It was a miracle!

[6_Time_Momma]

You said this:

Where did i say the reason was to find the papers? I said "I'm bringing you home. Help me help her" as in now that your home would you like to help me?

Didn't even suggest that's WHY He brought her home.

 

[orljustin]

No, don't generalize. Actually, give me a made-up reason, like "She was going to grow up to become a doctor, who accidently killed the president of the US who the next day stopped a nuclear war", or something like that.

You know what? Maybe there is no reason. Perhaps she died (and other bad things happen) because some freak killed her, and her life is over. And the "good" that comes out of it, doesn't really outweigh, or even justify what happened.

If these things that happen are so great, why do we put people in jail? Just let them roam about doing what they want, since the results have a "reason".

 

[agnes!]

Because people aren't stupid. They realize that you need to work as a group to survive and gain enjoyment from your life. The "golden rule" is the basis for civilization. If you aren't part of the/a team in some sense, you aren't going to make it very far. But that rule is just common sense.

You're just playing "devil's advocate", but not very well.

I was just honestly stating a question that has actually occurred to me recently. But I guess I didn't do it well.

In regards to smarts...people can be quite stupid, civilization or the lack thereof has proved that over and over. The Golden Rule is the basis of civilization? That would be nice, but maybe the basis of civilization is more rooted in what many people today would understand as a "gang" or "warrior" culture and "Do unto the other guy before he has a chance to do it unto you."

agnes!

 

[6_Time_Momma]

No, don't generalize. Actually, give me a made-up reason, like "She was going to grow up to become a doctor, who accidently killed the president of the US who the next day stopped a nuclear war", or something like that.

You know what? Maybe there is no reason. Perhaps she died (and other bad things happen) because some freak killed her, and her life is over. And the "good" that comes out of it, doesn't really outweigh, or even justify what happened.

If these things that happen are so great, why do we put people in jail? Just let them roam about doing what they want, since the results have a "reason".

Oh please. Why would i want to speculate? I'm not the one wanting it justified. You are. No reason Icould give would be satifactory to you and I am quite sure you know it.

Never said these things were great. Things have happened in my life where I've not been real thrilled that God allowed them to happen. DO I think it's "great" mt son has Down Syndrome and Celiac Disease? NOPE. Do I think it's "great"my 6th child died before I had a chance to tell her how much I loved her and wanted her?NOPE. Did I question God as to why? Yup. Do I accept He has reasons of His own. Yes.

 

[Carys]

Thank you AuntPolly for sharing your experience.

There are many things that do not make sense to me in life. I struggle
in my relationship with Him, but I am determined to see my struggle
through, because at the other end I will either satisfy myself that
the God I was brought up to know does not exist, or my faith will be
stronger than ever. I challenge my faith because (so far) it makes
my faith stronger. At this stage in my journey, here are some things
that I now understand, although maybe my understanding is yet imperfect:

1. God is God and I am human. I cannot comprehend how he sees everything
and hears everyone, because it is not possible for me to do so, and I
have no experience of any other human having done it. Therefore, I
need to have faith that he is watching over me and listening to my
prayers both big and small, and just because a prayer from one person
has been answered it does not mean he is paying more attention to
that prayer than a prayer from another person.

2. When a prayer is answered the way you were expecting or wanting it
to be answered, it is not because it is "deserved"; it is because it
was His will for it to be so. If you accept that it was his intention
to answer that prayer in that way, then you need to accept also that it
was his intention to answer other prayers in a way that you did not like.

3. God does not owe me an explanation for His Will. When I ask him
what his purpose could possibly be in "letting" people be murdered or
tortured, I am not a customer in a handbag store wanting to know why
a suitcase has been made using sweatshop labour. People often say that
things in life are not just black and white, and that nothing is
ever simple. It is human to feel that we are owed an explanation, but
if we know that the things we can comprehend are often terribly
complicated, why do we expect to be able to understand God's reasoning
for the many terrible things that happen, the reasoning for which must
surely often be complicated? This has been a hard thing for me to accept,
and some days I nevertheless am still driven to ask Why.

4. In a related vein of thought, as the line in one of my favourite hymns
says, God is working his purpose out as year succeeds to year. In the
beginning, there was God. In the 1900s, there was me. He is looking at
things from an awfully different timescale to me, and so things from
moment to moment (everyone has their own personal little or big tragedies)
that do not make sense to me, may have a place in his plan that covers not
just the last 24 hours but that covers the last ten million years.

I do not feel comfortable talking about my faith, because I feel that
I have so far to go. However, I felt moved to share after some of the
comments in this thread. I respect and champion everyone's right to
hold their own opinion in this thread, and I thank everyone for sharing,
especially those whose views disagree with mine because as I have already
said, my faith always needs to be challenged. I do hope though that if
anyone wants to disagree with something in my post in particular, they
will argue against that point, rather than make a personal attack. I am
also unlikely to post again in this thread, because I would rather listen
to what people say and take it on board rather than to argue something
which I may yet not understand perfectly.

I do not have answers for what God's will is. I do however believe that
nothing is too big or too small for God, that all things are possible
in his hands, and that he does not have to clear his every action and
purpose with me to make sure that I think it is ok first.

 

[va32h]

No, More like "Well, Jessica, my plans for you include bringing you Home today. Come here and help me help Polly find her papers."

I believe in God, Jesus, and prayer, but I still find this concept absolutely horrifying! If God wanted Jessica home so badly, he could have killed her in her sleep, instead of leaving her to be tortured and die in such a horrific way.

When evil things happen it is a perversion of God's plans, not the successful resolution of them.

But having read your other responses, I guess you will conclude that I am simply not as enlightened as you are.

 

[U2_rocks!]

So the brain can cure cancer and other diseases. Things that have nothing to do at all with us until after the fact are related us thinking about it? (something that we can't manipulate) There are some things that happen that can't be attributed to "brain power".

But I was really only talking about looking for things - not about any other kids of "miracles". But, actually, I DO believe in the healing power of our own bodies. I don't think most people (including me) know how to do it. There's a lot we don't know about how our bodies work, quite frankly.

I also haven't seen any evidence that prayer works to cure disease and perform medical miracles. For every person who appears to have been miraculously healed, there are at least as many who prayed very hard and received no miracle. There is no way to know whether "God's will" was the reason for any of the results. I hope this is not too personal but we had a recent death on this Board. Many people here loved him and prayed hard for him, and it didn't save him. We had another "near death" here recently too, lots of praying there too, yet he survived. Maybe it was time for one of them to be "called home" and not time for the other. Or maybe the prayers had zero effect and the first guy just had a more serious medical issue than the second guy. I don't know the answer. Neither do you. Your faith would make you choose the first possibility (it was one guy's time and not the other), my lack of faith makes me believe the second. Either way, there's point arguing about something so faith-based, since there will never be any PROOF!

 

[U2_rocks!]

I believe in God, Jesus, and prayer, but I still find this concept absolutely horrifying! If God wanted Jessica home so badly, he could have killed her in her sleep, instead of leaving her to be tortured and die in such a horrific way.

When evil things happen it is a perversion of God's plans, not the successful resolution of them.

I don't really believe in God, but if I did I'd expect him to behave the way you describe in your first paragraph, if he micromanaged the world.

Or, I could possibly believe in a God who did not control the world to that extent and therefore could not intervene when brutal things were happening to His children. (the whole "free will" thing - i.e. in order to allow a murderer to have free will, He needed to allow that murderer's acts to happen).

I couldn't really believe in any other kind of God, one who had a bunch of intricate plans that involved untold suffering, for reasons we had no clue about. That's not my idea of a "merciful" God, and I really would have no interest in a relationship with Him.

 

[6_Time_Momma]

I believe in God, Jesus, and prayer, but I still find this concept absolutely horrifying! If God wanted Jessica home so badly, he could have killed her in her sleep, instead of leaving her to be tortured and die in such a horrific way.

When evil things happen it is a perversion of God's plans, not the successful resolution of them.

But having read your other responses, I guess you will conclude that I am simply not as enlightened as you are.

I am not sure where I ever gave you that impression, but okay. I never claimed my beleifs were "better" than yours or anywhere else. I was simply stating what my beliefs were. Oh well. I know better than get involved in these discussions, but I always get sucked in anyway!

 

[Buckalew11]

God can make people believe stuff?

As an atheist, i'd be checking myself into a hospital...

Uh, no, not what I meant...I meant God would have to show Himself to that poster in order for that poster to ever "get" it. It would never be the things posted here to give him a reason to believe in God. Although the Bible says God does open and close one's eyes. So in a way He does choose us but in return we make the choice to react to the calling or not.

 

[hucifer]

I just wanted to say this to you AUNTPOLLY...you certainly handle yourself with grace and dignity.

I totally agree.

Aunt Polly, I am not a God-fearing person and therefore do not believe that God had anything to do with your paper search, but I am very impressed with how you handle the various opinions expressed in this thread.

 

[auntpolly]

I totally agree.

Aunt Polly, I am not a God-fearing person and therefore do not believe that God had anything to do with your paper search, but I am very impressed with how you handle the various opinions expressed in this thread.

Thanks! I just figure that if people get upset or feel threatened by something like this, there's something else going on there and, you know, not really anything I should take personally.

 

[Lanshark]

Wow! I was shocked to find this on page one again today. It seems to have turned into a free for all with people of faith having to justify their faith and non believers slinging reason after reason for why they're stupid for "believing".

I question, I sometimes doubt (gasp) and I struggle on a daily basis about how God can allow unjust, horrible, things to happen. For every person with a prayer answered there are many that go unheard. For every person with a miracle there are many dealing with pain and grief. I have no answers. I can't even phathom the justification. I can't comprehend the reason or what purpose it serves. I can make a choice to believe or not to believe. For those that believe, there is no reason you should have to rationalize or justify your belief. It is a personal decision and matter. For those that don't believe, there is no reason to ridicule those that do. It does nothing to strengthen your position.

 

[Fitswimmer]

Wow! I was shocked to find this on page one again today. It seems to have turned into a free for all with people of faith having to justify their faith and non believers slinging reason after reason for why they're stupid for "believing".

I question, I sometimes doubt (gasp) and I struggle on a daily basis about how God can allow unjust, horrible, things to happen. For every person with a prayer answered there are many that go unheard. For every person with a miracle there are many dealing with pain and grief. I have no answers. I can't even phathom the justification. I can't comprehend the reason or what purpose it serves. I can make a choice to believe or not to believe. For those that believe, there is no reason you should have to rationalize or justify your belief. It is a personal decision and matter. For those that don't believe, there is no reason to ridicule those that do. It does nothing to strengthen your position.

For those that don't believe-would it be ok for those that do believe to say the things about you that I've read on this thread?? Religious folks are constantly being taken to task on the DIS for evangelizing, for condemning people, for being judgemental-and I agree that those things are NOT acceptable. Nobody should be shoving religion down people's throats and making judgements about those who choose not to follow religion. HOWEVER, calling believers "silly" or "stupid" is just as unacceptable and rude.

If you don't believe in prayer-why get involved in a thread about prayer? I don't jump on the Athiest thread and make rude comments to the people posting there, and I'm hoping that other religious folks don't either.

"If you can't say sumpin' nice, don't say nothin' at all" works pretty well for both sides of this debate.

 

[auntpolly]

I was pretty surprised to see this on the first place too, LOL! Leave it to me to cause a fight about prayer.

 

[JoeEpcotRocks]

Excellent posts, Aunt Polly.

God is alive and does indeed answer our prayers.

And based on some posts here, I now know why the Christian Thread says "no bashing please."

 

[Saxsoon]

For those that don't believe-would it be ok for those that do believe to say the things about you that I've read on this thread?? Religious folks are constantly being taken to task on the DIS for evangelizing, for condemning people, for being judgemental-and I agree that those things are NOT acceptable. Nobody should be shoving religion down people's throats and making judgements about those who choose not to follow religion. HOWEVER, calling believers "silly" or "stupid" is just as unacceptable and rude.

If you don't believe in prayer-why get involved in a thread about prayer? I don't jump on the Athiest thread and make rude comments to the people posting there, and I'm hoping that other religious folks don't either.

"If you can't say sumpin' nice, don't say nothin' at all" works pretty well for both sides of this debate.

I have noticed that as well, but I can't say I am much better at times. I think everybody slips into an "I'm right and your wrong" mentality every once in a while when such a loaded topic such as this pops up.

And I agree, this wasn't meant to become a debate topic, yet here we are on page ten. At least its not at fifty yet.

 

[perdidobay]

Pardon me if I repeat something, as I haven't read the entire thread.
In the book ~How Green Was My Valley, a young boy is befriended by the local pastor when he becomes very sick. The pastor talks to him after he has recovered and says to him..

"You've been lucky, Huw. Lucky to suffer and lucky to spend these weary months in bed. For so God has given you a chance to make the spirit within yourself. And as your father cleans his lamp to have good light, so keep clean your spirit... By prayer, Huw. And by prayer, I don't mean shouting, mumbling, and wallowing like a hog in religious sentiment. Prayer is only another name for good, clean, direct thinking. When you pray, think. Think well what you're saying. Make your thoughts into things that are solid. In that way, your prayer will have strength, and that strength will become a part of you, body, mind, and spirit."

And even though I am agnostic, I like this.

I believe the OP just took a minute to direct her thoughts and then found what was already there. God didn't put it there, God doesn't cure diseases, etc. He focuses the strength and spirit in ourselves and others to do so.

But this is just all my opinion, Have a nice day

 

[auntpolly]

I believe the OP just took a minute to direct her thoughts and then found what was already there. God didn't put it there, God doesn't cure diseases, etc. He focuses the strength and spirit in ourselves and others to do so.
)

Like I've been saying, God doesn't do magic tricks (Voila! Watch me pull immigration papers out of your desk!)

I asked God to help me and he did. I know he did. The details don't matter. The whole thing just reminded me that he's with me.

 

[Saxsoon]

Pardon me if I repeat something, as I haven't read the entire thread.
In the book ~How Green Was My Valley, a young boy is befriended by the local pastor when he becomes very sick. The pastor talks to him after he has recovered and says to him..

"You've been lucky, Huw. Lucky to suffer and lucky to spend these weary months in bed. For so God has given you a chance to make the spirit within yourself. And as your father cleans his lamp to have good light, so keep clean your spirit... By prayer, Huw. And by prayer, I don't mean shouting, mumbling, and wallowing like a hog in religious sentiment. Prayer is only another name for good, clean, direct thinking. When you pray, think. Think well what you're saying. Make your thoughts into things that are solid. In that way, your prayer will have strength, and that strength will become a part of you, body, mind, and spirit."

And even though I am agnostic, I like this.

I believe the OP just took a minute to direct her thoughts and then found what was already there. God didn't put it there, God doesn't cure diseases, etc. He focuses the strength and spirit in ourselves and others to do so.

But this is just all my opinion, Have a nice day

I think that is why, if God were to involve himself, is why he allows suffering. It allows us to see him more clearly, at least that how it is for me. I remember when my great-grandmother died. I wasn't angry at God, I was just glad she had gone home, and I think I learned that death is not always the worst thing. I actually thought about death, because she was the first close relative I had ever lost.

I know not everyone is like me, and can have different for lack of a better word, results when it comes to suffering.

I think the best example I can give of that would be 9-11. Have you ever heard God Bless America as much as in the following months of the attacks.