Miracles in the Bible: Every Era, From Creation to Acts
From the burning bush to the viper on Malta, the mighty acts of God in the order Scripture tells them, each with the verse where you can read it for yourself.
By Daniel Reeves · Editor, The Bible Well
Published
Maybe you came here with a simple question. What are all the miracles in the Bible? That is a good question, and this page will answer it, era by era, with the reference for every one. But maybe you came with a harder question underneath it. Does God still do anything? You have prayed and watched the sky stay closed. You have read about the sea parting and wondered why your own sea stays exactly where it is. If that is where you are tonight, you are in good company. Gideon asked it out loud, standing in a winepress, hiding from his enemies: where are all the wonders our ancestors told us about (Judges 6:13)?
God did not scold him for asking. He answered him.
The miracles in Scripture are not scattered at random like sparks. They come in waves, at the moments when God was rescuing his people and making himself known. There is a wave around Moses and the Exodus. There is a wave around Elijah and Elisha, in a dark season when Israel had nearly forgotten the Lord. And there is the great wave around Jesus and the apostles who carried his name. Between those waves are long, quiet stretches where God worked through ordinary days, the way he often works through yours.
This page walks through them in the order the Bible tells them: Genesis, Moses, the wilderness, Joshua and the judges, Elijah, Elisha, the kings and prophets, Daniel, Jonah, then a short word on Jesus, and then the book of Acts. Jesus' miracles have their own full page on this site, so here you will find only a summary and a link. Read slowly. Open your Bible beside it. Every one of these was written down so that you would know who God is.
What is a miracle in the Bible?
A miracle is something God does that the ordinary workings of the world cannot do on their own. Seas do not stand up in walls. Iron axheads do not float. A man three days inside a fish does not walk up onto dry land. When those things happen in Scripture, the text does not ask you to find a natural trick behind them. It tells you plainly that the Lord did it.
The Bible uses three words for these acts, often side by side. There are mighty works, which point to God's power. There are wonders, which point to the awe that falls on the people who see them. And there are signs, which point past the event to what it means. The psalmist gathered all of it into one line of praise.
You are the God who performs miracles; you display your power among the peoples.
— Psalm 77:14
Notice who the subject of that sentence is. Moses did not part the Red Sea. Elijah did not call fire down by his own strength. Peter said it outright to the crowd that saw a lame man walking: why do you stare at us as if by our own power or godliness we had made this man walk (Acts 3:12)? In the Bible, every miracle has one author. The prophets and apostles were only standing where he chose to show his hand.
C. S. Lewis, in his book Miracles, argued that you cannot decide whether miracles are possible by looking at the evidence alone, because the question is really about what kind of world this is. If nature is all there is, miracles cannot happen. If there is a God who made nature, then nature is not a closed box. It is a house with an owner, and the owner is free to walk in.
Why God works miracles
If you read the miracles one after another, a few reasons rise to the surface again and again.
To rescue his people. The plagues and the Red Sea were not a display for its own sake. They were the Lord breaking Israel's chains. The manna was bread for hungry families in a desert. Much of the Bible's power is simply mercy with its sleeves rolled up.
To show who the true God is. In Egypt the Lord said the plagues would come so that the Egyptians would know that he is the Lord (Exodus 7:5). On Mount Carmel, Elijah prayed that the people would know that the Lord is God (1 Kings 18:37). Miracle after miracle is a contest between the living God and the gods that cannot see or hear.
To confirm his messengers. When God sent someone with a new word, he often stood behind that word with signs. Moses was given signs so that Israel would believe the Lord had truly appeared to him (Exodus 4:5). The early church read the apostles' miracles the same way.
God also testified to it by signs, wonders and various miracles, and by gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will.
— Hebrews 2:4
To give a glimpse of what is coming. Every healing is a small preview of the day when there is no more sickness. Every life given back is a whisper of the resurrection. The miracles are windows into the world God is making new.
That is why the waves of miracles land where they do. Teachers who read this pattern very differently, from John MacArthur to Sam Storms, have both written about how the miracles cluster around Moses, around Elijah and Elisha, and around Jesus and the apostles. They disagree about what that means for today. But the pattern itself is plain on the page. When God is doing something new in his story, he often lets the world see his hand.
Miracles in Genesis
Genesis is not crowded with miracles, but the ones it holds are the foundation stones for everything else.
- Creation. Before any other wonder, there is the wonder of a world spoken into being out of nothing (Genesis 1:1-31). Every miracle after this is the same Creator acting inside what he made.
- Enoch taken by God. Enoch walked faithfully with God, and then he was no more, because God took him away (Genesis 5:24). You can read more in the page on Enoch in the Bible.
- The flood. God sent the waters and kept Noah, his family, and the animals safe in the ark (Genesis 7:1-24, Genesis 8:1-19).
- The tower of Babel. The Lord confused the language of the whole world and scattered the builders (Genesis 11:1-9).
- Sodom and Gomorrah. Burning sulfur rained down on the cities, and Lot's wife, looking back, became a pillar of salt (Genesis 19:24-26).
- Isaac born to Sarah. Abraham was a hundred years old and Sarah was ninety, long past the age of children, when the promised son was born (Genesis 17:17, Genesis 21:1-7). Read the whole journey in the story of Abraham.
The birth of Isaac holds a question God asked Abraham that every reader of this list has to answer sooner or later.
Is anything too hard for the LORD? I will return to you at the appointed time next year, and Sarah will have a son.
— Genesis 18:14
Sarah laughed when she heard it. God did not take back the promise. He gave her a son and let her name him Isaac, which means he laughs.
Moses and the Exodus
This is the first great wave. For four hundred years Israel had been in Egypt, and for much of that time they had been slaves. Then God met a runaway shepherd in the desert, and the ground under his sandals became holy.
- The burning bush. A bush on fire that did not burn up, and the voice of God speaking from inside it (Exodus 3:1-6).
- Moses' staff becomes a snake. Given as a sign so Israel would believe (Exodus 4:2-5), and later thrown down before Pharaoh, where Aaron's staff swallowed the staffs of Egypt's magicians (Exodus 7:10-12).
- Moses' hand made leprous and healed. A second sign, given at the bush (Exodus 4:6-7).
Then came the ten plagues, each one a blow against Egypt's pride and its gods.
- Water turned to blood (Exodus 7:14-24)
- Frogs (Exodus 8:1-15)
- Gnats (Exodus 8:16-19)
- Flies (Exodus 8:20-32)
- The death of Egypt's livestock (Exodus 9:1-7)
- Boils (Exodus 9:8-12)
- Hail (Exodus 9:13-35)
- Locusts (Exodus 10:1-20)
- Darkness over Egypt for three days (Exodus 10:21-29)
- The death of the firstborn, while the homes marked with the blood of the Passover lamb were passed over (Exodus 12:21-30)
And then the sea.
Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the LORD drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land. The waters were divided, and the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left.
— Exodus 14:21-22
For the rest of the Old Testament, this is the miracle Israel remembers. The psalms sing it. The prophets preach it. When God wants to comfort his people in exile centuries later, he reminds them that he is the one who made a way through the sea. If you are standing with an army behind you and water in front of you, this is the story written for you. God is not stopped by what stops you.
Moses' life is worth reading as a whole, not just as a list of wonders. The story of Moses in the Bible walks through it from the basket in the reeds to the mountain where he died.
In the wilderness
Israel was free, but free in a desert with no bread, no water, and no map. For forty years God kept them alive by miracles so constant that they became part of the daily routine.
- The pillar of cloud and fire. God led them by a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night (Exodus 13:21-22).
- Bitter water made sweet at Marah. Moses threw a piece of wood into the water, and it became fit to drink (Exodus 15:22-25).
- Manna and quail. Bread from heaven every morning, and quail in the evening (Exodus 16:1-36).
- Water from the rock at Horeb. Moses struck the rock, and water came out for the people (Exodus 17:1-7).
- Miriam struck with leprosy and healed. After she spoke against Moses, and after Moses cried out for her healing (Numbers 12:1-15).
- The earth swallows Korah's rebels. The ground split apart under the men who rose up against Moses and Aaron (Numbers 16:31-33).
- Aaron's staff buds. Overnight it sprouted, blossomed, and produced almonds (Numbers 17:1-8).
- Water from the rock at Meribah. Water again, though this time Moses struck the rock twice instead of speaking to it as God had commanded (Numbers 20:1-13).
- The bronze snake. Anyone bitten by the venomous snakes who looked at the bronze snake on the pole lived (Numbers 21:4-9). Jesus later pointed to this very miracle to explain his own cross (John 3:14-15).
- Balaam's donkey speaks. The Lord opened the donkey's mouth, and it spoke to the prophet who was beating it (Numbers 22:21-35).
There is something tender in the manna. It could not be stored up. Gather more than you needed and it spoiled by morning. God was teaching a nation to trust him one day at a time. He still teaches it that way.
Joshua, the judges, and Samuel
The wave around Moses carried on into the conquest of the land under Joshua, and then flickered through the time of the judges.
- The Jordan River stops. As soon as the priests carrying the ark stepped into the flooded river, the water upstream stood up in a heap, and Israel crossed on dry ground (Joshua 3:14-17).
- The walls of Jericho fall. After seven days of marching and a great shout, the wall collapsed (Joshua 6:1-20).
- The sun stands still. At Gibeon, Joshua prayed, and the sun stopped in the middle of the sky for about a full day (Joshua 10:12-14).
There has never been a day like it before or since, a day when the LORD listened to a human being. Surely the LORD was fighting for Israel!
— Joshua 10:14
- Gideon's fleece. Wet with dew on dry ground, then dry on wet ground, just as Gideon asked (Judges 6:36-40).
- Gideon's three hundred. God cut Gideon's army down to three hundred men, and with trumpets, jars, and torches they routed the Midianites (Judges 7:1-22).
- Samson's strength. He tore a lion apart with his bare hands (Judges 14:5-6), and in his last prayer he pulled down the temple of Dagon (Judges 16:28-30).
- Dagon falls before the ark. The Philistines put the captured ark in their temple, and twice they found their idol fallen on its face before it (1 Samuel 5:1-5).
- Thunder and rain at harvest. Samuel called on the Lord, and the Lord sent thunder and rain in the dry season of the wheat harvest (1 Samuel 12:16-18).
Gideon is the one to watch here. He began as the man hiding in the winepress, asking where the wonders had gone. God did not wait for him to be brave. He called him mighty warrior before he had done anything at all (Judges 6:12).
The miracles of Elijah
The second great wave comes in the days of King Ahab and Queen Jezebel, when Israel had turned to Baal and the true prophets were being hunted down. Into that darkness God sent Elijah.
- The drought. Elijah announced that there would be neither dew nor rain except at his word (1 Kings 17:1).
- Fed by ravens. By the Kerith Ravine, ravens brought him bread and meat morning and evening (1 Kings 17:2-6).
- The widow's flour and oil. In Zarephath, a widow's last handful of flour and little bit of oil did not run out until the rain came (1 Kings 17:7-16).
- The widow's son raised. When her son died, Elijah stretched himself out on the boy three times and cried out to the Lord, and the boy's life returned (1 Kings 17:17-24).
- Fire on Mount Carmel. The prophets of Baal shouted all day to a god who did not answer. Elijah soaked his altar with water and prayed one short prayer.
Then the fire of the LORD fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench.
— 1 Kings 18:38
- The rain returns. Elijah prayed with his face between his knees, and a cloud as small as a man's hand became a heavy rain (1 Kings 18:41-45).
- Fire on the soldiers. Twice fire came down on the captains the king sent to seize him (2 Kings 1:9-12).
- The Jordan parted. Elijah struck the water with his rolled-up cloak, and it divided (2 Kings 2:8).
- Taken up in a whirlwind. A chariot and horses of fire came between him and Elisha, and Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind (2 Kings 2:11).
Right after the fire on Carmel, Elijah ran for his life and sat under a broom bush asking to die. The same prophet who had just seen heaven answer by fire was worn out, afraid, and alone. God's next miracle was not fire. It was bread baked on hot coals, a jar of water, sleep, and an angel's touch (1 Kings 19:5-8). Then God spoke to him in a gentle whisper (1 Kings 19:12). Some of God's most tender wonders are the quiet ones.
The miracles of Elisha
Before Elijah was taken up, Elisha asked for a double portion of his spirit (2 Kings 2:9). Read what follows and it is hard not to see that prayer being answered. Elisha's recorded miracles are more numerous than Elijah's, and many of them are small, personal mercies for ordinary people.
- The Jordan parted again. With Elijah's cloak, Elisha struck the water and it divided (2 Kings 2:13-14).
- Jericho's water healed. Salt thrown into the spring made the bad water wholesome (2 Kings 2:19-22).
- The widow's oil. A prophet's widow, about to lose her two sons to a creditor, poured one small jar of oil into every jar she could borrow until they were all full (2 Kings 4:1-7).
- A son for the Shunammite woman. A promise of a son to a woman who had shown him kindness (2 Kings 4:14-17).
- The Shunammite's son raised. Years later, when the boy died, Elisha prayed and stretched himself out on him, and the boy opened his eyes (2 Kings 4:32-37).
- Death in the pot. Poisonous gourds in a stew, made harmless with a little flour (2 Kings 4:38-41).
- A hundred men fed. Twenty loaves of barley bread fed a hundred men, with some left over (2 Kings 4:42-44). It is hard to read this without thinking forward to a hillside in Galilee.
- Naaman healed. The commander of the Aramean army washed seven times in the Jordan, and his flesh was restored like that of a young boy (2 Kings 5:1-14).
- The floating axhead. A borrowed iron axhead fell into the river, and Elisha made it float (2 Kings 6:1-7).
- The servant's eyes opened. Surrounded by an enemy army, Elisha's servant was terrified until God let him see what was really there.
And Elisha prayed, "Open his eyes, LORD, so that he may see." Then the LORD opened the servant's eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.
— 2 Kings 6:17
- An army struck blind. Elisha prayed, and the Aramean soldiers were struck with blindness and led away (2 Kings 6:18-20).
- Life from Elisha's bones. Even after Elisha died, a dead man thrown into his tomb came to life when his body touched Elisha's bones (2 Kings 13:20-21).
The floating axhead may be the most comforting miracle on this whole page. It was not a battle or a kingdom. It was a borrowed tool and a worried young man who could not pay it back. God cared about that too. There is no problem in your life too small for his attention.
Hezekiah and Isaiah
A few more miracles shine in the last years of the kingdom of Judah, gathered around King Hezekiah and the prophet Isaiah.
- The Assyrian army struck down. When Sennacherib's army surrounded Jerusalem and mocked the God of Israel, Hezekiah spread the enemy's letter out before the Lord and prayed. That night the angel of the Lord put to death 185,000 men in the Assyrian camp (2 Kings 18:17-35, 2 Kings 19:14-19, 2 Kings 19:35-36).
- Hezekiah healed. Sick and told he would die, Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and wept and prayed. God heard him and added fifteen years to his life (2 Kings 20:1-7, Isaiah 38:1-6).
- The shadow goes back. As a sign of that promise, the shadow on the stairway went back ten steps (2 Kings 20:8-11).
Hezekiah's prayers are some of the most honest in Scripture. He did not pray pretty prayers. He wept. And God said to him words you can hold on to: I have heard your prayer and seen your tears (2 Kings 20:5).
Daniel and the exile
Jerusalem fell. The temple burned. God's people were carried off to Babylon, far from everything they knew. And God did not stay behind. He went into exile with them, and some of his most famous wonders happened there.
- The fiery furnace. Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego refused to bow to the king's golden image and were thrown into a blazing furnace. The king looked in and saw four men walking around in the fire, unbound and unharmed (Daniel 3:19-27).
- The writing on the wall. At Belshazzar's feast, the fingers of a human hand appeared and wrote on the plaster of the palace wall (Daniel 5:5-6). That same night the king was slain and the kingdom fell (Daniel 5:30-31).
- The lions' den. Daniel kept praying three times a day even when it was against the law, and he was thrown to the lions. In the morning the king ran to the den, and Daniel called back to him.
My God sent his angel, and he shut the mouths of the lions. They have not hurt me, because I was found innocent in his sight. Nor have I ever done any wrong before you, Your Majesty.
— Daniel 6:22
Look closely at the furnace. God did not keep his friends out of the fire. He met them in it. If you are in a fire right now, that is the promise of this chapter. You are not walking around in there alone.
Jonah
Jonah's short book holds more miracles per page than almost anywhere in the Old Testament, and nearly all of them are God chasing a prophet who was running the other way.
- The storm. The Lord sent a great wind on the sea when Jonah fled toward Tarshish (Jonah 1:4).
- The calm. The moment the sailors threw Jonah overboard, the raging sea grew calm (Jonah 1:15).
- The great fish. The Lord provided a huge fish to swallow Jonah, and he was inside it three days and three nights (Jonah 1:17), until it vomited him onto dry land (Jonah 2:10).
- The plant, the worm, and the wind. God made a leafy plant grow up to shade Jonah, then sent a worm to kill it and a scorching east wind (Jonah 4:6-8).
Jesus pointed to Jonah's three days in the fish as a sign of his own three days in the tomb (Matthew 12:40). And the book leaves God's last question to Jonah hanging in the air on purpose, a question about whether God should not care for a great city full of people who do not know their right hand from their left (Jonah 4:11). It is a question handed to every reader who would rather see mercy withheld.
The miracles of Jesus
Then comes the greatest wave of all. The Old Testament miracles were God stepping into his world. In Jesus, God came to live in it. C. S. Lewis called the incarnation the grand miracle, the one that every other miracle either prepares for or flows out of.
Jesus healed the blind, the lame, and people with leprosy. He calmed a storm with a word and walked on the sea. He fed thousands from a boy's lunch. He drove out demons. He raised the widow's son at Nain, Jairus' daughter, and Lazarus. And when John the Baptist sat in prison wondering if Jesus really was the one, Jesus sent back a list of miracles as his answer.
So he replied to the messengers, "Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor."
— Luke 7:22
Look how many of the old miracles echo in his. Moses gave bread in the wilderness. Jesus fed the crowds and called himself the bread of life. Elijah and Elisha raised widows' sons. Jesus stopped a funeral and gave a son back to his mother. Elisha fed a hundred with twenty loaves. Jesus fed five thousand with five. Every earlier wave was pointing toward him.
This site has a full, grouped list of every miracle Jesus performed, with a short summary and gospel reference for each. You will find it at the miracles of Jesus: a complete list by type. If you want the count itself, see how many miracles Jesus performed, and for the healings alone, every healing miracle of Jesus. For deeper study of single moments, start with Jesus turning water into wine, the feeding of the five thousand, Jesus calming the storm, or the raising of Lazarus.
And above all of them stands the miracle the whole Bible has been leaning toward. Jesus himself rose from the dead on the third day (Matthew 28:1-10, Mark 16:1-8, Luke 24:1-12, John 20:1-18). Every other person raised in Scripture died again. He did not.
But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.
— 1 Corinthians 15:20
The apostles in Acts
After Jesus ascended, the wave did not stop. It moved into the hands of ordinary fishermen and a former persecutor, and it followed the good news out from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.
- Pentecost. A sound like a violent wind, tongues of fire, and the disciples speaking in languages they had never learned (Acts 2:1-12).
- The lame man at the Beautiful Gate. A man lame from birth, begging at the temple, asked Peter and John for money.
Then Peter said, "Silver or gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk."
— Acts 3:6
- Ananias and Sapphira. A husband and wife who lied to the Holy Spirit fell down dead (Acts 5:1-11).
- Healing in Peter's shadow. People laid the sick in the streets hoping Peter's shadow might fall on them, and all of them were healed (Acts 5:12-16).
- The apostles freed from prison. An angel of the Lord opened the jail doors at night (Acts 5:17-20).
- Stephen's wonders. Stephen, full of God's grace and power, did great wonders and signs among the people (Acts 6:8).
- Philip in Samaria. Impure spirits came out and many who were paralyzed or lame were healed (Acts 8:4-8). Later the Spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away after he baptized the Ethiopian official (Acts 8:39-40).
- Saul on the Damascus road. A light from heaven, a voice, three days of blindness, and then something like scales falling from his eyes when Ananias laid hands on him (Acts 9:1-18).
- Aeneas healed. A man bedridden for eight years got up at Peter's word (Acts 9:32-35).
- Tabitha raised. Peter knelt and prayed beside the body of a woman known for her kindness to widows, and said, "Tabitha, get up," and she opened her eyes (Acts 9:36-42).
- Peter freed by an angel. Chained between two soldiers the night before his trial, Peter was woken by an angel, and his chains fell off (Acts 12:6-11).
- Elymas struck blind. A sorcerer who opposed Paul was blinded for a time (Acts 13:6-12).
- The lame man at Lystra. Paul saw that a man lame from birth had faith to be healed and told him to stand up, and he jumped up and began to walk (Acts 14:8-10).
- A spirit driven out in Philippi. Paul commanded a spirit to come out of a slave girl in the name of Jesus Christ (Acts 16:16-18).
- The earthquake at Philippi. Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns at midnight in prison when an earthquake opened every door and loosed every chain (Acts 16:25-26). The jailer and his whole household believed that night (Acts 16:34).
- Extraordinary miracles in Ephesus. Even handkerchiefs and aprons that had touched Paul were taken to the sick, and they were cured (Acts 19:11-12).
- Eutychus raised. A young man fell asleep during Paul's long sermon, fell from a third-story window, and was picked up dead. Paul threw himself on him, and he was taken home alive (Acts 20:7-12).
- The viper on Malta. Paul shook a snake off his hand into the fire and suffered no ill effects (Acts 28:3-6).
- Healing on Malta. Paul prayed for the sick father of Publius and healed him, and the rest of the sick on the island came and were cured (Acts 28:7-9).
Notice that the miracles in Acts are never the message. They open the door for the message. When the lame man walked, Peter used the crowd to preach Jesus. When the jail shook, Paul used the moment to tell a jailer how to be saved. If you want to walk through the whole book with questions for each chapter, the free Acts Bible study guide is a good companion.
How many miracles are in the Bible?
There is no single agreed number, and that is not a problem. It just depends on how you count. Are the ten plagues one miracle or ten? Is the manna that fell every morning for forty years one event or thousands? Do you count the summary lines, like Jesus healing everyone brought to him at sunset, as one miracle or many? Lists that count each named event separately usually run well past a hundred.
What is more striking than the total is the shape. Take away the three great waves, Moses with Joshua, Elijah with Elisha, and Jesus with his apostles, and there are surprisingly few miracles left. Whole generations of God's people lived and died without seeing one. Abraham waited twenty-five years for Isaac. Joseph sat in prison for years with no angel opening the door. Their faith was not built on constant wonders. It was built on promises.
That may be the most important thing this list can tell you. If you are in a quiet stretch right now, where heaven seems still and no sea is parting, you are not outside the story of the Bible. You are standing where most of its faithful people stood. God was just as present to Joseph in the prison as he was to Moses at the sea. He is just as present to you.
Further study
A list like this is only a doorway. The best thing you can do with it is pick one era and read it straight through in your own Bible. Read Exodus 1 to 15 in one sitting and let the plagues and the sea land with their full weight. Then read 1 Kings 17 through 2 Kings 7, the whole run of Elijah and Elisha, and watch how many of the miracles happen for widows, orphans, and worried servants. Then read the book of Acts, which you can finish in a couple of evenings. If you want a thoughtful companion on the bigger question of whether miracles can happen at all, C. S. Lewis's Miracles is still one of the clearest books ever written on it.
If the miracles of Jesus are where your heart is, go next to the miracles of Jesus: a complete list by type, and then to the stories of Jesus walking on water, the raising of Jairus' daughter, and Jesus healing the blind man. For the man who stood at the center of the first great wave, read the story of Moses. If Genesis pulled at you, the Genesis Bible study guide walks through it chapter by chapter.
And if your real question tonight is not how many miracles there were, but whether God is there at all, you do not have to answer that alone. Start with is God real?, and if the question is why a God who can part seas lets you suffer, read why God allows suffering.
The God who spoke from the burning bush, who fed a prophet by ravens, who walked in the fire with three young men, and who rolled the stone away from an empty tomb has not changed. He is the God who performs miracles. And whether he parts your sea tomorrow or walks with you through it, he is with you in it.
Common questions
+What are the biggest miracles in the Bible?
Scripture itself points to a few as the great hinges of the story: the creation of the world out of nothing (Genesis 1), the parting of the Red Sea (Exodus 14), and above all the resurrection of Jesus (Matthew 28, Mark 16, Luke 24, John 20). The Old Testament looks back to the Exodus again and again as the mighty act that made Israel a people. The New Testament looks back to the empty tomb as the act that changes everything. Paul says that if Christ has not been raised, our faith is futile (1 Corinthians 15:17).
+Who performed the most miracles in the Bible?
Jesus, by a wide margin. The gospels narrate around three dozen of his miracles and then tell us he healed crowds whose numbers were never written down. Among the Old Testament prophets, Elisha has the most recorded miracles, roughly twice as many as Elijah by the usual count, which many readers connect to his request for a double portion of Elijah's spirit (2 Kings 2:9). Moses stands at the head of the list for the sheer scale of what God did through him in Egypt and the wilderness.
+How many miracles are in the Bible?
There is no official number, because it depends on how you count. Do the ten plagues count as one miracle or ten? Is forty years of manna one event or thousands? Lists that count each event separately usually run well past a hundred. What matters more than the total is where they fall. Most of the Bible's miracles cluster around a few moments: Moses and the Exodus, Elijah and Elisha, and Jesus and the apostles.
+What is the first miracle in the Bible?
Creation itself. 'In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth' (Genesis 1:1) is the miracle behind every other one. Everything that follows in Scripture is the same God acting again inside the world he made. If you are asking about the first miracle of Jesus, it was turning water into wine at a wedding in Cana (John 2:1-11).
+What was the last recorded miracle in the Bible?
The last narrated miracles come near the very end of Acts, on the island of Malta. Paul shakes a viper off his hand and suffers no harm (Acts 28:3-6), and then he prays for the father of Publius, the chief official of the island, and heals him. After that the rest of the sick on the island come and are cured (Acts 28:8-9). The book of Revelation contains visions of the future, but Acts 28 is the last miracle told as history.
+What is the only miracle found in all four gospels?
The feeding of the five thousand is the only one of Jesus' public miracles that all four gospel writers recorded (Matthew 14:13-21, Mark 6:30-44, Luke 9:10-17, John 6:1-15). The resurrection of Jesus is also told in all four, and it stands in a category of its own.
+Did anyone besides Jesus raise the dead?
Yes. Elijah raised the son of the widow of Zarephath (1 Kings 17:17-24). Elisha raised the son of the Shunammite woman (2 Kings 4:32-37), and a dead man came back to life when his body touched Elisha's bones (2 Kings 13:21). In Acts, Peter raised Tabitha, also called Dorcas (Acts 9:36-42), and Paul raised Eutychus after he fell from a window (Acts 20:9-12). Every one of them was raised by God's power, not their own, and every one of them died again later. Only Jesus rose never to die again.
+Why are there so few miracles in some parts of the Bible?
Because the miracles were never spread evenly across history. Long stretches of Scripture pass with God working quietly through ordinary means, through famine and harvest, kings and battles, births and deaths. The book of Esther never even names God, and yet his hand is on every page. Then, at turning points in the story, when God is rescuing his people or speaking through a new messenger, the miracles come thick and fast. Quiet is not the same as absence.
+What is the difference between a miracle, a sign, and a wonder?
The Bible often uses the three words together, as in Acts 2:22, and they describe the same events from different sides. A miracle, or mighty work, stresses the power. A wonder stresses the awe it stirs in the people who see it. A sign stresses the meaning, what the act points to beyond itself. Every miracle in Scripture is all three at once.
+Does God still perform miracles today?
Christians who love the Bible answer this in different ways. Some believe the sign gifts given to the apostles were meant for that founding season and are rare now. Others believe the gifts of healing and miracles continue in the church today. Almost everyone agrees on the heart of it: God still hears prayer, still heals, and is still free to act beyond what nature can do. Scripture invites the sick to call for prayer (James 5:14-16). It never promises that the right words will force God's hand, and it never makes a miracle the measure of your faith.
+Are the miracles in the Bible meant to be read literally?
The biblical writers tell them as things that happened, in named places, to named people, in front of witnesses. Moses' plagues fall on Egypt, not on a symbol of Egypt. Elijah's fire falls on a real altar on Mount Carmel. The miracles also carry meaning, and reading for that meaning is right. But the meaning rests on the event. If God is the Creator of all things, then a God who can act inside his creation is not a strange idea at all.