Did They Not Pray Hard Enough

[Cato]

God is a dick.

Particularly since he took out an unborn child, presumably without the mother's consent. This is a class C felony in Indiana.

[Cinjin]

The bible didn't put any disclaimers on prayer, but GUESS WHAT ... this filthy fucking apologist will.

luke 11 cinny.

Luke 11
9 “So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

11 “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for[f] a fish, will give him a snake instead? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”


That's not a disclaimer Dich. In fact it basically says that your fucktard god will actually give even better than your own family because he's the holy fucking king of the world ... and moreover that he WON'T give you something negative in it's place.

I'm thinking a bus rolling over your head is a bit negative, or if you want to get more real about it ... asking god to save your sick grandson of his leukemia and then watching him die isn't exactly getting fish instead of a snake. Dich!

More filthy fucking apologists bull shit in ...3...2...1...

[Minimalist]

When Drippy reads English with the Holy Blinders on he sees something completely different.

Sad, really.

[Fruity]

Didn't read the whole thread, but here goes...

Why do you ask God for anything?

God knows everything, right? He knows what you will do, say, ask, and everything that he will throw (or "allow") your way. There are no surprises. Suppose you could change his mind by asking for something. Please, God, don't let my family die in the crash. God scratches his head and says, "Well, ok, son." Didn't he know he was going to change his mind? If he knew, then he didn't really change it. If he didn't know, then he doesn't know everything. If he won't change his mind, because he already knows what is best for you and has everything figured out, then why bother asking? Please, God, don't let my family die in that crash. God scratches his beard and says, "Gee, you'll just have to wait to see what I have prepared for you." You just wasted saliva for nothing. In any case, he knows everything... including what you want to say. No need to say it. Unless he likes to be reminded.

Why do you ask God for anything? When people say, I will pray for you, I think, "Poor mofo." I remember a pastor say that we need to pray with all our might. Beg God for what you want with all your might and he will listen to your cry! God will not save you from a crash if you don't beg. He wants you to beg with all your strength! Just for kicks, because he already knows tomorrow.

If you pray to have a relationship with God, then what do you call a relationship? I suppose you have to know a person deeply, hold conversations about so many things, be able to identify the character, etc. So, you pray and you call it a conversation, right? He talks back? You say yes and believe that the voices you hear in your head are him talking. What does his voice sound like? If it doesn't sound like you, you should look into getting a psych evaluation. If it sounds like you, it is you. You are answering your own questions by imagining what you think he would answer. If it sounds like someone else you know, you probably leave the God responsibility on your pastor, leaders, parents, etc. You might not even know it. How do you know his character? By what the Bible says? He's mean. Cruel. Sexist, Really, he is confusing. Unless you cherry pick. If you pray to have a relationship with God, you are really having a relationship with a delusion. If you say, it's not a voice, it's more like a conviction of what he is saying to me, that is the result of what you have learned about him organizing your thoughts in ways that seem to reflect his character. It makes sense, because that is exactly what he would say, so it must be him! No, it's you critically thinking what he would say.

So, did they not pray hard enough? They probably did. Thing is, either God ignored them (and knew he would), someone else prayed harder for them to die (and God knew about that, too, all the while they were praying their asses off), it didn't seem like begging, the relationship sucked, or God doesn't doesn't exist. You pick.

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I just saw a thread "what is the point of prayer"... I guess my post here should have gone there.

[Tonus]

Luke 11
9 “So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

11 “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for[f] a fish, will give him a snake instead? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

When people who have left Christianity point to the failure of those verses, we are told that we must not have "a/s/ked" the right way. Yet there are no qualifiers there aside from the implication that you make the effort and god will respond. Min's thread title is sarcastic, but the point is relevant: why does anyone have to try hard enough to get closer to god when scripture seems to tell us that he's practically standing right next to the door, ready to shower us with holy spirit and all kinds of gifts before we even ring the doorbell?

[Doubting Thomas]

No one said anything about reciting the Lord's prayer.

But yet they do, verbatim. I know plenty of Protestants who may pray "freestyle," but yet they do recite the Lord's Prayer, often after deriding Catholics for reciting their prayers (including the Lord's Prayer).

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God knows everything, right? He knows what you will do, say, ask, and everything that he will throw (or "allow") your way. There are no surprises.

I've often wondered this. Prayer is totally useless and a waste of time because:

If you pray for something to happen, and it's God's will that it happen, it was going to happen anyway. So praying for it to happen is a waste of time.

If you pray for something to happen, and it's not God's will, it will never happen anyway. So praying for it to happen is a waste of time.

God is supposed to be all-knowing, so if there is something in particular that you need, he already knows it. So praying for him to deliver, whether it's his will or not, is a waste of time. And frankly, what kind of sick fuck is God who knows you're starving but refuses to send you food after you pray for it?

Prayer is nothing but mental masturbation.

[Drich]

That is confusing. Asking god for things is not prayer,but asking for bread makes it a prayer.

Wanting what God wants for you and you asking Him for it is a prayer.

Your asking God for what you want despite what He has asked you to ask Him for is just a petition and God is not obligated to 'grant your wish.'

Unless you mean that deviating from the template (ie, asking for anything that isn't daily bread) negates the prayer. But in texts like the one Min quoted, there are no specifics and only one requirement (have faith). As with so much of the Bible, this leaves the "rules" of prayer open to many interpretations.

That it is why we are charged in taking everything the bible says and create a understanding that does not conflict or contradict any of it.

I know, I know... everyone else has it wrong.

'Everyone else' simply understands what they can phatom based on what scripture they have exposed themselves to. That is why Christianity is considered a journey or a walk with God. We are all at different points in that walk. Which does not mean that if someone is behind you he is wrong. The only time it becomes 'wrong' is when you know that something is not right yet you stagnate in your faith and do not seek a better understanding.

---

Please bear with me, this is my first post on these particular forums and i'm still trying to work out the etiquette.

We've had this discussion before. Short answer is: God is a title and not a Name. As in God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. Or If you perfer something a little more trestial It's like saying Mr, president. We only have one president that is head up the United States, but many different indivisuals have held that office and shared that title.

"I am the LORD, and there is no other; Besides Me there is no God. I will gird you, though you have not known Me; That men may know from the rising to the setting of the sun That there is no one besides Me. I am the LORD, and there is no other"

But when Jesus was on earth there were 2 as he was also god according to your interpretation? You can't have 2 "Mr Presidents" at the same time.

We have currently have 5 Mr. Presidents, for they do not loose their title when they leave office.

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So Yahweh being the original God and Jesus being the second are now only called God in an honorary sense and the presiding god is now the holy spirit?

Drop the president analogy as it only describes one aspect of the understanding of God. (In that the word God is a title and not a name.) To understand the relationship between the personages of the God head Try going with one goverment 3 branches.

There are now 3 "entities" all sat in heaven called using the title God?

One goverment 3 branches.
Executive, Judicial, Legislative, Each branch is a form or encarnation of goverment but not an indivisual goverment unto itself. In the case of this goverment it takes all three branches to form the one goverment that persides of the United States. Like wise God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are all Considered The God of Creation.

surely that means there are more than one God? Also, another entity can also come along and claim to be god?

How many Goverments currently perside over the United States?

This seems to be what you are saying.

How about now?

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luke 11 cinny.

Luke 11
9 “So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

11 “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for[f] a fish, will give him a snake instead? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
That's not a disclaimer Dich. In fact it basically says that your fucktard god will actually give even better than your own family because he's the holy fucking king of the world ... and moreover that he WON'T give you something negative in it's place.

how about now, Christ Clearly states what your prayer should be about.

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Didn't read the whole thread, but here goes...

Why do you ask God for anything?

Because we want or need.

If you pray to have a relationship with God, then what do you call a relationship? I suppose you have to know a person deeply, hold conversations about so many things, be able to identify the character, etc. So, you pray and you call it a conversation, right? He talks back?

Talk, back only once. But He has communicated each and everytime I seek direction. For me most of which are based on answer questions. I have only read the bible once in chuncks or sections it it took me a couple of years to do it. But when I seek an answer I know where to look. Even if that answer is found in the obscure corners of the bible I do not know very well. I'll get a 'direction' and simply start reading and will be supprised when I read across the answer I was looking for.

You say yes and believe that the voices you hear in your head are him talking. What does his voice sound like?

He sends 'messengers' their voices vary.

How do you know his character? By what the Bible says?

yes

He's mean. Cruel. Sexist, Really, he is confusing.

So?

So, did they not pray hard enough? They probably did. Thing is, either God ignored them (and knew he would), someone else prayed harder for them to die (and God knew about that, too, all the while they were praying their asses off), it didn't seem like begging, the relationship sucked, or God doesn't doesn't exist. You pick.

-or- Maybe the boy died so that that pastor could have a revelation or come to a different understanding of prayer. Or maybe the boy died so we could have this talk. Or maybe the boy died because he was sick and did not want to live anymore.

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Luke 11
9 “So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

11 “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for[f] a fish, will give him a snake instead? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

When people who have left Christianity point to the failure of those verses, we are told that we must not have "a/s/ked" the right way. Yet there are no qualifiers there aside from the implication that you make the effort and god will respond. Min's thread title is sarcastic, but the point is relevant: why does anyone have to try hard enough to get closer to god when scripture seems to tell us that he's practically standing right next to the door, ready to shower us with holy spirit and all kinds of gifts before we even ring the doorbell?

The Qualifier is that one must A/S/K Not ask and seek or just ask and not seek or ask and knock and not seek.

We ask in prayer, we seek in reading the bible, church and in forums like this, we knock by repeating this process. And we continue this process the rest of our lives. It's not a one time thing. I still A/S/K

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But yet they do, verbatim.

I did not say people don't. I simply stated that it is a model of prayer. and then I gave an example of prayer based completely on that model, plugging in my own specifics to make that prayer my own.

[Tonus]

Wanting what God wants for you and you asking Him for it is a prayer.

Why would I need to ask god to provide me with what he wants for me? What you are describing is that god wants something for me, knows what it is, and knows it will be beneficial for me. But he won't give it to me unless I ask?

That it is why we are charged in taking everything the bible says and create a understanding that does not conflict or contradict any of it.

2,000 years of trying and there is still no interpretation that does that, as far as I can tell. Instead, there seem to be even more denominations of Christianity. I think this speaks poorly of the Bible, that it is beyond the scope of its audience to make proper sense of it.

'Everyone else' simply understands what they can phatom based on what scripture they have exposed themselves to.

This also strikes me as a flaw in the book, that it is so easy to get the wrong understanding by reading just parts of it. Maybe I'm just picky, but I think a guide book from a supreme and wondrous creator should be so amazing that reading even just parts of it would knock our socks off, so that we'd want to read all of it over and over and learn the secrets of the universe (or whatever it is that the supreme creator wants it to tell us). Instead, we get a book that is so easy to misunderstand and misinterpret that after centuries of effort we're farther apart than ever.

The Qualifier is that one must A/S/K Not ask and seek or just ask and not seek or ask and knock and not seek.

But that's just more of what I was talking about. You have created a god that is supposed to be extremely difficult to "find." So that anyone who doesn't find him simply didn't know how to look, or wasn't persistent enough, or whatever other reasons can be used to explain why someone who made a sincere effort to find god didn't find him.

I'm just not impressed by a god that seems determined to lead people astray for reasons that I can't fathom. He seems to be toying with us out of sheer spite.

[ronedee]

God is a dick.

Particularly since he took out an unborn child, presumably without the mother's consent. This is a class C felony in Indiana.

Humans do it all the time! Usually w/o the fathers consent. On demand too....No felony required!

53 Million burned since 1973.

[Something completely different]

Particularly since he took out an unborn child, presumably without the mother's consent. This is a class C felony in Indiana.

Humans do it all the time! Usually w/o the fathers consent. On demand too....No felony required!

53 Million burned since 1973.

Do you understand the meaning of the word "consent"????

If you do, then show how all these abortions were done without the mothers consent!