whywontgodhealamputees.com is a big website that would take months to explore. It is interesting as it contains loads of stories of both religious people and atheists as they struggle to work out if there is a God. I have only had a quick explore of the site but it has already got me thinking about what I think is a common misconception about Xy.
That is... God is all powerful and God answers prayer by intervening in our world.
I’d like to argue that God is not all powerful. God is creator and powerful but not all powerful. Part of the reason that God is not all powerful is that God has given us power we have the power of free will power to choose for ourselves power to do what we like with no consequence that is external to the community in which we live. God created us not to worship God and not to and not be controlled by God but that we might have a relationship with God. This is not explicit in the Bible rather implicit for unless you have servant master relationship every relationship is based on negotiation whether that be two friends, partners or parent and child. There is negotiation because one party does not have all the power. And that is the nature of our relationship with God.
I'd also like to argue that God does not change our world. Rather, God changes us. This is something I've hinted at previously in my Not praying for car parking spaces and There will be no "deux ex machina!" posts. We live outside of Eden, in an imperfect world a world with floods, earthquakes and missing limbs. No matter how good it would be not to have them they are part of the reality of this world. A world is just good enough for us to suspect something very good is behind it and just bad enough for us to suspect that this is not as good as it gets. For example: We see other animals growing back limbs but yet it doesn't happen for humans. I guess for me I believe this is not as good as it gets and it won't be better until we are reconciled with each other, we are reconciled with God and that reconciliation has culminated with our return to Eden.
Finally I'd like to say the world or creation, though it doesn't seem as good as it could be, it is not evil. Far from it. Like humanity it is not what it could be and, according to Paul, groans for that final redemption.
That is... God is all powerful and God answers prayer by intervening in our world.
I’d like to argue that God is not all powerful. God is creator and powerful but not all powerful. Part of the reason that God is not all powerful is that God has given us power we have the power of free will power to choose for ourselves power to do what we like with no consequence that is external to the community in which we live. God created us not to worship God and not to and not be controlled by God but that we might have a relationship with God. This is not explicit in the Bible rather implicit for unless you have servant master relationship every relationship is based on negotiation whether that be two friends, partners or parent and child. There is negotiation because one party does not have all the power. And that is the nature of our relationship with God.
I'd also like to argue that God does not change our world. Rather, God changes us. This is something I've hinted at previously in my Not praying for car parking spaces and There will be no "deux ex machina!" posts. We live outside of Eden, in an imperfect world a world with floods, earthquakes and missing limbs. No matter how good it would be not to have them they are part of the reality of this world. A world is just good enough for us to suspect something very good is behind it and just bad enough for us to suspect that this is not as good as it gets. For example: We see other animals growing back limbs but yet it doesn't happen for humans. I guess for me I believe this is not as good as it gets and it won't be better until we are reconciled with each other, we are reconciled with God and that reconciliation has culminated with our return to Eden.
Finally I'd like to say the world or creation, though it doesn't seem as good as it could be, it is not evil. Far from it. Like humanity it is not what it could be and, according to Paul, groans for that final redemption.
2 comments:
Its a puzzling one. I'm not one of those who freely jumps about in worship singing "All things are possible" while there are people in wheel chairs in the back row. The explanation we have traditionally been given for these sorts of things seems to show a need to defend God. It also shows that people haven't been allowed to ask deep questions because the answers have already been formulated.
To me it seems that while God can theoretically do anything, He is somehow limited in what He does. And we just don't know why. If He was to fix everything would ultimately lead us back to a new Garden of Eden, which is not what our existence is about. For if everything was fixed in a perfect world, would we still 'need' God? He intervenes at times, leads us at other times, but ultimately has left us within the exiled environment Adam and Eve were ushered into.
Its funny though...well strange really...that there seems to be 'healing' for some things but not others. You see tele-evangelists claim healings over cancer, blindness etc but never the re-growth of a limb. So what's in that then?
Hello Garth,
Thanks for some good thoughts and questions. Just a few quick responses to some issues you raise. I’m still not sure if God can theoretically “do anything”. If I have a pet I mouse I may be all powerful (relatively speaking) I maybe able to influence the mouse in what it does but I’m not sure I can do anything. In a similar but by no means the same may I don’t think God can do anything without sacrificing the possibility of us having freewill, which perhaps therefore does limit God in some ways. I might revisit this as I’m just thinking off the top of my head.
I’m not sure about healings especially as they seem to happen to such a wide range of people. It would surprise me if Xy had a superior healing strike rate to other religions or belief systems. I think one of the things that was really important about Jesus’ healing was that unlike the tele-evangelists they weren’t “hey look how powerful I am” kind of events. Rather they tell us something about God’s character, hence healing a begging leper rather than more famous people and asking people to keep quiet about there healings to. I can still remember a girl at my school, a dancer, who had snapped a tendon it was healed at a charismatic Xn rally yet she did not keep her faith for more than a couple of months. I wonder if miracles can be explained away but an encounter with God is far more powerful.
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