Do you seriously believe people can walk on water?

G’day everyone, Dave Deane here, and our question for the week is: Do you seriously believe people can walk on water?

Several years back I remember going to listen to a lecture down the road here in Newcastle from an atheist professor of philosophy who was visiting from the USA on a tour with the Richard Dawkins foundation. And during that talk he said some rather provocative things, referring to Christians as ‘little ones sitting at the children’s table of faith ‘n fantasy’ because we believe in absurd things like miracles, while atheists or non-religious people are like adults who sit at the table of reason and rationalism.

Of course, not all atheists or non-religious people carry on like that, but I had read his book at I wasn’t surprised at his tone. What did surprise me, however, was how evangelistic he was in laying out strategies for de-converting people from their belief in God. One of the tactics he said was, when you find someone who believes in God, ask them questions about their beliefs to make them look silly. For example, he said ‘if you know a Christian, then look them in the eye and ask them sincerely: ‘do you really believe that once upon a time there was a man called Jesus who walked on water? And then the idea is to engage with the Christian when they get caught off guard, and try and get them to doubt by asking questions like: have you walked on water? Have you seen anyone else walk on water? Don’t you know the density difference between a human body and water? Come on! You seriously a person can walk on water?!’

So there I was, listening to all of this feeling like a lamb amongst lions and all I wanted to do was stand up and yell out ‘YES SIR! I believe that! But it gets worse than that because I believe at least TWO people walked on water – Peter AND Jesus – admittedly one did it better than the other… but here’s the thing: I do not believe Jesus walked on water because of “how” physics works, I believe Jesus walked on water because of “who” Jesus is!

You see, here’s the point: miracle stories, like Jesus walking on the water, they’re always sound far fetch and crazy if we don’t believe God exists because the whole idea of a miracle presupposes the existence of God. If God exists, then God can act, and that’s all a miracle is: a supernatural act of God in the natural world that could not have resulted from purely natural causes.

And, I mean, what’s the argument that Jesus didn’t walk on water? Improbability? Well, being incredulous about something because it’s unlikely is not a proof that it didn’t happen. What matters is the reasons or evidence for or against its occurrence. And that’s where questions like this one really bottom out because the real issue here is not the astonishing act of walking on water, it’s the even more astonishing fact of who was walking on water. And if we look at this miracle as the Bible describes it in Matthew 14, that’s exactly what we see: when Peter took his eye off of Jesus and got preoccupied with the water and the waves instead of who was walking on the water and the waves, he began to sink.

You see, miracles are described as signs in the Bible. They are not ends in themselves, they are always pointing to something. So the real question, then, is who do you think Jesus is and are you open to the existence of God? Because if Jesus is God, then I’d submit to you that walking on water is trivial for the One said let there be light and there was light! (Gen. 1:3).