Is It True Today?

I'm not trying to find reasons to abandon my faith. Really, I'm not. I just can't help thinking about this stuff.

I try to be credulous about religious claims. Because they generally deal with the unseen, personal experience, and things beyond our knowledge, I don't want to poo-poo other's beliefs about God. I've never felt the presence or guidance of God, but others believe they have. And since I'm in no position to analyze these subjective experiences, it's not hard for me to believe that God does interact in tangible ways with some people, in some circumstances. When I hear about miraculous healing, exorcisms, prophecies, and so on, I tend to give them the benefit of the doubt. And when people tell me God answered their prayer, I recognize that I could never conclusively determine whether this is the case, and choose to trust that such things really happen.

But I find my faith in these things becomes much more difficult when I encounter them first hand. While I still believe (in the absence of any compelling evidence) that God genuinely and tangibly communicates and interacts with people, too often I hear of supposed encounters with God that I cannot help but mistrust. (Again, I'm not saying that any of these encounters are definitely fake. I'm just saying the majority of them seem pretty suspicious.) Similarly, while they sound great second hand, any exorcisms or healing or miracles that I've personally witnessed have been profoundly unconvincing, and done much to damage my faith in those I have not seen. I have no desire to disbelieve in the supernatural - just the opposite - but when I see them first hand or really sit down and think about them, I can't help but be incredulous.

I've struggled for a long time with prayer - its effectiveness, its purpose, its value. I wish to say plainly from the outset that I do not understand prayer, that any ideas I might have about it's mechanics or objectives may be dead wrong, that I have never been able to establish a habit of prayer or a desire to pray, and that I have never been in a position which merited heartfelt prayer for God's intervention (except maybe that one time). So don't tell me that I'm confused or ignorant about prayer; I already know that. I'm seeking knowledge here, not dispensing it.

As I've said above, I've always considered the question of whether God answers prayer not to be provable one way or the other. There are just too many unknowns, too many alternative explanations for both "answered" and "unanswered" prayers. It's easy to dismiss a seemingly unanswered prayer by saying that it was not God's will, that unconfessed sin got in the way, that the one who prayed was insincere, impure in motives or lacking in faith, that we fail to understand the "big picture" of God's plan, that sin and free will restrict God's action, that prayers may be answered in ways we do not expect or long after we've forgotten them, that we do not pray enough, or do not ask enough, or do not work enough, or any number of other explanations good or bad, likely or unlikely. A person such as myself who wants to believe in a God who cares for us, listens to us, and is active in our world will have no difficulty finding explanations and excuses for seemingly unanswered prayers. And never having lost a young child to cancer, never having known unalleviated hunger or sickness, never having struggled with crippling sin or physical disability or large-scale rejection or extreme hatred or cruelty or injustice, I've had relatively little to be disappointed with in prayer. I felt the sting of God's apparent apathy a couple years ago when I asked in vain for him to reveal himself to me, but the nagging questions then were how could God do this and what was I doing wrong, rather than whether God really answers prayer at all. This latter question occurred to me only a few days ago.

In the spirit of full disclosure, the question was prompted by something I read on a web site, and (in my opinion) not a particularly good website. whydoesgodhateamputees.com is a longwinded, multifaceted attack on Christian beliefs. The bulk of the arguments I skimmed through didn't strike me as particularly fair or compelling, but the argument against prayer alluded to in the title caught my attention.

It's not hard to find stories of "miraculous" (that is, improbable) answers to prayer. You've heard them in church, read them in the paper, and deleted them from your inbox. But have you ever heard of someone regaining a lost limb as a result of prayer? Assuming you haven't, do you not find this a little weird? There are countless stories of prayer healing diseases, but none (none!) of prayer regenerating severed limbs. (Or are there? I'd be grateful if you could find me one.) Why does God seem to heal all varieties of illness and infirmity, but never amputation?

I think there are two differences between the regrowth of a lost limb and other healing: it's impossible, and it's indisputable. Diseases, even the most deadly, are not invincible. All (or nearly all) can be overcome, and human bodies have been known to make inexplicable and highly improbable recoveries. But there is no natural possibility of healing for an amputee. Human limbs do not spontaneously regenerate, ever. And while sickness is enigmatic and prone to misdiagnosis and misunderstanding, amputation is black and white. If a woman has one arm today and two arms tomorrow, there can be no question that something inexplicable has occurred. No unknowns, no complicating factors, no uncertainty. And while naturally improbable recoveries from illness occur rarely, naturally impossible healing of amputees occur never. This bothers me.

Real Live Preacher tells of how his faith reached the breaking point as a hospital chaplain in his story (highly recommended). One factor was his realization that sick people tend to live when the doctors say they will live and die when the doctors say they will die, regardless of prayer however fervent, trusting, and persistent. Various sources confirm this. And now that I've really let this sink in, it bothers me.

I'm not saying all this proves anything. (As I said at the start, I don't think it's possible to prove anything about prayer.) But it bothers me. Maybe I've just not had enough good experiences with prayer. I'm sure that stories I chalk up to chance would be much more difficult to shrug off if I had experienced them personally. Maybe I just need to have more realistic (I'm tempted to say "less Biblical") expectations of prayer.

I suppose I should make a distinction between believing in God and believing that he answers prayer. At present I believe there is a God who "works all things together for good" according to his mysterious and perfect will. What I don't understand is why I ought to pray for God to change his will, or how my prayers could be necessary for God to accomplish his will, or why God seems to take great pains to make answers to prayer look like coincidences. This certainly isn't the way prayers were answered in the Bible.

But as usual I'm talking to long. What do you think? What do you believe about prayer?