Exploring the 4 Types of Jesus’ Miracles
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I’ve been going through my old baseball cards recently. I collected during what is known as the “junk-wax era.” That’s a fancy way of saying my cards aren’t worth much. They were so mass-produced that everybody’s grandma bought them mountains of packs. You don’t just have one treasured Bo Jackson card — you have 36 of them. When you’ve got so many of something, you need to create a system for organizing them.
What does any of that have to do with Jesus? Well, I’m trying to set us up for engaging in a bit of wonder. Scholars have come up with a bit of a system for organizing the miracles of Jesus.
Think about that for just a second. I don’t have to come up with a system for organizing my 1952 Topps baseball cards. I’ve got one of them. And it’s not the Mickey Mantle; it’s a dog-eared card of a dude I can’t even remember the name of. No need to organize.
Do you see where I’m going with this? It’s an absolutely amazing thing that Jesus did so many miracles that we have to categorize them. Page after page, Jesus heals the sick, casts out demons, calms storms, and even raises the dead. And these aren’t just random acts of compassion, though compassion flows through every act. These are signs that point somewhere.
And those categories point somewhere too. They aren’t just arbitrary buckets; they tell us something about Jesus’ mission, his identity, and how he fulfilled long-held Jewish expectations of the Messiah.
We will explore each of these categories. And along the way we’ll see how these all come together in a remarkable moment when John the Baptist asked a haunting question: “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?”
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1. Healing Miracles – The Compassionate King
In the ancient world, sickness wasn’t just a medical issue. It was a spiritual and social one. It was a bit like having a cough during the COVID pandemic. You sneeze from an allergy and everyone around you starts to hide their precious children and side-eye you like you’ve just insulted their deceased granny. To be sick in the ancient world was isolating.
The sick were often excluded from temple worship, from community life, even from family connection. When Jesus heals someone physically, he’s not just restoring their body; he’s also restoring their place in the world. Many of Jesus miracles fall into this category. He touched lepers, opened blind eyes, healed people who were paralyzed, and stopped an issue of bleeding that no doctor could heal.
These healing miracles also point to Isaiah 35:5-6. There the prophet writes that in the days of God’s salvation, “the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap like a deer.”
Jesus’ healing ministry wasn’t just him doing good, it was also fulfilling prophecy. Jesus was showing Himself to be the compassionate king. They were signs that the kingdom of God had come near. And this is what happens when God comes close — broken things get fixed. Our tattered bodies get a little taste of life.
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2. Exorcisms – The Warrior King
In some Christian circles, talk of the demonic may not seem all that out of place. In other segments, it feels a little weird. In the first-century Jewish world, spiritual oppression was real, personal, and terrifying. The gospels describe people tormented by unclean spirits, cut off from society, and sometimes from their own sense of self.
It is into this dark world that Jesus spoke. And when Jesus spoke the demons ran. It’s almost laughable how powerless they are before Him. He doesn’t chant or perform rituals. There are no incantations He goes through. He just speaks and they leave. This is a display of His raw power — but it’s also so much more. It’s about authority. It’s a spiritual declaration: the strong man is being bound, and the kingdom of God is pushing back the kingdom of darkness (Luke 11:20-22).
Again, this fits what the Messiah was supposed to do. He was expected to bring liberation, not only from Rome, but from all forms of oppression, including the demonic. Jesus’ miracles involving the demonic ultimately show His victory over death and all that wreaks havoc on the world that God made.
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3. Nature Miracles – The Creator King
Some of Jesus’ more well-known miracles fall into this category. Here he shows His power over the natural world. People don’t just walk on water. You don’t speak into a storm and say, “Hey, hush up” and suddenly the winds and waves obey you. That’s not something that is normal. And we don’t typically see water turned into wine. We can turn water into Kool-Aid with a packet. And we could water down some wine with a few ice cubes — but we can’t change the substance of something and make it better than it was. Nor can we feed thousands of people with a few loaves and fish.
These miracles don’t just defy science; they provide evidence of Jesus as Creator and Sustainer of the universe. In calming the wind and waves, Jesus is doing what only God does in Psalm 107: “He stilled the storm to a whisper; the waves of the sea were hushed.” In feeding the multitudes, he reveals himself as the true provider — like God providing manna in the wilderness.
Nature miracles show us that Jesus isn’t just some kind of miracle worker. They help us see that He is the Lord over creation itself. He’s not manipulating nature, He is commanding it. It bows to Him. Jesus isn’t just a prophet or a great teacher, He is the very Son of God.
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4. Restoration Miracles – The Redeeming King
At first glance it might seem that a “restoration” miracle isn’t much different than healing. And it’s true that there is significant overlap in all of these. But this final category has more to do with Jesus’ miracles of raising people from the dead — or those where we see a full-scale reversal of someone’s life. Death is undone. Shame is erased. Outcasts are brought home.
In some ways we might be able to say that this is the very miracle that Jesus brings about anytime someone moves from spiritual death to spiritual life. He’s still doing these kinds of miracles.
But we should also point out that raising the dead isn’t just miraculous, it’s messianic. In Isaiah 26:19, God promises, “Your dead shall live; their bodies shall rise.” Jesus raising the dead signaled not only his compassion but his authority over life and death itself. Jesus didn’t come just to patch things up. He came to bring absolutely new life. He came for resurrection reasons. Every one of these miracles is a preview of the future kingdom – a world without tears, without disease, without funerals.
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Why These Four?
So why divide Jesus’ miracles this way?
In part, this just how they kind of divide themselves. Like me dividing my baseball cards by year and brand, this is just a natural and simple way to divide them. But there is a little more here too. These also form a holistic picture of who Jesus is:
Healing miracles show his power over the body and his compassion for the broken.
Exorcisms reveal his authority over evil and his mission to liberate.
Nature miracles demonstrate his sovereignty over creation.
Restoration miracles hint at his power over death and his promise of new life.
We were created for rest, rule, and relationship. But sin wrecked everything. Because of sin these holy callings were infused with difficulty. We get sick now. People die. These four categories mirror the core brokenness of our world: physical pain, spiritual bondage, chaos, and death. And Jesus confronts each one. He’s showing Himself as the Promised Rescuer.
The Miracles as Messianic Evidence
In Matthew 11, John the Baptist is imprisoned and He seems a bit discouraged. He sends messengers to Jesus with a simple but heavily-loaded question:
“Are you the one who is to come, or should we look for another?” (Matthew 11:3).
John had previously called Jesus the Lamb of God. But now he’s sitting in a dank prison. The kingdom that Jesus was supposed to bring doesn’t quite look like John expected. Why would the forerunner to Messiah have this as his lot. Was John wrong about Jesus? Should we be looking for another Rescuer?
How does Jesus respond? He doesn’t explain himself. He doesn’t correct John’s theology. Instead, he says:
“Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news preached to them” (Matthew 11:4-5).
That’s not just a list of accomplishments. It is a direct reference to Isaiah – specifically chapters 35, 26, and 61. These were widely known messianic prophecies, describing what would happen when God’s anointed came.
Isaiah 35: “The eyes of the blind shall be opened… the lame shall leap like a deer…”
Isaiah 26: “Your dead shall live.”
Isaiah 61: “He has anointed me to bring good news to the poor.”
Jesus is telling John to look at the miracles. What Isaiah said would happen through Messiah is happening through Jesus. His miracles are highlighting His identity for anyone who has eyes to see.
Jesus’ miracles aren’t just to impress. They are there to reveal who He is. And they show what kind of kingdom He is bringing.
Even today, these miracles still speak. They remind us of who Jesus is. And they remind us that He is still in power. They show us His compassion, and that He meets us in our place of need.
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