Why are some miracles hard to explain and some are not?
score:3
Any answer to this question will be pure speculation - the Bible doesn't say why there are these two "classes" (the question of the existence of said classes I'll leave alone for now), so we don't know.
With that said, here are two potential reasons that are Scripturally based:
God is sovereign over everything, and is pleased to work out his will through his Creation, often utilizing secondary and tertiary causes. The Parting of the Red Sea shows this , and it is no less a miracle because God used one part of his creation to affect another - after all, God created it all in the first place!
God hides things from us. There are things we cannot yet know. While God's power is manifest in the Red Sea, marveling us, his mystery and wisdom are manifest in the feeding of the 5000, keeping us grounded in our own frailty.
That is, God demonstrates different attributes through different miracles that serve different purposes.
Upvote:1
Not all miracles can be explained by natural causes. A magician can bring a rabbit out of a hat as long as he has three things: some jiggery pokery, a hat, and a rabbit; but only God can bring an entire universe out of literally nothing.
In the two miracles you especially mention, there are spiritual lessons to be learned which surely are more important to take note of than the mechanics. The lad brought everything he had to Jesus and so must we; when he brought everything Jesus was able to multiply it to feed all - if we bring our all to Jesus, though it is so very little, Jesus will be able to multiply what we bring; Jesus, the bread of life, will only be able to feed all if He is broken; Jesus did not feed the crowds directly but used his disciples, and we must be willing to be used by our Saviour too; and probably several more applications in Matthew Henry's Commentary for this and the oil miracle.
In your comments you say "I believe God is not a magician" - That is true: a magician tries to make it look as if he has special powers and has done a miracle; but God, on the other hand, DOES have special miraculous power and actually does miracles.
Upvote:1
Consider the six days of creation, which in itself is a miracle. God spoke things into existence that did not exist before.
Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear. (Hebrew 11:3)
So to your question, yes, God has the ability to control elements (Matt 8:27), but He can go further. He has the ability to bring elements into existence from nothing in the first place. And as a God of order, once the elements are in place, He places them under His laws, but God as the originator is not bound by His laws.
Finally, the giving of life, which is the ultimate miracle of all, is not even considered in your two categories. That's because we simply cannot explain the spark of life through the scientific framework.
If God only did miracles that can be explained by us, would He not be limiting Himself?
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