Signs and Wonders

     My parents and I awoke to the sound of our shepherd barking in our car, which is uncool in the middle of the night in a peaceful Yosemite campground. We looked out to see the moonlit situation: a bear cub was up a tree, our stupid dog was in our tin can of a car barking at the cub, momma bear was at the bottom of the tree, and we were in a tent. It all did work out eventually, but everyone knows—you don’t mess with momma bear.

      Paul was a bit like a momma bear concerning the Corinthians (all NRSV).

1 Cor 1:24 For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolishness of our proclamation, to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. 

2:1-4 When I came to you brothers and sisters…my speech and my proclamation were not with plausible words of wisdom, but with a demonstration of the Sprit and of power, so that your faith might rest not on human wisdom but on the power of God. 

4:18 But I will come to you soon, if the Lord wills, and I will find out not the talk of these arrogant people but their power. For the kingdom of God depends not on talk but on power. 

Then Paul reminds them again in 2 Cor 12:12: “The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with utmost patience, signs and wonders and mighty works.” Paul is saying—your Greek philosophers have no life because they don’t personally know the Immortal One. He doesn’t act for them. They only have pretty words.

     Besides more obvious wonders, what are signs of God’s coming to His people? Here are three key images from Scripture.

1. The Dove: God gives supernatural Holy Spirit guidance and revelation to individuals and also to His church, which is discerned corporately. This leads to a certainty and fearlessness¬¬¬¬¬ in those who have seen God, which causes them to forsake all—even their lives and their reputations—out of desire for the pearl of great price.

2. The Tree of Life: His word reaches all manners of people because they are words of life to those who have discovered this tree’s fruit. This leads to a love and understanding of His breath of life in the Scriptures. Our tongues likewise become springs of life for others instead of mouths of death and negativity. “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” (Matt 12:34).

James 3:8 …but no one can tame the tongue—a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse those who are made in the likeness of God. From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this ought not to be so. Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and brackish water? Can a fig tree, my brothers and sisters, yield olives, or a grapevine figs? No more can salt water yield fresh.

3. A New Heart of passion, singing, and thankfulness:  First, Christ through His death, resurrection, and ascension can give us a new heart of sacrificial love towards Him and others; similarly, Paul’s concern for the churches comes upon him daily.

 2 Cor 11:28, 29: And, besides other things, I am under daily pressure because of my anxiety for all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is make to stumble, and I am not indignant?

 Secondly, as “David danced before the Lord with all his might “(2 Sam 6:14), triumphant ones now dance through life with joy, singing in the Holy Spirit and with the mind (1 Cor 14:15). Finally, when the Risen One comes He gives His people thankfulness and freedom from cravings  because “His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness” (2 Pet 1:3). Paul too had learned this secret (Phil 4:11-13). 


     What should be our response to God’s signs to us? Deep repentance as Jesus says.

Matthew 11: 20 Then he began to reproach the cities in which most of his deeds of power had been done, because they did not repent. Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the deeds of power done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.

     At the core of the Theology of the Body is the teaching that God is a person, separate from us, just as we are separate from each other. Through the love-gift of His Son, though, we can penetrate Him and He us. He can become our best friend. And He can make us an answer to someone else’s prayer to God. This is the amazing news of great joy. But for this to happen, we have to wail over our unbelief, and we have to “stay here in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high” (Luke 24:49). The Crucified Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God, will visit us.