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As a continuance of whether we can truly know anything about God's affairs and also whether all Christian views need a Biblical basis, I was curious if there were any instances of God's influence on humanity that are not mentioned in the Bible. On a basic level, many people like to believe that God intervenes from time to time in answering prayers; surely all the ones post-Bible aren't documented in the Bible (like, if you had a prayer answered yesterday, obviously it's not in the Bible). I'm looking for something a bit more substantive than small answered prayers though, like God revealing himself to a group of people or something of that nature, which isn't strictly found in the Bible but most/many/some Christians hold the event to be true in the Christian lore.

What are some of the situations accepted by Christians in which God performed some act, or revealed himself, or otherwise influenced mankind in some way that is not mentioned in the Bible (if any)?

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  • Related: christianity.stackexchange.com/questions/384/…
    – Flimzy
    Sep 21, 2011 at 19:10
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    Is it possible for God to intervene and have it not be considered a miracle? If so, how do we know it was God? Because of this line of reasoning, I think this is an exact duplicate of What evidence exists for modern day miracles?
    – Richard
    Sep 21, 2011 at 19:18
  • @Flimzy & Richard: I would divorce the two concepts (intervention/revealing himself and miracles), especially if He doesn't do anything but show himself. Some people, for example, claim they saw God in the sky at some point—along with dozens of other people—but he didn't actually do anything. I'm not sure I would call that a miracle. If there is an event like that in some Christian lore, especially one in which more than one person witness, that would be exactly what I'm looking for.
    – stoicfury
    Sep 21, 2011 at 19:36
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    OK, so you're looking for accounts that intervene in human affairs, but aren't miraculous? These seem to be contradictory. Are you just looking for stories?
    – Richard
    Sep 21, 2011 at 19:40
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    Please make each question stand on it's own. You shouldn't have to start with two "read first" links as a lead in to a question. If you want to include them for further reading in a post script that's fine, but please word questions as stand alone entities. SE guys have broken us off about this before and closed some questions over it. Thanks!
    – Caleb
    Sep 21, 2011 at 22:21

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It is challenging to get all Christians to believe in anything together; with all the different denominations each has their own particular views of God, of the Trinity, of the validity of each of the various stories in the Bible. Did the flood actually happen? Or is an anecdote, simply there to teach us a lesson? Can a man really live inside of a really big fish? Or was it a whale? Which translation is most accurate?

The learned Christian finds that although all Christian men of faith believe in the same God, they vary in the extent of their beliefs. That said, some particular beliefs may be shared more widely than others; for example, the idea that God is all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-loving is a belief that is probably shared among the great majority of Christians, regardless of denomination. Regarding the question being asked here—whether there is any generally shared belief involving God's intervention in human affairs that is outside Biblical documentation—the simple answer is "No". There is no widely shared belief in any event in which God revealed himself or otherwise intervened in human affairs that is documented outside the Bible. There are some denominations, however, that do profess such beliefs, but they make up a relatively small minority of the Christian whole and as such cannot be taken as representative of the "average" person of Christian faith.



source: dancek

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