Cessationism & R. C. Sproul

Submitted by Mr. Anon y mous on Tue, 10/05/2021 - 22:58
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R. C. Sproul argues that miracles ceased because they were to authenticate the "credentials of agents of revelation" 1 which I will refer to using the word apostles.

Implied is that, if miracles / signs were to authenticate apostolic authors of the Bible, then that is the only thing they can authenticate. The Bible does not specify this limit to only authenticating apostles.

Consider: the purpose of a notary public is to authenticate documents. If a notary public authenticates one type of contract, does this mean they never can authenticate any other type of contract? Are they limited to one type, simply because they happened to have authenticated that type? The answer is obvious. 

Likewise, if miracles or sign gifts indeed did authenticate that apostles actually were apostles, does this mean that miracles / signs never can authenticate anything else?

Limiting the authentication to apostles solely is not specified in the Bible, as limiting of miracles for such a purpose. 

So, miracles and signs can actually authenticate other things - such as God's approval of some person (not necessarily approval as an author of scripture) or some event.

Let's look further. Why limit miracles or signs to merely authentication, even authentication of multiple types of entities? 

What about miracles for other purposes, such as the purpose of just simply helping those in need? This certainly seems to be the motivation of Christ himself, in the feeding of thousands of people, when Jesus saw their need of food and had compassion on them. The Bible does not say that Jesus looked on the multitude, saw them as sheep without a shepherd, and had compassion on his own  "need" for authentication of himself. That might have happened, and other scriptures might say that He was indeed authenticated by signs or miracles - however, in this specific instance, there is another clear motivation for the miracle. (There actually can be more than one motivation and more than one reason for some things.) 

Look also at the raising of Lazarus form the dead. Jesus wept, and someone commented on how much Jesus loved Lazarus. Obviously, though Jesus might have been aware of the need for miracles and signs to authenticate himself, there was something else in play here - love for someone in need.

So, if the reason for cessationism is, partly at least, based on the fact the Bible indicates miracles and signs were for the purpose of authenticating apostolic offices or authorship of scripture, then we must admit, in order to be fair with scripture, that scripture also indicates other motivation for miracles. On the basis of similar reasoning, we can state that miracles are for the purpose of meeting needs of sick, hungry, etc. and that though the Bible has been written, people still have needs.

The above invalidates the reason given by Sproul for cessationism, since it is based on the incorrect assumption that the only reason for miracles / signs / gifts is to validate credentials of authors of scripture / apostles.