Is Natural Law a Miracle or Near-Enough?
Religion asks why there is any order in the universe when there could be nothing but chaos. It thinks the answer is God. God has supernaturally designed the universe and organised it.
A miracle is a sign-event that interrupts normal causal order. The origin or grounding of natural law, if supernatural, is not a sign and not an interruption. That does not mean we cannot see natural order as a sign of God - it is just not intended as one.
Both would be in the class of supernatural cause.
While calling natural order a miracle would be inaccurate, it is
close to one and some do call it a miracle - in an imprecise way.
Some say, "The order of nature is a miracle. We believe in the miracle of order.
It keeps things in order. We can't live if people start turning into frogs!"
This is a case where a "miracle" is believed in that refutes all other miracles.
If miracles are rare signs they happen for grave serious reasons -
the exception must support the rule. If the design of the
universe is real and supernatural that renders all wonders such as
the alleged resurrection of Jesus redundant.
You can be a sceptic and say that supernatural things do not happen for the laws
of nature do not permit it. Also you can be a sceptic and say that the only
supernatural event that has happened is the creation of the laws of nature.
Suppose it is a miracle that a seed grows into a flower. It would be strange
then to say that the miracle of making the seed turn instantly into a flower is
needed. Consider what is being claimed here. It is not a benevolent
transformation of a seed instantly into a flower. It is the
removal of the distance, the progress, between a seed becoming a
flower. Look at it that way and you see how it is about, "I
want to show my power". We let the beauty that results blind
us to how it is about cutting out a growth process.
If natural law is a miracle or "miracle", then it follows that if God decides to make a new
natural law tomorrow he can.
A God who makes miracle laws and then miraculously undoes them would be a very
stupid and indecisive God.





