I can't really agree with the "Prayer does not change God, but it changes him who prays." concept (at least as a basis for understanding prayer, it is true in some aspects), assuming one is using the Bible as their basis for understanding prayer. There are examples throughout the Bible of the actions of His people prompting action from God or in some cases changing actions by God. Not to mention that there are examples of prayer and fasting actually having an impact on the spiritual world, etc. That doesn't mean we ought to pray frivolously, that is also harshly condemned in the Bible. In fact there are some very strong arguments for the whole "taking God's name in vain" actually referring much more to frivolous use of one's relationship w/God and much less about saying "OMG!". The real issues is HOW we use prayer. Many (and I'm referring to Christians here) don't use prayer to "talk" with God anymore, they use it like a wishing well they drop a penny into. Thats the result of a poor biblical understanding and poor biblical teaching in our churches IMO.
Of course if one claims to be a Christian but doesn't use the Bible as a basis for belief... well, then it's pretty much a "choose your adventure" so go nuts.
Well, this is the thing: The bible tells us that God is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent, and that he has a perfect will. I find that difficult to believe if his 'plan' is affected by our prayers.
I mean, I know that there are instances in the Bible where God has changed his mind. I believe Moses managed to pray God's wrath away more than once, and there's one instance of a king of Israel (or was it Judea?) who basically died of a foot infection. Scripture even goes as far as saying plainly 'If he had brought it to God in prayer, his foot would have been healed."
I believe prayer is something that Christians are commanded to do, but if I also believe that God has a perfect will ... then
something has to give. Either our prayers have very little effect on the actual will of God, or God isn't all that concerned about his plan for humanity.
But, I believe we've sort of talked about this before, Espy. My belief in God is a bit less personal than the typical Evangelical Christian. While it's sort of drifted closer to Theism than the Deism it was a year ago, it's still not something I've nailed down completely.
Admittedly perhaps I came off as intolerant when I posted the rant that started this. I was just a little frustrated at the whole ordeal ... especially since this cousin has demonstrated how small she is in other ways before (emailing my father after my parents divorced, simultaneously offering him all kinds of advice, and condemning him for leaving my mother ... all while she is less than 1/2 his age, and has been living on the other side of the continent for nearly a decade with very little contact with the rest of the family)[/QUOTE]
And thats all fair Rob, I respect your view, even if I don't necessarily agree with it. From a Biblical basis, I see a very intimate and involved God who for whatever incomprehensible reasons to us (and lets face it, like Paul said, we do hit that dim glass we can't see through, its just a limitation of not being God and instead being human), actually allows us to be involved in the affairs of the world. He cares enough about us to listen and respond. Biblically I find no problems with that and instead find instance after instance where its the norm rather than the exception. Like I said, its fine for people to not agree on this, it won't get me upset, but from an authority perspective I will pick the portrayal of God that is consistent with His actions in history, if that makes sense. I honestly couldn't read the Bible and not see that it's all about relationship and interaction from Genesis through Christ coming to restore that broken relationship, it's, in my opinion, impossible to get around.
If thats all God just lying to trick us, well, I'm not sure why anyone would want to serve or call themselves a follower of that kind of god. So again, its really going to come down to ones reading of scripture for all Christians, after all it's how we get to know God, it's His word to us. I'm glad you are working through this stuff though, it's not easy stuff to wrestle with man, and I relate to that. I hope you don't read anything I write as being judgement of you or your views, it's not my intent, I really think it's good to work through these things and I think the general evangelical church does a piss poor job of helping most of the time.
As to your original rant, I don't think thats intolerant at all, that stuff is really annoying most of the time for at the very least being cheesy and sometimes I think violating the the taking God's name in vain commandment so no worries.
One of the things about people just beginning in webcomics (or Kurtz) is that mentioning them on a forum will almost always SUMMON THEM.
LOL. True.
) is looking after you now and then.
