Defining the miraculous

The Inverness pastor, together with some friends, was quietly praying and distributing leaflets outside a psychic fair. He felt compelled to speak to a woman who was about to go in, a woman he had never met before. He told her he understood she was hoping to receive some help at the fayre with difficulties in her marriage, and that God ‘knew the pain she was going through.’

The woman asked how he knew this. ‘Because God told me,’ he replied, ‘and this is proof that He loves you and wants to help you.’

This is one of many striking stories contained in a book which had its Highland launch on Saturday at the Inverness CLC Bookshop. Its author is Samuel McKibben who has a life-long connection with Apostolic churches, and was formerly pastor of Inverness Christian Fellowship.

The main theme of the book -  The God of the Miraculous - is that it is God’s intention that churches should not merely share a good news message, but demonstrate God’s power to change lives, a power often seen in ‘signs and wonders’ which have no rational explanation.

‘Our Lord,’ the pastor writes, ‘is interested in every part of our living and, if necessary, will do miracles to prove it’ – miracles through which lives will be changed, and faith strengthened.

Pastor McKibben anticipates that Christians will encounter the reality of God’s powerful presence in, for example, receiving the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, from which point God is experienced in our lives in a deeper way; in instinctive knowledge which (as in the words Samuel spoke to the woman outside the psychic fayre) could only have been given supernaturally; and in the gift of ‘tongues’. This refers both to a private supernatural prayer language, and to words spoken in public in an unknown language which bring encouragement when they are interpreted in English by a listener.

It should also be almost commonplace, he argues, for Christians to see healings and miracles taking place, and people delivered from oppression by evil spiritual forces. All this, he explains, is experienced in the context of belief in the biblical God, and in Jesus Christ as Lord.

A significant number of Highland Christians are familiar with such events. Samuel McKibben is known and respected in the community. We believe him absolutely when he claims that his book contains ‘true and accurate reports of what I have seen God do in my lifetime.’

The God of the Miraculous reminds me of books I read half a lifetime ago which kindled in me a hunger for a deeper experience of the miracle-working God. I prayed, and was prayed with that I would receive God’s Holy Spirit, but there was no divine response. What was wrong with me, I wondered?  Didn’t I love God enough?

Over time, I came to realise that God was indeed with me and in me just as God was with and in the ‘charismatic’ Christians whose experiences I sought to share. I realised that rather than seeking some big, new encounter with God, I should rather explore and rejoice in the presence of the Father who was already within me.

I have not experienced miracles or dramatic healings such as Samuel describes (except once when back pain significantly eased following prayer.) But I believe that God has been with me, and that God has not been a sleeping partner.

Like Pastor McKibben, I am familiar with that ‘whisper or thought voice in my head’ which I have learned to acknowledge as a voice from God. Often, though not always, I have the clarity to say with him that I ‘know unswervingly that God is my Father and my friend.’

I believe God has been with me throughout the journey of my life, helping me make choices, giving insights in the fine detail of work, granting me courage to be who I am. God’s peace has expelled demons which though apparently less wild than those Pastor McKibben encounters nevertheless cast a dark shadow of despair.

With Samuel McKibben, I can say ‘What a wonderful Lord, Saviour and Friend we have in Him.’ But I believe this God hovers lovingly over our suffering world, and I do wonder if we can have too narrow a definition of ‘miracle’ which excludes God’s everyday presence in the ordinary.

I do not know why Samuel McKibben and I experience God in different ways. Some say that God stopped working ‘signs and wonders’ when the first Apostles passed away, but this I can’t believe. There is too much evidence to the contrary.

I simply take my stand with Samuel in believing that in the name of Jesus God transforms – whether we encounter this God in the spectacular, or in hiddenness, in gentle whisper.

(Christian Viewpoint column from the Highland News dated 15th August 2013)