I honestly don’t know how to start this article simply because God’s work is supernatural from Genesis 1:1 through Revelation 22:21. This isn’t going to be an exhaustive work that goes through the Old Testament and New Testament showing you how God provided or Jesus calming the storm through His spoken word where “even the wind and the waves obey him”.1 Yes, that is supernatural when Jesus speaks and nature obeys.
What I want to focus on is when God does a supernatural work in our lives or other peoples lives and we deny it or reject it. For example: In Acts 12:1-19 we see the Apostle Peter arrested and imprisoned by King Herod. The church begins to earnestly pray for him2. God answers the prayers of the church and we have a divine prison break happen, a supernatural work with an angel involved and everything. The Apostle Peter acknowledges God’s work in verse eleven and heads to where the church is meeting to share the good news of what has happened. He knocks on the door, the servant girl Rhoda comes to answer and when she sees that it is indeed Peter standing there she runs back to tell the house church who is there. Two things happen here: Peter is left standing on the porch dumbfounded humming the tune “Bad Boys” and the church denies that Peter is indeed standing on the porch.
The church who prayed for God to work rejected the work of God.3
They did not believe Peter was there and were “astonished” in verse sixteen when they saw him.
We reject the supernatural work of God because we simply just don’t believe He’ll answer.
We do this today in our churches and in our own life. I am SBC born and raised and have served for 21 years in the SBC church. I can testify that we have sucked the life out of Sunday morning. We translate Psalm 150 with “piano and organ”. We are experts at sucking the life out of church which in turn creates an environment that rejects or denies God's work in the name of “reverence”. We deny God’s work because He took to long. He didn’t answer our prayer when we wanted him to and when he finally does answer we get angry at Him - Joseph probably felt the same way until his deliverance happened. That’s a long time to sit joyfully in a jail cell.
We deny the supernatural work of God because He took to long.
We deny the supernatural work of God because we are angry with Him.
There is a disconnect in the church when someone is born again by the Spirit of God because we’ve been conditioned to show reverence in all circumstances. We’re not allowed to be “happy” in church. When I was a child I remember being told in church “we don’t laugh or smile here, this is church!”.4 I totally understand the need to revere God but are we so detached from the joy of Christ that we cannot celebrate the work of God in our life or someone else?
Salvation is a supernatural work of God, dean men are revived by The Holy Spirit! Read Ephesians 1-2 and marvel at God’s sovereign grace and mercy! And yet we deny that supernatural raising of dead men and women because it does not fit our narrative or definition of who God is.
We reject God’s supernatural salvific work because of x…y…and z. Insert your favorite excuse or reason here. I’ve heard a lot of them, I use to believe them…
We should be shouting for joy when we baptize but we’ve been conditioned to modestly clap with an occasional “amen” thrown in for good measure. We do not truly comprehend what has happened, that a soul has been saved by almighty God!
We simply cannot acknowledge God’s sovereign work because it doesn’t fit our narrative of who we’ve been taught God is. At least not in Southern Baptist circles.
These are just a few reasons and thoughts that come to mind for me as I ponder why we reject the supernatural work of God. I pray that The Lord opens my eyes and heart to His work and that He opens your heart and eyes as well, because we are missing so much!
Mark 4:41
Acts 12:5
Acts 12:15
I grew up at Emmanuel Baptist church in Roanoke, VA and this truly happened.