Does prayer work?

[psychdave]

OK, I know this will be controversial...

Does prayer really work?? A study in the US in 2006 of around 1800 heart patients showed that intercessory prayer had NO effect.

So let's look at the Christian view of prayer. God answers EVERY prayer with yes, no or wait.

So for example, I decide to pray to my mobile phone for a week......

I ask for money to come in, I ask for my son to get a girlfriend and I ask for a red Ferarri.

After the week, I get a refund from my gas provider, the Ferrari doesn't turn up and the week after my son meets a cute girl on Facebook...

Praise be to Samsung for bringing all this to pass....

Christians are taught to focus on the positives and write down the good things they believe God has done. They go out in churches and tell stories of the wonders God has done but they don't testify to all the things that don't happen... So in my case above, I could give testimony that my Samsung phone answered my prayer and gave me money without mentioning that a Ferrari didn't arrive.

It's life.... Good things and bad things happen to people whether they are Christian or Atheist.

Healing is a classic example of the above. Little Johnny is very ill and may not make it so the church all pray and thanks to modern medicine little Johnny makes it through so the church all make testimony of God's healing. The reality if other little Johnny's that haven't been prayed for also make it through and many "little Johnny's" who have been prayed for by devoted Christian's DON'T make it....

The reality is that life happens some will live, some will die. Christians will say those that live are down to God's healing and those that die God wanted to take home. Non Christians see the reality that hospital staff battle away to save lives but tragically not all can be saved....

[Zzyzx]

.

Should you choose not to recieve and believe , then you will surely not fall into Gods favor. The choice is yours to make, not Gods. According to the bible.

Bold added to emphasize that the entire scenario depends upon ancient tales about supernatural entities are true and accurate.

[tokutter]

[Replying to post 1 by psychdave]



Number one God did not promise any of us a " Rose garden " here on earth . Number two, one must be in Gods favor to have prayers answered and heard.

Ones with Gods favor will receive it , those that do not have it will not. That simple.

God has sovereignty over all things that happen on the earth , according to the bible.
I highly doubt God intervenes on things that were already meant to be. God would intervene into ones life that have his favor, in a positive manner you are either chosen to have this favor , or you are not.

Prayer is an opportunity to communicate with God, either in groups or in private. Prayer is an opportunity to show God your concern for others, prayer is a chance for you to relay to God how you feel about him. Prayer is an outlet for hope.

Pray for increase , put the work in, with the power of prayer, should you have gods favor , you will receive increase, should you pray for a red Ferrari, God could show you the way to that car in different ways in your life , should you be sincere in your faith , you might realize this through prayer and due diligence , although prayer was not really designed to give you your wants , but to communicate with a God.

I would say , it never hurts to ask. 😉

My personal experience is that I recieve even the most mundane things I ask the lord for , everywhere I go. Remember also, God will only help those that help themselves , and I don't mean help themselves to another serving of mash potaters.

I have no doubt I have Gods favor.

2 Kings 192 Kings 22

2 Kings 20:1-21:9New International Version (NIV)

Hezekiah’s Illness
20 In those days Hezekiah became ill and was at the point of death. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz went to him and said, “This is what the Lord says: Put your house in order, because you are going to die; you will not recover.�

2 Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord, 3 “Remember, Lord, how I have walked before you faithfully and with wholehearted devotion and have done what is good in your eyes.� And Hezekiah wept bitterly.

4 Before Isaiah had left the middle court, the word of the Lord came to him: 5 “Go back and tell Hezekiah, the ruler of my people, ‘This is what the Lord, the God of your father David, says: I have heard your prayer and seen your tears; I will heal you. On the third day from now you will go up to the temple of the Lord. 6 I will add fifteen years to your life. And I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria. I will defend this city for my sake and for the sake of my servant David.’�

7 Then Isaiah said, “Prepare a poultice of figs.� They did so and applied it to the boil, and he recovered.

Hezekiah surely had gods favor , according to the bible. This would be a rare event of divine intervention .

With one thought god could turn a car away meant to crash into you, with one thought God could give you the opportunity for increase , that you have asked for. There is also the fact that one is lucky to have gods favor.

I define luck as when opportunity meets skill , God grants us the opportunity, we must have the skill, knowledge and faith to do something with that opportunity.

Pray for what you need, work for what you want.

Does anybody know how many hairs were split in this "explanation".

I lost count at ten.

Faithful.......since your in gods favor.........prayer for world peace...........and get this over with.

"MMMMMMMMMMMM........well........wait.........it don't work that way"......(sound of another hair splitting)

If prayer worked there wouldn't be anymore need for prayer.

My sister prays for volleyball games.............while my mother dies of cancer.

"BBBBUUUUUUTTTTTTTTTTT wait.........you have to understands sumpin about prayers" (sound of another hair splitting)

prayer works in the usual unfalsifiable way.......like tongue talking..........indistinguishable from something not working at all.

ALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL those christian soldiers.......coming back mamed from war.....prayed for by a greatful christian nation...........ooooooops

"Now wait a minute............you got prayer all wrong" (sound of another hair splitting)

IF PRAYER WORKED EVERY GUY ON THE PLANET WOULD HAVE TROUBLE PUTTING HIS PANTS ON
"Now your just being silly.........you just dont understand" (sound of another hair splitting)

aaaaand around aaaaaaaaaaaaand around aaaaaand around it goes.

[Tired of the Nonsense]

[Replying to post 1 by psychdave]

OK, I know this will be controversial...

Does prayer really work?? A study in the US in 2006 of around 1800 heart patients showed that intercessory prayer had NO effect.

So let's look at the Christian view of prayer. God answers EVERY prayer with yes, no or wait.

So for example, I decide to pray to my mobile phone for a week......

I ask for money to come in, I ask for my son to get a girlfriend and I ask for a red Ferarri.

After the week, I get a refund from my gas provider, the Ferrari doesn't turn up and the week after my son meets a cute girl on Facebook...

Praise be to Samsung for bringing all this to pass....

Christians are taught to focus on the positives and write down the good things they believe God has done. They go out in churches and tell stories of the wonders God has done but they don't testify to all the things that don't happen... So in my case above, I could give testimony that my Samsung phone answered my prayer and gave me money without mentioning that a Ferrari didn't arrive.

It's life.... Good things and bad things happen to people whether they are Christian or Atheist.

Healing is a classic example of the above. Little Johnny is very ill and may not make it so the church all pray and thanks to modern medicine little Johnny makes it through so the church all make testimony of God's healing. The reality if other little Johnny's that haven't been prayed for also make it through and many "little Johnny's" who have been prayed for by devoted Christian's DON'T make it....

The reality is that life happens some will live, some will die. Christians will say those that live are down to God's healing and those that die God wanted to take home. Non Christians see the reality that hospital staff battle away to save lives but tragically not all can be saved....

If and when the objective of the prayer seems to have wholly or partially occurred it's considered to be an example of God's mercy and proof of God's existence. Sometimes this occurs even when not praying directly to God, but to someone close to him such as the Virgin Mary. Because apparently omniscient God is subject to occasionally changing His mind upon being asked nicely. If and when the objective of the prayer does not occur as asked, which is most of the time, this is considered to be an example of God's plan and therefore God's will at work. And so God's existence is fully justified in all cases.

[Zzyzx]

.

IF PRAYER WORKED EVERY GUY ON THE PLANET WOULD HAVE TROUBLE PUTTING HIS PANTS ON

Good one. Let's add that most women (and/or people in general) would wear clothes several sizes smaller. Prayer plus self-control works in achieving / maintaining proper weight. However, self-control without prayer works -- no prayer required.

[Kenisaw]

Being in gods favor means increasing your faith in him. We are are all considered Gidd children, according to the bible, but children go astray , those that are not increasing their faith , are going astray , they will lose Gods favor , regardless of the unconditional love that is offered by God.

The "unconditional" part comes into relevance , in the sense that you could never be worthy of heaven on your own, but can still get there by the grace of God. Should you accept this message , then you will recieve unconditional love from God. The opportunity is forever there , this does not go away. There are no conditions under which you would never be allowed to recieve it, if you so choose to recieve it, if you are sincere in recieving it.

Did you not just list conditions that need to be followed in order to receive the unconditional love?

Should you choose not to recieve and believe , then you will surely not fall into Gods favor. The choice is yours to make, not Gods. According to the bible.

If a god is all knowing then humans can't possibly have free will. Don't know if that dilemma has ever been discussed here before, but all knowing divine entire and free will can't exist at the same time...

My point here is that divine intervention is a rarity , not an impossibility. God can intervene where he wishes , which is why I gave the Hezekiah example ,he was destined to die, God put this off for fifteen years, according to the story.

But he wasn't destined to die. The god knows all, which means it already knew that his death was going to be put off for 15 years. Even before Hezekiah was born it was known to the god when he would be born and when he would die. That's what all knowing means.

There is nothing that "has to happen" in anyway , as far as the one one who made the plan goes. God has sovereignty over all of the happenings of the world . Those that are not believers might not be affected by this sovereignty , falling out of the plan of salvation , thus left to the world to decide their fate , to them that fate is ambiguous , they have no idea of what it will be, those who are in the faith, know what their ultimate fate will be , falling under gods sovereignty. The lord will concern himself with them and their fate , which is known. i.e

God knows what he wishes to know , God controls those that fall under his sovereignty. God knows the ones that will fall under his sovereignty , they also have the choice to choose right or wrong. Once this path is chosen , then your fate is chosen.

A god that only knows what it wishes to know is not, by definition, all knowing then. And since the biblical god cannot lie, but claims that it is all knowing, something ain't right...

[1213]

OK, I know this will be controversial...

Does prayer really work?? A study in the US in 2006 of around 1800 heart patients showed that intercessory prayer had NO effect.
...

I would like to know, what exactly was prayed and what happened to those people? Do you have link to some article that tells these things?

[psychdave]

[Replying to 1213]

Here's a link as requested.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16569567

[Tired of the Nonsense]

[Replying to post 15 by Kenisaw]

If a god is all knowing then humans can't possibly have free will. Don't know if that dilemma has ever been discussed here before, but all knowing divine entire and free will can't exist at the same time...

God's omniscient nature and the free will of humankind are not themselves fundamentally contradictory. Imagine entering a giant maze. Within the maze there exist an infinite number of possible routes to an infinite number of possible exits. Every choice you make to reach your particular exit is made of your own free will. God however, being omniscient, knew every choice you would make as well as your final exit point before you were ever born.

Where the concept of God's omniscient nature runs afoul of reason and logic are in the stories of God's actions. For example, God created Adam and Eve knowing exactly what their nature would be, and what they would eventually do. Being omnipotent he got exactly the result He intended to get. Exactly the same procedure went into making the serpent (Satan, according to some belief). God brought Adam, Eve and the serpent together in the garden, knowing precisely what would occur and then condemned both sides in perpetuity when it inevitably did. The contradictory nature of such stories and such claims SHOULD naturally be our first clue that they are purely mythological in nature, and have nothing whatsoever to do with anything valid and true.

[psychdave]

Suprised that there hasn't been more defence of prayer by Christian's on here. Was looking forward to having a debate.

[Faithful One]

[Replying to post 18 by Tired of the Nonsense]

This will explain what I am saying in much more detail , for you to understand . This is my writing from a prior thread , about the "unknown of unknowns ".

As far as the God of the bible is concerned he is the alpha and omega for the human race. There is only alpha for God of the bible , there is no omega. There would be no end to be aware of in the first place. Omniscience is infinite awareness. According to the bible, God is infinite, so this would go the possibility that God is infinitely aware.

My philosophy on this ..
God knows what God wishes to know. The ability verses the desire. We are set upon this earth with a choice , according to the bible. Once we reach the age of accountability then those choices as far as God of the bible is concerned , will either save you or condemn you. The desire to know your heart is Gods choice , the ability of God to know your choice is certain.

Once you are saved your destiny is set by God , not being saved can set you on a path to uncertainty and ambiguity , until the day of reckoning , whereas God will take the faithful and the others will be left with their destiny. So being saved would surely allow God to be omniscient over you to fulfill your predestined rapture. Not being saved , God has the ability to not concern himself with your destiny, as it is known already, because there would be no desire to do so, even though the ability is there, the desire must be there also.


Although God allows us free will, God is still sovereign over all he created. This means he controls everything as he so wishes. There is no " appeal to ignorance " , here. God is infinitely aware of all things , according to the bible . Infinite awareness is omniscience. This leaves no unkown to be known , all is known.

There is no fallacy in this philosophy, as far as the God of the bible is concerned.

https://bible.org/article/resting-god%E ... erbs-161-4

Quote:
In Psalm 103, a magnificent hymn of praise, David praises God for His blessings and compassion as a loving and forgiving father for his children (vss. 1-18). He concludes with a universal call for praise (vss. 19-22), but he begins this call with a declaration of God’s sovereignty (vs. 19) for it is God’s sovereignty that gives Him the absolute freedom to do what He does in His blessings and showing compassion to frail and temporal humanity (vss. 15-16).

Psalm 103:15-19 As for man, his days are like grass; As a flower of the field, so he flourishes. 16 When the wind has passed over it, it is no more; And its place acknowledges it no longer. 17 But the lovingkindness of the LORD is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, And His righteousness to children’s children, 18 To those who keep His covenant, And who remember His precepts to do them. 19 The LORD has established His throne in the heavens; And His sovereignty rules over all. (emphasis mine)


This is basically what I have just told you in "SP" secular speak, so non believers can understand this , but the religious statement is quite more eloquent .