Why doesn't God still perform miracles like in the Bible?

All sickness does not come under the head of chastening, though discipline we may find in it, and find it needful, therefore, to that end. The apostle's thorn in the flesh had this character, and was not removed, nor could be; God taught him to acquiesce in and to profit by it. For Timothy's weak "stomach's sake and often infirmities" he prescribes, not the prayer of faith, but "a little wine." Trophimus he leaves at Miletum sick; Epaphroditus too is sick, nigh unto death, right under the apostle's eye; but God has mercy on him, and on Paul too thus, and raises him up. Even in apostles' days, and with such as he, the gifts of healing were used, not indiscriminately, or for the personal ease of Christians, but for the glory of God as with Lazarus' resurrection, or that healing of the sick of the palsy, "that ye may know that the Son of Man hath power on earth to forgive sins."

It seems as if these gifts that appealed to the senses and were visibly miraculous, were intended to carry conviction in connection with the establishment of Christianity, but now that need has passed, and moreover in face of the disunited condition of the church, its failure on every hand, its worldliness, it is no wonder that such a gift is not seen in vigorous manifestation. Apart from a system that exalts faith healing into a position Scripture never gave it, and which in reality degrades the whole Christian profession, there are instances in which, quietly and without ostentation, the prayer of faith has healed the sick.

It is an evident fact that by the close of the apostolic age these miraculous gifts mentioned in 1 Corinthians 12 had ceased. The Apostle Paul indicated that they would in 1 Corinthians 13:8, just as the miracles of the days of Moses and Elijah had passed away. What happened when the apostles were gone? Just what happened when Moses was gone and when Elijah and Elisha were gone — rapid declension. If bestowed to accredit a people and a message as being indubitably of God, what is likely to happen when both people and message begin to be corrupted? Obviously, the withdrawal of the authentication. From a worldly church and a defective or corrupted gospel, no longer "approved of God," the signs and wonders were withdrawn.

Great things followed. Their habitual place seems to have been in Solomon's porch. No one dared to join them. They held the position of authority. Though they had been forbidden the public ministry they are back in a prominent place. The people magnified them too. Then another result was that more believers were added. Added to what? The First Hebrew Christian Church of Jerusalem ? The First Jewish Christian Society? No. They were added to the Lord. The sinner believing is saved, receives the Holy Spirit, is joined to the Lord, becomes one spirit with the Lord, a member of the body of which He is the Head. Signs and wonders were done by the Apostles. The sick were healed, unclean spirits were driven out. Multitudes of people from the surrounding country flocked to Jerusalem, bringing their sick, and they were all healed. They waited even in the streets for the time when Peter walked along so that his shadow might fall on some of them. These were great manifestations of the power of God. The words spoken by the Lord were then fulfilled. They did the works He did. These signs and wonders, however, are nowhere mentioned as to their permanency throughout this age. They were only for the beginning of this age; after the Gospel of Grace and the mystery hidden in former ages had been fully made known they disappeared.

Let me now consider the way in which scripture presents miracles. It is alleged, and Christian apologists seem to acquiesce in it, that miracles are the proof of Christianity. This is a great mistake. They are graciously given of God in compassion to man's weakness to confirm the word. But the revelation of God in the word, His nature and actings, are the first things. Thus we have in Mark 16 the Lord working with them, and confirming the word by signs following; so in Hebrews 1, God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders and with divers miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost. And this is so much the case, that a faith founded on miracles is not owned of the Lord: the moral element which links man's quickened soul with God is wanting. "Now when he was in Jerusalem at the passover on the feast day many believed in his name, seeing the miracles which he did; but Jesus did not commit himself unto them, because he knew all men and needed not that any should testify of man, for he knew what was in man." It was a human conclusion, drawn from the testimony of His works, and a just one; there was no new life, no moral renewal, it was "what was in man."

Hence we find as a fact in the ways of God, that, as a rule, miracles were wrought only at the introduction and establishment of a divine religious order, or where it was abandoned by those whom He had not yet abandoned; in a word, where a testimony needed to be confirmed in this way. Thus Moses wrought miracles, but no prophet in Jerusalem, where (however evil the people were) as a system the religion established by Moses remained, ever wrought miracles. When Israel had set up the golden calves, and God visited the people to maintain a testimony of the truth for a poor remnant, Elijah and Elisha work miracles. Again, whatever the miraculous power, it was to confirm the truth proposed, never for self. Paul leaves Trophimus at Miletus sick. Yet how many had he healed? Epaphroditus was sick nigh unto death, but God had mercy on him. Hence, if a miracle was wrought leading away from divine truth the miracle-worker was to be stoned; Deut. 13. In mercy to man, adequate outward testimony was given, leaving man without excuse; but faith which God owned rested in the word, and its effectual working morally in the heart.

Some of these gifts have been called sign-gifts, because it is said they were a sign to unbelievers. They were for the inauguration of Christianity, but there is no intimation of their continuance. The church continues, if you take the secret wisdom of God; if you take the revealed statement of God, there is no intimation of remaining here. You will never find the church contemplated as remaining, so as to put off the coming of the Lord. In the parables with reference to it, though we have "After a long time," yet the servants to whom the talents were entrusted are the same as those who are judged; the virgins who slept are they who are roused and so on. So with the seven churches, all was existing then, and yet it has been all going on.

278 As to the signs, we read, "confirming the word with signs following," as a promise. Moses wrought miracles, and Elijah too, in the midst of apostate Israel. But not so the other prophets. Isaiah and Jeremiah worked no miracles, nor John Baptist. When God is introducing something new, you have them - wherever the thing was to be made good in testimony for our poor hearts to sanction the truth. I see no restoration of miracles, or of anything indeed. There will be miracles at the end on the devil's part: power, and signs, and lying wonders. There was no statement to the church that it must lose them at a certain time, nor that they must go on for a certain time. Some ask as to the continuance of apostles and elders. This was what they said to me in Switzerland: "How can you think of God setting up a church with elders and apostles, and yet making no provision for their continuance?" I said, It is so, because God did not mean the church to continue. We see this to be the way God used miracles. Of course, He could work a miracle at any time.

Peter is set free by the intervention of the angel, and Herod is struck by the judgment of God when he sets himself up against Him. Can we expect similar intervention now? I do not believe that miracles are performed to-day; angels no longer appear; it was not a gift that could continue. In Ephesians 4 no miraculous gifts are to be found. But I fully believe, according to the Lord's promise, that prayer is heard, and that the angels work in favour of the children of God as much now as in those early times. As to prayer, the word of God is clear. The condition is made, however, that what we ask be according to the will of God, and that prayer be made in faith; and we are told that, if the words of Christ abide in us, we shall ask what we will.

Some may wish to enquire why God has not acted in this way on behalf of His servants far more frequently? The answer surely is, that God acts in this miraculous way at the beginning of some change in His dealings with men, though He may often act on behalf of His saints in a providential way. It was so, for instance, at the beginning of the Christian dispensation. Peter was miraculously delivered from prison and death, as recorded in Acts 12. Since then, many a saint has died in prison for the sake of the Gospel, though some have been providentially delivered.

It is not at all contended that the Holy Ghost necessarily works in every way as of old, and still less in the same measure of power. In the latter part of the New Testament we do not read much about miracles -very I little - less and less too as time passes on. We can understand that, in the opening of a new dealing of God, there should be, in His goodness, a wonderful working and display of these mighty answers to awaken the attention even of careless men. But, as the truth of His presence was established, and the new communications of God were gradually written, and there was thus not merely the evidence of outward tokens, but positive scripture committed to human responsibility, we can easily see that external vouchers were no longer so requisite, and that the Spirit of God (grieved, as we know, by much found in those who professed the name of Christ) might gradually withdraw, not Himself, but the manifestation of mighty signs, and refuse to put outward ornaments upon that which dishonoured the Lord Jesus.

In Egypt, in the Wilderness, in the Land, in Captivity, the O.T. records the working of God by His power, for or with His people; whilst in the N.T. we read of signs being wrought by the Lord Jesus and the apostles, as well as by those who believed their testimony (Mark 16:17). Early church history also bears witness to their having been wrought while as yet Christianity was combating the forces of pagan emperors, and the powers of darkness. The purpose of God in using miracles may be gathered from the words used in scripture to express them, namely, signs, wonders, and powers. As "signs" they witnessed that God had visited His people; as "wonders," arresting the attention of a godless world to His rights in it; and as "powers," as being superhuman and accomplished only according to His permission, and the working of His sovereign will. We find all three words used in reference to the miracles wrought by the Lord Jesus Himself (Acts 2:22); by those wrought by the apostle Paul (2 Cor. 12:12); and to those which will be by the antichrist in the near future (2 Thess. 2:9).

Seeing then that we have this general testimony of Scripture concerning miracles, we may ask, To what cause can we attribute the fact that we do not see them wrought around us in the present day? Certainly none dare question the prerogative, or right, of God to act as He pleases in the heavens, or on the earth, and it may be that even now He puts forth His hand to over-ride some law of nature locally, for the deliverance or succour of His children: but such action does not take the form of a public testimony, because the Holy Spirit is not only now present in the church, but to convince (elegchein) i.e., to reprove, bring to light, and put to shame, the world as such, before God, by the instrumentality of His word now completed, and which would not be made more effectual even were It accompanied with miraculous powers. It is mighty in itself to the pulling down of strongholds (2 Cor. 10:4), and when its working is manifested by spiritual power seen by a gainsaying world in the believer, or in the church, and made known for the obedience of faith in the preaching of the gospel for the deliverance of souls from death and destruction, no material sign of the testimony being owned of God is required. For it is manifest that a miracle of grace has been wrought in every soul delivered from Satan's power; and the entire sufficiency of the word of God as the sword of the Spirit, would be less distinctly seen, did it please God to allow signs following to confirm the word now (Mark 16:20. Compare also 1 Thess. 1:5–10; 1 Thess. 2:13). We cannot rely too implicitly on,or press too earnestly, the sole authority of the Scriptures now completed, and accompanied by the presence of the Holy Ghost, sent down from heaven, who uses them. But the solemn fact is revealed that He who now letteth will be "taken out of the way" (2 Thess. 7); and the world, left to itself and its darkness, will worship the antichrist, who will exercise power, and, signs and great wonders (Rev. 13:12-13) lying wonders — which God will permit to delude those who believed not the truth (2 Thess. 2. 2 ). May He give us to discern the times and the spiritual blessings wherewith He now blesses us, together with the power of His word to accomplish all His will!