Jay520 said:
Andrespetmonkey said:
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Jay520 said:
One of the reasons we pray to God is so that we can thank Him for the blessings he's done for us. In a word: Worship. Most people pray to worship & praise our Lord.
Now, you're talking about praying to ask for things. That does make sense. We are not praying to inform God of our troubles. He knows this already. We are praying to physically present ourselves as the small weaklings (cant think of a better word right now) that we are. When we get down on our knees and pray, it shows that we know that we are weak and are acknowledging the power of our Lord.
When we do this, we act our humbleness, and God likes this. Even if he knows we need help, we must still act on it. He knows we need him. That doesn't mean he'll always act. He wants us to put forth some form of action. To meet him halfway. And sometimes, all we have to do is humbly request help and acknowledge that he is the one who loves us and the one who can help us. And that's all the action he wants, sometimes.
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So to put it plainly, God just wants you to kiss his arse and he'll help you? I don't understand why a benevolent being would want this, nor do I understand why a perfect being would want anything.
But let's say there's a perfectly rational reason as to why God would want this, if he really does answer prayer, why does practically every study on prayer show that it doesn't work? And why is practically every claim about an answered prayer something that could happen by chance, or even something that was bound to happen. You could get the worlds population to pray for an amputee's limb to grow back and it wouldn't happen.
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I may be mistaken but it looks like you think respectfully asking for something = kissing arse. If this is your stance (and Please correct me if I'm wrong), then I'd have to disagree.
But why would he need to be asked? Why does he want you to ask for it when he knows exactly what you want and how much you need it? How could this possibly benefit him in anyway? And if he's doing it for the benefit of us, rather than himself, then again, why? Assuming you're Christian, there are 6 billion people on this planet who aren't praying to what you pray to, so what happens to them? God knows they believe in and pray to a different God(s), but he stil expects people to ask for help when the vast majority don't even know who to ask or are asking the wrong deity? He doesn't even have the decency to tell these people that they're asking the wrong dude, not even a hint of his existence for 2000 years (and that's assuming Jesus is the son of God, and existed)
"if he really does answer prayer, why does practically every study on prayer show that it doesn't work?"
Good question. I'd say one reason is because: God works in mysterious ways. I'll leave this to the Iron Chariot. A person may have a problem and he'll pray for a particular item which he deems the solution to his problem, however, go may give the solution, just in a different manner. For example, a man may have a problem with depression because of paralysis. So he may pray to be able to walk. God may answer his prayer, but if so, it doesn't have to be by granting him the ability to walk. God will try to fix his problem. His problem wasn't paralysis, it was depression. So god my give this man wisdom. Wisdom that he doesn't need to walk to have joy. This wisdom will help eliminate the man's depression.
Firstly, if the source of his depression is paralysis, then healing his paralysis would indeed eliminate the man's depression. Secondly, this 'wisdom' is something most if not all amputees eventually find out on there own, people learn to deal with their disabilities. And thirdly, saying he's given the man wisdom instead of a limp is just very unconvincing, it reinforces the statement I made earlier about claims of answered prayers always conveniently being something that could happen anyway or was likely to happen.
You should link me to these 'studies' so I an get a better understanding of their system.
No prob -
http://www.templeton.org/pdfs/articles/060331Reuters.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efficacy_of_prayer#Third_party_studies
"And why is practically every claim about an answered prayer something that could happen by chance, or even something that was bound to happen."
I see you said practically. Not all. Is this not evidence of God's influence? Keep in mind that I never claimed that God grants all prayers. Nor does he grants most of them. He may only grant a fraction of a fraction of the prayers he gets. So telling me that "most prayers don't work" means nothing.
key word = "claim"
I'll change the question to "Why are there no answered prayers that could not of happened by chance confirmed by study and evidence?"
"You could get the worlds population to pray for an amputee's limb to grow back and it wouldn't happen."
Again, God fixes problems. This amputee may still be able to have a fulfilling life without that limb. And God could be the entity that shows the amputee his fulfilment.
Addressed.
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