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Can Miracles Be Proven? The Evidence Behind The Case for Miracles · Crosswalk Talk: Celebrity Christian Interviews

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  Speaker 1: Life audio. Do you believe a miracle can be provenly? Well,
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  Speaker 1: I think, like anything else you look at evidence. Proof
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  Speaker 1: is a funny word because you know, I come from
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  Speaker 1: a law background, and to prove something meaning something versus
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  Speaker 1: provide evidence for And I think what we have is
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  Speaker 1: evidence from science, from eyewitnesses and so forth that point
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  Speaker 1: in a direction of something being true. Do we have
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  Speaker 1: to take kind of a step of faith in the
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  Speaker 1: same direction the evidence is pointing? Yeah, I think we do.
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  Speaker 1: But we do that every day of our lives. So
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  Speaker 1: very few things other than mathematics, it is provable beyond
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  Speaker 1: any doubt whatsoever. There's always some question that needs to
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  Speaker 1: be resolved by the quality and the quantity of the
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  Speaker 1: evidence that we have.
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  Speaker 2: Tell us an example or two of significant miracles in
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  Speaker 2: this movie that maybe you know encourage your faith, and
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  Speaker 2: of course, yeah, the case for miracles is the movie
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  Speaker 2: December the fifteth through the eighteenth.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, one of the ones that we talk about is
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  Speaker 1: a woman who is blind for a dozen years with
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  Speaker 1: an incurable condition. She went to a school for the blind,
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  Speaker 1: she learned how to rebrail, she walked with a white cane,
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  Speaker 1: and she married a Baptist passer and one night they
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  Speaker 1: getting ready to go to bed, and she's already in bed.
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  Speaker 1: He comes over. He puts his hand on her shoulder.
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  Speaker 1: He begins to cry, and he begins to pray and says, God,
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  Speaker 1: I know you can heal my wife. I know you
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  Speaker 1: can do it, and I pray that you do it tonight.
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  Speaker 1: And with that, she opened her eyes and said, I've
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  Speaker 1: got perfect eyesight. She saw her husband for the first time.
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  Speaker 1: She said, for years there was darkness, there was nothing. Now,
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  Speaker 1: all of a sudden, it's a miracle. I can see.
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  Speaker 1: And she said, in her words, I've got perfect vision now.
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  Speaker 1: That her eyesight continued for the rest of her life,
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  Speaker 1: which was another fifty years. So what do you do
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  Speaker 1: with something like that. This case was investigated by multiple
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  Speaker 1: medical researchers and it was published in a peer reviewed
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  Speaker 1: medical journal. So this is an incredible case that I
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  Speaker 1: don't think as a natural explanation. I mean, this is
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  Speaker 1: an incurable condition, juvenile macular degeneration. You don't just see
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  Speaker 1: that being instantaneously.
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  Speaker 3: Cure it after a prayer.
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  Speaker 2: How would you define miracle? What's the definition that you
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  Speaker 2: applied for this book and this movie.
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  Speaker 1: I think the best definition to say a miracle is
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  Speaker 1: an event brought about the power of God, that is
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  Speaker 1: a temporary exception to the ordinary course of nature for
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  Speaker 1: the purpose of showing that God has acted in history. So,
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  Speaker 1: in other words, a lot of people misunderstand miracles. They think, oh,
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  Speaker 1: you can't have a miracle because it would violate the
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  Speaker 1: laws of nature. That's not what a miracle is about.
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  Speaker 1: You know, I'm picking up something from my desk or
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  Speaker 1: this pen. If I were to drop this pen, the
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  Speaker 1: law of gravity says it's going to hit the floor.
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  Speaker 1: If I drop this pen and you reach it and
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  Speaker 1: grab it before it hits the floor, you're not overturning
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  Speaker 1: the law of gravity, and you're not violating the law
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  Speaker 1: of gravity. You're merely intervening. And that's what a miracle is.
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  Speaker 1: We have good evidence from cosmology and physics, for example,
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  Speaker 1: that there is a creator behind our universe, and if
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  Speaker 1: indeed a creator can create our universe, then for him
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  Speaker 1: to vene and the same laws of nature that he
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  Speaker 1: created would be child's play.
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  Speaker 2: What about an everyday occurrence, because we often use the
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  Speaker 2: term miracle to describe somebody running into somebody that they
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  Speaker 2: have been singing years. Yeah, and answered prayer, Yeah, what
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  Speaker 2: would you say about those types of incidents being called
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  Speaker 2: a miracle?
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  Speaker 1: Well, you know, I think you can have great coincidences.
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  Speaker 1: I think, you know, for me to document it as
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  Speaker 1: a miracle, I think it's got to be a well
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  Speaker 1: documented it's got to have multiple eye witnesses with no
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  Speaker 1: more but to deceive. It's no natural explanation and so forth.
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  Speaker 1: So you know, if if all of a sudden, I
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  Speaker 1: pull up and I see a parking lot in the
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  Speaker 1: middle of a crowded city, and I say it's a
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  Speaker 1: miracle I got a parkings place, say well, maybe not,
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  Speaker 1: you know. And let's face the third cases of fraud
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  Speaker 1: where people pretend to have a miraculous ceiling. There are
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  Speaker 1: cases of misdiagnosis or someone says, oh, a seal of cancer,
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  Speaker 1: but the original diagnosis was wrong. We have the placebo
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  Speaker 1: effect where people who think they're going to feel better,
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  Speaker 1: all of a sudden will feel better. So there are
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  Speaker 1: some explanations going to account for some miracles. And yet
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  Speaker 1: I did a national survey in which we asked a
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  Speaker 1: cross section of Americans, have you ever had at least
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  Speaker 1: one experience in your life you can only explain as
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  Speaker 1: a miracle of God in thirty eight percent of American
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  Speaker 1: adults said yes. Now, if we got rid of ninety
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  Speaker 1: nine percent of those and said okay, they think it
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  Speaker 1: was a miracle but a big coincidence, that would still
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  Speaker 1: leave a million miracles just in the United States.
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  Speaker 3: What do you think the purpose of the miracles are?
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  Speaker 1: I think they deepen our faith. They point us toward God.
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  Speaker 1: We see clusters of miracles taking place. I don't think
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  Speaker 1: miracles are evenly distributed around the planet Earth. We tend
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  Speaker 1: to see them in places where the gospel is just
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  Speaker 1: now breaking, in cultures where, by the way, they don't
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  Speaker 1: have a lot of literate people who can't read a Bible,
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  Speaker 1: and so in Mozambique, for instance, in parts of Brazil,
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  Speaker 1: we see clusters of the miraculous taking places, and I
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  Speaker 1: think that points people toward the reality of God.
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  Speaker 2: You still my next question, because I was going to
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  Speaker 2: ask you, do you believe miracles are more prevalent in
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  Speaker 2: certain parts of the world than others?
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  Speaker 3: The answer is yes, in your opinion.
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  Speaker 1: It is. And in fact, there was a study done
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  Speaker 1: by a PhD from Harvard. It was a professor at
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  Speaker 1: Indiana University who took researchers to Mozambique, where there's a
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  Speaker 1: cluster of miracles. They went into the rural areas. They said,
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  Speaker 1: bring us all your deaf and blind. They would then
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  Speaker 1: test them scientifically, what is their level of vision? What
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  Speaker 1: is their level of hearing? Then they were immediately prayed
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  Speaker 1: for in the name of Jesus, and then they were
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  Speaker 1: tested again scientifically. Is there any difference and get us
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  Speaker 1: What they found there was improvement of virtually every case.
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  Speaker 1: In fact, the average improvement in visual acuity was tenfold.
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  Speaker 1: One woman named Martine could not hear the equivalent of
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  Speaker 1: a jackcammer next to he when they encountered her. After
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  Speaker 1: ten minutes of prayer in the name of Jesus, she
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  Speaker 1: could here a normal conversation. Well, I was gonna ask
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  Speaker 1: to go ahead and went to another place where miracles
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  Speaker 1: are breaking in which and the Gospels breaking in, which
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  Speaker 1: is Brazil. They did the same testing and got the
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  Speaker 1: same results. This is a legitimate scientific study that was
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  Speaker 1: published and accepted for publication in a secular, scientific, peer
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  Speaker 1: reviewed medical journal, the Southern Medical Journal. That's pretty powerful stuff.
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  Speaker 2: How would you counsel someone who is prank for a
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  Speaker 2: miracle but it hasn't received one because they'll watch this film, yeah,
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  Speaker 2: and they'll be encouraged, but they might also.
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  Speaker 3: Be discouraged a little bit. How do you counsel someone
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  Speaker 3: like that?
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  Speaker 1: Well, you know, this is a story of our life,
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  Speaker 1: my wife and I My wife has an incurable neuro
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  Speaker 1: muscular condition. She's been in pain for twenty years. She
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  Speaker 1: will be in pain every day for the rest of
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  Speaker 1: her life unless God does a miracle and cures this
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  Speaker 1: incurable condition, which she has not chosen to do. And
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  Speaker 1: so we get it. We get it. And yet in
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  Speaker 1: the New Testament, miracles were not automatic either. In one
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  Speaker 1: chapter of the Gospels, Jesus gives the disciples the authority
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  Speaker 1: to heal, and then about six chapters later, they couldn't heal.
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  Speaker 1: An epilogic boy Paul never had this thorn in the
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  Speaker 1: flesh was being healed. In fact, Paul had a friend
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  Speaker 1: named Trophemus. Trophemus was sick. Did Paul heal him?
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  Speaker 2: Know?
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  Speaker 3: He went off on a.
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  Speaker 1: Mission every journey instead, So healing was not automatic in
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  Speaker 1: the New Testament either. God is sovereign. God understands things
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  Speaker 1: that we don't understand. And you know, the Bible says
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  Speaker 1: We sometimes use this a sick cliche, but God can
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  Speaker 1: take things that happened to us, that are difficult, that
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  Speaker 1: are hard, that are painful, and from those if we
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  Speaker 1: follow him, if we trusted him, he can create good
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  Speaker 1: to emerge. And we see that. I see that in
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  Speaker 1: my wife's life. You know, she's such a person of
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  Speaker 1: sensitivity and love and compassion for others and empathy for
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  Speaker 1: others that I don't know she would be if she
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  Speaker 1: didn't face this issue in her own life. So God
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  Speaker 1: can take things that are difficult for us and yet
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  Speaker 1: draw good out of them.
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  Speaker 2: Final question for you, perhaps, so do you hope viewers
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  Speaker 2: of this movie take away from it?
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  Speaker 3: What do you hope they're talking about all the way home?
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  Speaker 1: I hope for Christians they walk away evermore in love
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  Speaker 1: with God and evermore solid in their faith. But I
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  Speaker 1: hope they also reach out to a friend who's maybe
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  Speaker 1: a spiritual skeptic or someone who's maybe just spiritually curious
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  Speaker 1: and say, hey, I just saw this movie. Why don't
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  Speaker 1: you come with me tomorrow we'll see it again. I'll
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  Speaker 1: see it again. You can see it for the first
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  Speaker 1: time and then we could talk about and see what
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  Speaker 1: you think. But you know, this was dumb, bad guy
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  Speaker 1: who was a skeptic himself, an atheist himself, and yet
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  Speaker 1: came to faith because of the evidence for a supernatural
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  Speaker 1: miracle of the resurrection, and now has researched these cases
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  Speaker 1: that are well documented. These are just stories that you
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  Speaker 1: hear in an elevator. So I hope people use it
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  Speaker 1: as an outreach and I hope it deepens the faith
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  Speaker 1: of believers as well.
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  Speaker 3: Let me ask you more question.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, because E've ben following Christianity for several decades now,
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  Speaker 2: and we're kind of in a period right now where
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  Speaker 2: it seems to be.
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  Speaker 3: Christianity is on the rise.
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  Speaker 2: Almost Bible sales are a college campus is being arenas
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  Speaker 2: are being filled with college students, worship being interesting, Jesus
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  Speaker 2: is up. How would you describe this movement and what
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  Speaker 2: do you think How do you think the Body of
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  Speaker 2: Christ should react to it.
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  Speaker 1: I think it's very encouraging. I see evidence of it.
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  Speaker 1: I have a friend whose ministry is to travel the
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  Speaker 1: country and to speak to audiences of college or high
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  Speaker 1: school students. He said, Lee, I've seen more young people
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  Speaker 1: come to faith in Jesus Christ in the last three
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  Speaker 1: years than the previous eighteen years of ministry combine. Something
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  Speaker 1: is going on. God is working in amazing ways right now.
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  Speaker 1: And I think for those of us who are Christians,
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  Speaker 1: this is an opportunity. You know, Christmas season is upon
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  Speaker 1: us and people are more spiritually open during the Christmas season.
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  Speaker 1: Let's take a risk and invite them to come to
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  Speaker 1: the movie or to Christmas service as a church, give
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  Speaker 1: them a Christian book or whatever. But you see this
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  Speaker 1: season as an opportunity to reach out, to be able,
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  Speaker 1: to be praying for them, to be looking for opportunities
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  Speaker 1: or spiritual conversations, and then when those opportunities come up,
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  Speaker 1: they have the courage to kind of pursue them.
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  Speaker 3: Lee, thanks so much.
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  Speaker 1: I enjoyed it, Michael, Thank you, my friend.
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  Speaker 4: If you enjoy today's interview, please make sure to subscribe
• 10:09
  Speaker 4: and share the episode with a friend. A big thanks
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  Speaker 4: to the team at Life Audio for their partnership with
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  Speaker 4: us on the podcast. If you go to lifeaudio dot com,
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  Speaker 4: you will find dozens of other faith centered podcasts in
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  Speaker 4: their network.
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  Speaker 3: See you next time.