Signs, Wonders and Worship?
What are signs and wonders all about? Basically, I'd say that the point of signs and wonders is to point people, not simply to a powerful God, but to who Jesus is. So, in John's Gospel there are seven signs, all of which reveal Jesus' real identity, but most people missed the point and just wanted the exciting miracles. In John 6:26, after the feeding of the 5000, Jesus says "Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves." In other words, they liked the miracles, but they missed the point, and that's no good. If it's really a sign it has to point to something.
In Acts, when Peter and John heal the lame man when they go to pray in the temple, it leads to people gathering around to find out what's happened and so creates an opportunity to preach the gospel and many people believe (Acts 3:11-4:4 – in fact, that's when we're told that the church grew to 5000 people). There the sign leads to preaching so that people hear the gospel and get saved. Signs and wonders by themselves don't save, but true signs and wonders draw people's attention to the gospel which does save.
As for worship, our worship is a response to what God has done for us in Christ. So, I get worried sometimes about things that give people the impression that worship is something we do that causes God to act. We don't worship so that God will turn up, we worship because He's already here. What I want to see in worship is people getting a greater grasp of the glory and grace of Jesus, not getting excited about strange things that happen. That's not to say strange things can never happen; sometimes strange things do happen in the Bible, but always with a purpose of pointing people to Christ.
In Acts, when Peter and John heal the lame man when they go to pray in the temple, it leads to people gathering around to find out what's happened and so creates an opportunity to preach the gospel and many people believe (Acts 3:11-4:4 – in fact, that's when we're told that the church grew to 5000 people). There the sign leads to preaching so that people hear the gospel and get saved. Signs and wonders by themselves don't save, but true signs and wonders draw people's attention to the gospel which does save.
As for worship, our worship is a response to what God has done for us in Christ. So, I get worried sometimes about things that give people the impression that worship is something we do that causes God to act. We don't worship so that God will turn up, we worship because He's already here. What I want to see in worship is people getting a greater grasp of the glory and grace of Jesus, not getting excited about strange things that happen. That's not to say strange things can never happen; sometimes strange things do happen in the Bible, but always with a purpose of pointing people to Christ.
Having what we've heard about happening somewhere else happen with us shouldn't be the goal of our worship - only Jesus should be. So anything that doesn't point us to Jesus is out of place.