The Evidence for Miracles

In the first part of this series, I argued that there is no good reason to believe that miracles are impossible.  If it is possible that God and/or other supernatural beings exist, then it must be at least possible that these supernatural beings sometimes cause miraculous events.  But do they?  Do we have any good reason to believe that miracles actually do happen?

Many skeptics would say no.  They would say that alleged miracles can easily be explained away.  They would say that there is no hard or documented evidence of miracles actually occurring.  They would say that the only people who believe in miracles are credulous, superstitious people who believe in things for no good reason.  

And they would be wrong.  While it is doubtless true that many claims of miracles occurring are false, it is also true that there is good evidence that miracles sometimes do happen.  

The Evidence

I have personally met numerous eyewitnesses to miraculous events.  These include miracles of healing, accurate information miraculously conveyed through visions, and angelic intervention.  In at least most of these cases, I can vouch for the reliability of these eyewitnesses as intelligent, sensible, and trustworthy people.  

The most dramatic miracle which I have met eyewitnesses to is the healing of Barbara Snyder, which occurred in 1981.  Years previously, Barbara had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.  Her condition had deteriorated to the point that she could no longer walk, was blind, could not breathe on her own, and could not control her bodily functions.  Most of her muscles were atrophied, and she was bedridden.  Doctors said that she did not have long to live.

One day, as her whole church and hundreds of others were praying for her, she heard God tell her to get up and walk, and she did!  Not only was she instantly and completely healed of her disease, her atrophied muscles instantly and miraculously regrew.  She was suddenly able to see, breathe, walk, and control her body.  It was a miracle!

I have personally met numerous eyewitnesses of Barbara’s miraculous healing, and I can state with absolute certainty that they are reliable eyewitnesses.  There is also extensive medical documentation of her disease and miraculous recovery.  Two doctors who treated her wrote have written about her miraculous recovery in books.^[1]Harold P. Adolph, Today’s Decisions, Tomorrow’s Destiny (Spooner, WI: White Birch, 2006), 48-49; Scott J. Kolbaba, MD, Physicians’ Untold Stories (North Charleston, SC: CreateSpace, 2016), … Continue reading  You can even hear what happened in her own words by watching this video, which contains her story and an interview with her starting at the 40 minute mark.  Lee Strobel gives a detailed account of her miraculous healing in his book, The Case for Miracles.^[2]The Case for Miracles (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2018), pages 101-105.  And this is just one example of numerous accounts of modern miracles verified by reliable eyewitness testimony that he records there.  

There are many other collections of reliable eyewitness testimony to miracles I could point to.  The most extensive collection of miracle accounts, however, is found in Craig S. Keener’s massive two-volume work, Miracles: The Credibility of the New Testament Accounts.^[3]Craig S. Keener, Miracles: The Credibility of the New Testament Accounts (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2011).  In addition to discussing philosophical and methodological issues regarding when it is reasonable to accept eyewitness testimony to a miracle, Keener records there numerous eyewitness accounts of miracles.  In addition, through study of secondary sources, Keener shows that, contrary to the common assumption that miracle claims are rare, there are hundreds of millions of miracle claims made by people living today.  While Keener acknowledges that not all of these miracle claims are necessarily reliable, he also shows that, in some cases, there is good reason to accept the claims of eyewitnesses to miracles.  

Conclusion

So, in spite of repeated and forceful claims by skeptics to the contrary, there is a lot of good evidence that miracles do in fact happen.  It is simply not true that miracles allegedly took place in the past but no longer take place today.  It is simply not true that alleged miracles only take place among superstitious, ignorant, uneducated people.  It is simply not true that all eyewitnesses to miracles are unreliable.  It is simply not true that there is never any hard evidence backing up miracle claims.  Miracles have happened in the past, and they continue to happen today, including among modern Western civilized people.

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