miracles
 

What exactly is a miracle? What distinguishes something from "normal" phenomenon?

“Miracles are spontaneous, they cannot be summoned, but come of themselves” (Katherine Anne Porter).

Dictionary.com describes a miracle as: An event that appears inexplicable by the laws of nature and so is held to be supernatural in origin or an act of God.

So I guess to answer your question, it seems it would be something that is distinguished from a "normal" phenomenon.

Its all a matter of perception. A miracle is relative to whats considered normal to you. For example, to your great-great-great-great-great-great-grandmother (give or take a few greats), a light going on with the flick of a switch would be a miracle, but to you and me, its just the flow of electrons causing work to be done on a filament, which releases photons as a result.

There's this one quote I really like... In fact I think i'll make it my sig. Look out below :D

natural phenomenon would be things that might happen within nature.. we don't know how they happen, but they do happen... while a Miracle is someone who looks like they are going to die.. all of the sudden heals up and is okay in a matter of days. Thus you have natural phenomenon and then there is the Unexptected Phenomenon.... I hope that makes sense to you.

Good call GakFace. You really hit the nail on the head.

I'm not a GodBod, but I thought that miracles were events that were suposed to have been deliberately manifested as a display of divine power, not just as divine intervention. Sort of "LOOK MORTALS! NO HANDS!" tricks.

exactly.. that's why miracles are different from magic (where i would put the lightbulb going on for the great great...great grandmother). a miracle is supposed to provide a kind of "evidence" of the power of God.

for example, the Creation is a miracle, but the effects of that creation (what we call natural phenomena) are not.

-

Not to contradict anything that's been said so far, but there's another sense of the term miracle that's used -- I think sometimes too cheaply -- by some of the more evangelical churches. These are the situations when someone is in need of something and the thing or assistance that is needed unexpectedly appears; like, you're computer has busted and you can't finish your final paper and you have six hours left and you don't have any money to get it fixed anyway, so you go to a coffee house and tell your troubles to a guy who _just happens_ to be a computer tech, and he goes back to your place and fixes it for nothing. These things do happen, and some people are more prone to experience them -- or are just somehow open to them -- than others. I think that a better word is synchronicity.

Read up on a man named Sai Baba, who lives in India....this man is considered a living avatar and regularly performs what we call miracles. Check it out,,,,then define what a miracle is.

Well said. This is all I ever heard about in church. Things turning out well, happening well, when things fail to go wrong. A newborn child. A wedding. Especially the conversion of a non-Christian. All miracles. As a Christian I always felt it cheapened the real miracles of old, when Joshua stopped the sun and Jesus turned water to wine.

Not that that applies anymore...