Miraculous healings and other signs and wonders in the name of Jesus Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, are happening in the world today. Skeptical unbelievers say it’s all just a sham or a hoax, but that’s not us. Other folks believe everything they ever hear about it, with no questions asked – which is not terribly wise, either. Most people, including most Bible-believing Christians, fall somewhere in between. A lot of us just want to know what the Bible really does teach about signs and wonders. That’s what we’re going to talk about today.

As we make our way through the book of Acts in the New Testament, we find ourselves in chapter 5, verses 11 through 16. I’d love for you to stand out of respect for the Word of God as we read.

So here is what we need to understand today. While the Holy Spirit will go on doing signs and wonders to confirm the preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ whenever, wherever, however, and through whomever he wants until Christ returns, during the first Christian generation there were miraculous, Holy-Spirit-empowered signs that belonged uniquely to the Apostles of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Toward that end, I need to share with you four further truths about Apostolic signs.

An explanation of Apostolic signs

What we have first is an explanation of Apostolic signs.

Before we do anything, we’d better be sure we understand what we mean by the word “sign.” Our Lord Jesus himself performed miracle after miracle, and the gospel writers routinely referred to those miracles as “signs.” A “sign” was an astonishing event intended to point people to some important truth about Jesus Christ. That’s what the word meant as it was used in the gospel stories, and that’s what the word means as Luke uses it right here. He means a miraculous event intended to point people to the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.

The salient point here is that they were uniquely being done by the Apostles. Look at verse 12: 12 Now many signs and wonders were regularly done among the people by the hands of the apostles.

Now this is not to say that it was only by the Apostles that the Holy Spirit ever did any signs in the book of Acts. In chapter 6, the Spirit will use Stephen to do mighty signs and wonders. In chapter 8, it will be Philip. Those two men are deacons and evangelists, but not Apostles. In fact, the authority they have as deacons they have by the laying on of the hands of the Apostles, as we’ll find out in chapter 6. Luke’s point here in chapter 5 is that the Spirit was doing works first and foremost through the Apostles – particularly Peter.

Go back and keep reading in chapter 5 verse 12: And they were all together in Solomon’s Portico. (That’s all 12 of the Apostles together in the Temple courts, preaching the gospel and doing wonders in Jesus’ name.) 13 None of the rest dared join them, (That is, none of the rest of the believers dared to join the Apostles at the Temple any longer, probably because the imprisonment and interrogation of Peter and John we read about in chapters 3 and 4 led the Apostles to instruct the other Christians to stay home.)  13 None of the rest dared join them, but the people held them in high esteem. (That is, the common people of Jerusalem really admired and were intrigued by these wonder-working preachers.)  

  14 And more than ever believers were added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women, 15 so that they even carried out the sick into the streets and laid them on cots and mats, that as Peter came by at least his shadow might fall on some of them.   (Do you see what the wonderful healing power of God in Peter and the other Apostles was doing? It was pointing people to Jesus. That’s what signs do.)   16 The people also gathered from the towns around Jerusalem, bringing the sick and those afflicted with unclean spirits, and they were all healed.

Do you wonder where Luke got the idea that the Apostles wielded a unique power from the Holy Spirit? You could say he got it from the Spirit of God himself, and you’d be right. But that does not mean he got it by mystical dictation from the Holy Spirit. In point of fact, he learned it from the Spirit by way of his regular traveling companion, the apostle Paul. Paul said to the Corinthian church, “The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with utmost patience, with signs and wonders and mighty works.” (2 Corinthians 12:12)

Some examples of Apostolic signs

With both Peter and Paul, the Spirit of God routinely worked two types of signs: judgments and healings. And those two types of signs had clear purposes: the fear of God, and faith in the gospel.

         For the fear of God

Signs that the Spirit of God did to help people fear God appropriately by pointing to God’s holiness by executing God’s judgment on sin through Apostles

Peter à Ananias & Sapphira à Acts 5 à killed
Paul à Elymas à Acts 13 à struck blind

         For faith in the gospel

Signs done by the Spirit of God through the Apostles to draw faith from the onlookers

physical healings
exorcisms
raisings from the dead

14 And more than ever believers were added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women, 15 so that they even carried out the sick into the streets and laid them on cots and mats, that as Peter came by at least his shadow might fall on some of them. 16 The people also gathered from the towns around Jerusalem, bringing the sick and those afflicted with unclean spirits, and they were all healed.

The expectation of additional signs

Stephen, Philip, gifts of healing in Corinth… healing gifts today
not the unique Apostolic gift, but same HS

The exploitation of additional signs

Simon Magus, Elymas
Paul, John both warn about false apostles… in that context… signs
Jesus himself warns about lying signs (Matthew 24:24)
selling the idea that the HS at our disposal
faith = taking God at his Word… the only infallible faith is believing the Bible

conclusion

Let me say it again: while the Holy Spirit will go on doing signs and wonders to confirm the preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ whenever, wherever, however, and through whomever he wants until Christ returns, during the first Christian generation there were miraculous, Holy-Spirit-empowered signs that belonged uniquely to the Apostles of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Back on July 30th of this year, I preached a whole sermon on the subject of who the Apostles were and what they were for. You can access that sermon on our website at the web address that you see on your listening guide in your bulletin, if you want more explanation and understanding on that issue.

Over 20 years ago, just after I became pastor of this church, I wrote an article addressing a particular understanding of miraculous healing among American Christians. I have put five copies of that article on the table in the foyer. Like most of the things I write, only pick it up if you’re ready to do some reading.

For now, let me just quickly suggest 4 sins to avoid

the sin of presumption: presuming that we are Apostles, with Apostolic power
the sin of unbelief: an automatic skepticism about miracle claims
the sin of unbelief: an unwillingness to trust Jesus for salvation
the sin of joylessness