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Faith?
Over the last couple of weeks I have been keeping track of something that I think many of us would find interesting, the loss of faith.
There is an older woman at my work she is a good Christian by all accounts and a rather nice person as well. (The two do not always go hand and hand.)
Anyway this lady has suffered from some sort of leg circulatory problem for several years and lives in constant pain.
A short while ago she mentioned that she went to get healed.
Now most of us here understand the results of such a "healing" but this lady honestly believed that she was going to be truly and completely healed.
At first she did seem to walk better and have less pain. But as time passed her eyes began to show the stress of pain once again.
Now she is back to normal.
The problem is that she was so excited at first, she told everyone about her faith and the miracle of her healing.
As the pain returned her faith has seemed to waver. I have even overheard some of her friends talk about how worried they are over her behavior and that she has been missing church services.
Will she return to the flock and renew her faith? Most likely, people have a great capacity to fool themselves. But I think she has a better idea of the way god doesn't work.
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Re: Faith?
That isn't the way its supposed to work. Faith healing is a parlor trick. Pray in Christianity is usually meant to encourage overcoming of one's mental barriers. The idea isn't that you pray for god to make your boss give you a raise. Rather a person prays for the strength to work hard enough to be worthy of a raise.
The fact that you can't just pray or perform some religeous ritual to make random things happen isn't proof that there's no god.
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Re: Faith?
Read the New Testament Auron--that IS how prayer and healing is supposed to work. Jesus doesn't say faith will move a mountain only if you pray for it and then subsequently round up some bulldozers and other heavy machinery. And was Jesus's healing a parlor trick? What about the "signs" he mentioned that will allow you to identify a Christian--the ability to heal others, to handle snakes, etc?
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Quote: Read the New Testament Auron--that IS how prayer and healing is supposed to work. Jesus doesn't say faith will move a mountain only if you pray for it and then subsequently round up some bulldozers and other heavy machinery. And was Jesus's healing a parlor trick? What about the "signs" he mentioned that will allow you to identify a Christian--the ability to heal others, to handle snakes, etc?
Actually, not everyone has ever taken all of the miracles literally. For instance, the miracle of the loaves and fishes is sometimes thought of as a take on the stone soup fable.
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Re: More on the story...
Well I sort of ambushed this lady today to find out what was going on with her. I told her that she looked like she was in pain again, and asked her what was the matter.
She wavered for a bit but I managed to get her to talk about it after about 20 minutes. I sum up her final solution thusly.
This woman of wavering faith has given up her entire life for Jesus. Gone to church faithfully, followed the teachings, prayed, volunteered, and has not once wavered in her belief. Even now she fiercely believes that there is a higher power.
But after 60 + years of service to her lord, her god of compassion, and love decided that she is not deserving of the one thing she has ever asked him for.
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Re: More on the story...
I think she should feel cheated. She is being cheated. Her Bible and her preacher or priest have told her over and over and over again, "Ask and it shall be given..."
Quote:Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. For everyone that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. (Matt.7:7-
Quote:This is one of the most amazing promises in the entire Bible. It almost seems unbelievable, except we know that Jesus Christ is trustworthy, and if he said it, (and he did), then it has to be true. But he must have known that we would find it hard to believe, because as soon as he had said it in the first sentence, he immediately said it over again in the second, just to assure us that this fantastic promise means exactly what it says, and is not to be brushed aside as a mistake. It's no mistake! Try it, and you will see for yourself. Prayer really does work, and we really ought to use it more often than we do, because, as someone said, "More things are wrought by the power of prayer than this world can even imagine."
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Re: More on the story...
In addition to feeling cheated, she must also feel she has grossly wasted a large chunk of her life. If she spent much of her free time celebrating, participating in, and reading about her god and her religion, and if a large part of her community life has involved her religion, where does she turn at the age of 60? Do you start all over with a new community? All those relationships built around her faith will certainly change. Are they over? Not necessarily. But they are sure to be altered.
Perhaps it's easier to just continue your faith than to question one of your life's major choices during your sunset years? I'm glad I sorted out my issues with faith on the earlier side of my life.
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Re: flocks
Quote:She has wasted her time serving a master who has no desire or ability to repay her. so either he is a god of empty promises, or he does not exist.
Or either you have no idea what's going on and your just guessing. What makes you think that it is not in her best interest to be exactly where she is in life right now. Perhaps God has something else planned for her that will extremely increase her faith permanently. The fact is you don't know.
Quote:I think this woman is finally seeing that fact, and in her words she feels cheated. To work in the name of god demands sacrifice and I believe she wonders at the potential life she has denied herself.
In what way do you feel that she denied herself? If you get sick or injured would you like someone to feel that you must have not had a good life? This is really sad you defaming this woman.
Quote:In her mind she has worked a lifetime for god, but payment is not forthcoming.
You assume that she worshipped God as an insurance policy.
Quote:Is the only reason she did all of that because she intended to collect in the future? I tend to doubt it.
Then why suggest it to everyone?
Quote:I really do not think that at 5/10/20/40 years of age this woman was thinking "boy I'll really get a good payback from god when I am 65!
But in any event the things that you see as gifts from god are available to all of us, believers or not.
The Bible states it as "It rains on both the Just and unjust" The Quaran says clearly that this life is but a trial.
Quote:Happiness, health, peace with ones self, peace with others, are all possible without invoking the god myth. In fact I would argue that it is easier without god, because there is no outside source of needless guilt.
You certainly have no guilt condemning this womans faith. Why don't you tell her what you've been discussing here and invite her to join in on this conversation.
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Re: flocks
Chris OConnor: I think she should feel cheated. She is being cheated. Her Bible and her preacher or priest have told her over and over and over again, "Ask and it shall be given..."
In the interests of fairness, it should be pointed out that, while that passage could be interpreted to say you'll be granted whatever you ask for from God, it doesn't say that. It seems entirely more like to me that the "it" of the passage refers very specifically to Christian salvation. Context counts for a lot here: the chapter before 7 is about judgement; the chapter after is about the gate to life, which is generally interpreted to mean heaven.
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Crosses
I think there is some deep confusion regarding the goal of Christian life: it is not wealth and status and delightful health...but radical confrontation of the forces of evil and oppression, understanding full well the brutal consequences of such action.
The Christian, as I see the text and understand the traditions, is not pursuing health, but the Kingdom of God...which is largely in direct contradiction to the dominant Imperial structures that inform and support the world of wealth, position, success and what is called "health".
In other words, living a long and happy life free of pain is not on the agenda for Christians. Instead, an intensly active pursuit of peace and justice that rattles the cages of the masses while upsetting the comfort of the masters is in store: and it will kill those who are taken seriously.
For Christians who think praying to God will simply cure their diseases, heal their illnesses or remedy their sickness...miss the point. The point is changing the world and sacrificing one's life along the way. Asking and receiving from God is only meaningful in that context.
Now, I think Christian healing is a matter of pulling isolated, resentful, oppressed and battered folk out of the Imperial grip of master/slave relationships: but not as a way of simply reducing discomfort and increasing ease...but as a way of building authentic relationships of love and compassion that share a common goal and purpose. This common goal and purpose is the Kingdom of God.
For Christians, praying to God is only meaningful as far as it awakens them to the coming Kingdom, makes them receptive of it, and equips them to work towards it. Healing, curing, mending...all of this is an issue of radically changing the world, not simply asking God to make the world less painful.
Christians need to know what they're getting into when they decide to follow the path of the Crucified one...and understand it demands profound transformation at great cost. It is a terribly dangerous practice and it is not something conducive to bourgeois mentalities or those simply seeking the American dream or a happy, normal life.
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