a child in my faith taking one uncertain step after another, but always trusting in Abba.
posted by A Secular Franciscan | 6:20 AM
1 Comments:
Very good - I was thinking of something similar this morning, trying to answer a similar question about the Bible - I thought maybe it is like a physicist trying to explain physics to a 3 year kid. He tells him a story with an example so he can maybe get the general idea. We can't really imagine what this is all about, so God gives us examples hoping we'll get it in some way.
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