Important Disclosure. I was a member and volunteer staff from 2008-2011 at James River Church in Springfield, MO. I have a lot of friends that are on pastoral staff and in membership currently there.
“Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father.”
“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
What would happen if the documented miracles of the Bible’s time could be seen on TikTok? What if one of the disciples Vlogged Jesus’ ministry throughout Judea and Galilee? Would that change the world? When I hear testimonies of God’s movement in churches worldwide I do not even ask if it happened, I ask if it was captured.
With the growth of AI, Instagram filters, and easily accessible tools for video editing, I have no doubt that even if these events were captured on film they’d be viewed skeptically. And it is understandable, there are many examples of doctored miracles and charlatan preachers faking healings for clout and money. But, even with all of this being true, I still wonder why the miraculous is not captured on social media more. And that leads us to the toes.
Show Me The Toes
James River Church (JRC) in Springfield, MO reported a few weeks ago that during one of their “Week of Power” services a woman named Krissy was prayed over to receive healing on her foot. She had lost 3 of the 5 toes in a domestic dispute with her husband and had lived with the injury ever since. You can see the original report from Pastor John Lindell here:
And here is Krissy’s testimonial:
I was alerted to this by one of my friends who still goes to JRC after the service it was reported in and the first question I asked him was, “did they capture it on the stream?” He disappointingly said no - at least not yet. Pastor John later explained the reasoning the church has not released so-called “proof” of the miracle here:
During my time at JRC, I did not work directly under Pastor John, but I did have a lot of interactions with him and I have no reason to doubt the veracity of his claim here. And in his explanation for delaying evidence of the miracle, as a fellow pastor I understand his stated motivation of wanting to protect a member of his congregation. Especially a domestic abuse survivor. You do not want her to have to revisit and re-explain how she lost her toes over and over again and you definitely do not want people running up to her and asking to see her feet.
After watching this unfold for the last few weeks I’ve seen a lot of people debating and arguing about the veracity of this claim and the arguments seem to grow in intensity the further we get from the initial report (one of the main reasons I hope they release evidence soon and maybe it could be a lesson for delaying a testimony until evidence is ready). And while JRC is no stranger to controversy, the so-called “Week of Power” has created a level of discourse I’ve never seen online regarding both the church and the main speaker of the event (you can see my own thoughts on Bill Johnson here). And I understand why this is getting so heated, the implications of this miracle are huge. If the church is making up or exaggerating the testimony of the healing, the devastating effects of that false report would be staggering. If however there is proof of this miracle, then we have maybe one of the biggest “capturable” evidence of a miracle occurring in our modern digital age.
But is it wrong to ask for proof? Some in this discourse seem to think so and I could not disagree with that more. Here’s why.
In 2 Thessalonians 2:9-10, the Apostle Paul states that an anti-Christ sort of figure will deceive the world with power, signs, and wonders. This is actually a common occurrence in both Testaments of Scripture. The evil one, Satan, and all his minions can perform miracles in order to deceive people. That’s a long way to say that miracles are not immediately identifiable as God’s work; they need to be tested (see Matthew 24:24 for an even more dire warning). What are these tests?
Verifiable
In Luke 17:14, Jesus healed lepers and told them to go to the high priests to verify their healings as Scripture commanded. This was also Jesus’ way of getting these folks integrated back into their community. Many of the Lepers probably did not want to go or were afraid to. They’d been kept out for so long because of the disease it would understandably be terrifying to come under scrutiny when you’ve spent years out of the community. Yet, Jesus still sent them to the priests to confirm.
In Acts 4:16, the religious rulers (bonafide skeptics), were not able to deny a genuine miracle of God that took place under Peter and John’s ministry towards a lame man. While sadly many did not glorify God or see Christ as Lord, they were not able to dismiss it as legitimate since it was easy to verify the claim.
The conclusion to this first test is simple, the Bible does not forbid and in fact DEMANDS we verify any claim of the miraculous.
Proper Theology
In my pentecostal upbringing, theology came to be a sort of pejorative term and put into opposition with the miraculous. This was always silly because even the most pentecostal of evangelists have a “theology” of healing. But Scripture outlines a couple of tests for the veracity of a miracle and all of them center around having good, biblical theology.
The miracle must glorify God (Acts 8:9).
Those praying for a miracle must know Jesus (Matthew 24:24)
The miracle centers around making much of Jesus (Acts 8:6)
This is a proper theology of miracles and if any one of these three points does not happen, then it is not a miracle from Christ. I actually think we could probably add a few more to this list, but for now, we’ll call this a sort of *mere* miracle requirement.
Holy Spirit Confirmed
In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul talks a lot about the Holy Spirit’s work in our churches. The Holy Spirit will confirm His work through the body of Christ. Inevitably there is a sort of subjective layer to this as anyone who grew up in pentecostal churches can attest. I’ve been prophecied to marry 3 different women (all not my wife) and after the first one got married I worried if I had to wait for her to get divorced or if I had missed an opportunity and was doomed to be single forever (to be fair, I was 17 when this happened, my theology of the Spirit has definitely matured since then).
Many of my fellow Pentecostals get this test wrong. They overemphasize this test and neglect the other two. All three of these tests must be held together and equally applied. You cannot reject theology in testing miracles. You cannot reject verification because you breed doubt. And finally, you cannot cut the Holy Spirit out of the process of verification because it is by the Holy Spirit that the miracle occurred.
Now What?
James River has said that they will eventually offer proof in the near future and I pray they live up to that promise. Yet, I cannot emphasize enough that folks who are, in good faith, following Scripture and seeking confirmation and verification are not “doubting Thomas’” as I’ve seen some referred to online. There are definitely bad actors in this conversation, but seeking to follow biblical command does not mean one lacks faith. It means their faithful to the command of their Lord. One that actually legitimately haunts me:
For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.
I have attended the Church since I was 30. My wife had been there longer. We raised 9 Children under the stewardship of JRC Church. I have only discovered a Bible Base teaching that each Miracle, Story as well as every word is without question the Gospel. I say;
Leave room for God. If we believe in a God just a few have seen face to case or in the “Physical”, why is it so hard to believe a Miracle for not all to see in the “Physical”?
2 Corinthians 5:7
“We live by faith and not by sight.” The Good News: Trusting in something you cannot see may not be easy, but God's love for you can be felt every day.
I bet the Individual felt blessed and loved no matter what happened, because she had our Saviour on her mind.
There are worse “Stuff” to believe in than Miracles. Me personally, I don’t understand all the ways and reason for when the Lord moves, but by faith I don’t need to.
Kelly McDonald