It doesn’t matter what we think of as miracles, but that they were important to Luke. This is because Luke records so many miracles that Jesus performs. Even Jesus’ birth was miraculous to him. Through the miracles in Luke, Luke shows that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and the fulfilment of the Old Testament prophecies. The Miracles were signs of God’s power and God’s Kingdom, and showed who Jesus was. In Luke’s Gospel, he records examples of all four kinds of miracles.
The story about the ‘Feeding of the 5000 (Luke 9:10-17)’ is a nature miracle. Jesus shares five loaves of bread and 2 fishes with 5000 people – this is physically not possible, but however, Jesus manages to do this. If the event actually happened it can show us that Jesus was as great, or greater, than the Old Testament prophets who had provided food. For later generations it may serve as a reminder of the Last Supper and of the Eucharist. Also, the twelve baskets may be symbolic of the twelve disciples of Israel, and the five loaves of the five books of the Law. This reveals to us, that Jesus can create something out of nothing. In application, this means in doing ministry we should not be overly concerned about how little we have. We just need to share what we’ve given to the Lord and let God do the rest.
The Feeding of the 5000 (Luke 9:10-17)
‘The Draught of Fish (Luke 5:1-10)’ tells us that Jesus can easily obtain for us the things that we may never obtain by our hard work, and ‘Stilling the Storm (Luke 8:22-25)’ shows us He is Lord over nature, commanding the wind and sea. These two miracles are both nature miracles, which are in Luke’s Gospel. When Jesus showed his power over nature, he showed God’s power breaking into the world. God could do marvellous things for his people that seemed impossible and were unexpected.
‘The Woman with a haemorrhage (Luke 8:43-48)’ is an example of a general healing miracle. This miracle reveals that by contacting Jesus by faith, it can bring healing. This woman must have been treated like a leper as she had been in a continuous unclean state (because she had a flow of blood for twelve years). According to Leviticus 15:25-27, ‘whoever touches them will be unclean; he must wash his clothes and bathe with water, and he will be unclean till evening.’ Although the woman was afraid to approach Jesus openly, she had sufficient faith to touch him. Because Jesus recognised this faith, she was healed and then He summoned her into the open, to restore her self-respect and to ensure that her belief in Him was personal and not superstitious. Luke could have intended this story to be both a healing story and a story about faith.
The Woman with a haemorrhage (Luke 8:43-48)
Some other general healing miracles are ‘Cleansing the Ten Lepers (Luke 17:11-19)’ which shows Jesus expects the healed to praise God in response to being healed, and ‘Healing a Blind Man (Luke 18:35-43)’ which tells us Jesus responds in sympathy to urgent pleas which are given with faith in his ability. When Jesus healed the sick, he showed to the people who were suffering, the love of God.
The story of ‘Jesus and Beelzebul (Luke 11:14-20)’ is an example of Jesus casting out demons, which is another type of miracle. The title ‘Beelzebul’ refers to Satan, the Prince of the Devils, which was also the name of the god of Ekron (2 Kings 1:2). Jesus argued his point when some of the crowd didn’t believe he was the Son of God. Luke has this story in his Gospel because it tells us that it must surely be by God’s power that Jesus overcomes demons. And that it shows that through Jesus, the Kingdom of God has already broken through the power of evil. This story also reveals Jesus as being the Son of David and heir to the throne because he is able to cast out demons. Both ‘Jesus Heals a Man with Demons (Luke 8:26-39)’ which shows us Jesus is Lord over demons and can bring the demon-possessed back to their right minds, and ‘A Man with an Evil Spirit (Luke 4:31-37)’ which shows Jesus is Lord over demons, are two other examples of this type of miracle in Luke. When Jesus cast out demons, He showed that Satan was being defeated because the Kingdom of God was stronger than the Kingdom of Satan.
The last form of miracles, are the resurrection miracles. ‘Jesus raises a Widow’s Son (Luke 7:11-15) and ‘Jairus’ Daughter (Luke 8:41-42, 49-56)’ are two examples of this type of miracle. In these miracles it shows Jesus is able to raise the dead to life. When Jesus raised people from the dead, He showed that nothing could stand in God’s way – the power of God was stronger than death.
Jairus’ daughter (Luke 8:41-42, 49-56)
By looking at the amount of miracles Luke writes about, and the different types of miracles there are (Healing, nature, driving out the devil and resurrection) shows us how important they were to him. Each of these miracles show Jesus as a miracle worker in one way or another, and they all teach us something which we can put into practice.
