I couldn’t really tell you where I
was before my parents conceived me. Yes I was in fragments inside the bodies of
mum and dad. But where was I before mum and dad became fragments in my four
grannies? In this era of In Vitro
Fertilization, it all looks really easy, and the particles can now be
manipulated in the laboratory and bam! we have babies! Not so fast. The day the
scientist synthesizes these particles in the laboratory, without total recourse
to the Creator’s materials, I will probably agree. In the meantime which is
forever, I solemnly do declare that I am a miracle of God’s creative genius.
A miracle is an act or event whose occurrence
can only be explained in terms of divine intervention. They exist only in the
context of divine revelation. Consequently, miracles speak to the faith-filled
and the sceptic alike, eliciting a wide range of responses in either group. To
the believer, a miracle is a sign, a proof of the hand of God at work in his
creation. But the sceptic struggles to differentiate between the miraculous and
the magical, the scientific and the natural. The world boasts of the use of
powers beyond the natural[1],
to manipulate and conjure up signs using magic, sorcery, exorcism, witchcraft
and others. However, equating miracles with magic is at once a mistake and a
misconception, as will be clarified in this work. A critical look at the context,
source, medium, purpose, impact and effect of miracles and of magic on those
who witness and or experience them reveal convergent and divergent points.
