christian looking to understand athiests

[msid]

no because God created us with a free will and unless we ask him he cant change things that happen in our lives or our choices

What is free will?

its when you decide everything you want to do and make decisions in your life.  God cant force you to do anything because you have free will.  Eve had free will in the garden of eden and she could either eat or not eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil.  with her free will she decided to eat the fruit

[robvalue]

You didn't answer my question about prayer. What does God do to make changes? Does he alter other people's free will? Or what does he do?

If I pray that I'll get a job, that is asking for God to change the free will of the guy making the job decision.

[msid]

Curious.

What type of things have you or others prayed for that have come true? Are they ordinary every day things or big I can't believe it actually happened things? Do you think that your/others prayers might be self fulfilling, things that will happen more than likely with or without prayer?

Example: Every day I hope (pray?) that the mail is delivered. This comes true on 6 out of 7 days of the week.
Example: I hope (pray?) that my wife makes it home from the Stones concert safely. It happened.
Example: I hope (pray?) that my dog passes this level of sheep herding trial/certification. I happened eventually.

If you'd like me and others to take stock in the prayers coming true motivation for belief I'll need a lot more details.

a couple of examples are some people at my church 

a woman almost lost her legs because they were filled with fluid and God had told her years ago that he would heal her.  she continued praying and within a week her legs were almost back to normal and the doctor had no medical explanantion

a man at our church had his hip bone injured by being crushed between two boats in the navy,  the bone was never healed right but one prayer meeting when everyone started praying for him there was a loud snap and his hip was healed

a woman at our church was bitten by an ant in her bed and the bite spread. when she went to the doctor he said there was no ant that could cause that huge of a rash.  the bite swelled and covered a lot of her arm.  she and others prayed for healing and the bite was gone within a week

my brother had a lott of warts on his hands that were causing a lot of pain and he had about 20 in all.  he tried all kinds of creams and ointments.  he was prayed for and overnight every single wart was gone with no sign they were ever there

[Crossless2.0]

msid, not all Christians subscribe to the idea of free will. There is at least one member here (a born-again, non-denominational, Bible believing Christian) who maintains that the idea of free will is absolutely un-Biblical. In any case, it seems your holy book is crammed with examples of your god not taking such a hands-off approach out of respect for peoples' free will. Was Saul's alleged experience on the road to Damascus an example of your god not forcing the issue out of respect for someone's free will? What about Job? Or Jonah? Was Yahweh concerned about the free will of the Amalekite children whose slaughter he supposedly ordered? For that matter, if free will is something to be respected, then what's up with damnation for those who exercise it but don't reach the "correct" set of beliefs?

[SteelCurtain]

 am i required to only be in the introductions forum because im fine here

You aren't. I am on Tapatalk right now and made an assumption that this was in the intro forum. My apologies!

[msid]

You didn't answer my question about prayer. What does God do to make changes? Does he alter other people's free will? Or what does he do?

sorry im trying to reply to all of these, 
God will never change anyones free will but he can change circumstances and things through prayer. 
for instance our family needed a car because our old one broke down and we prayed for weeks and a friend of my parents was told by her eye doctor (about the same time we were praying) that her eyesight was too bad to drive,  she had known that it was bad for a while but she diddnt have any need to drive other then groceries and church which she had plans worked out for.  we got the car for a very low price and it is very nice and hasnt had any problems 


that is one expample where God changed circumstances with prayer

[Crossless2.0]

You didn't answer my question about prayer. What does God do to make changes? Does he alter other people's free will? Or what does he do?

sorry im trying to reply to all of these, 
God will never change anyones free will but he can change circumstances and things through prayer. 
for instance our family needed a car because our old one broke down and we prayed for weeks and a friend of my parents was told by her eye doctor (about the same time we were praying) that her eyesight was too bad to drive,  she had known that it was bad for a while but she diddnt have any need to drive other then groceries and church which she had plans worked out for.  we got the car for a very low price and it is very nice and hasnt had any problems 


that is one expample where God changed circumstances with prayer

Someone needed a car and (amazingly!) someone else was getting rid of one. That's some solid evidence, msid! You're right: it must have been Yahweh/Jesus/Superman. 

[Minimalist]

i see that most of you believe what you do because of lack of evidence that there is a God.  Personally i am a christian because of all the evidence ive seen and the ways ive seen him answer prayers.  ive had people come up to me and pray for problems that i was having that i hadnt told anyone.  ive had many prayers awnsered in ways that could only be explained by God.  I also completely understand everyone heres point of view

Great. Why not show us a bit of this evidence? Maybe you'll come up with something we've not seen before.

Unlikely, Stim.

[msid]

i see that most of you believe what you do because of lack of evidence that there is a God.  Personally i am a christian because of all the evidence ive seen and the ways ive seen him answer prayers.  ive had people come up to me and pray for problems that i was having that i hadnt told anyone.  ive had many prayers awnsered in ways that could only be explained by God.  I also completely understand everyone heres point of view

And then we hear stories about children dying of treatable illnesses because their parents believed in prayer over medicine. Prayer is not consistent enough to be considered good evidence. One person's evidence is not the same as another, but if there was any concrete evidence for any god, we wouldn't be debating his existence thousands of years after people started writing about him.

there are many different reasons why people die and Jesus isnt going to save every person who is prayed for.  death happens, its the result of the fall of man.

---

sorry im trying to reply to all of these, 
God will never change anyones free will but he can change circumstances and things through prayer. 
for instance our family needed a car because our old one broke down and we prayed for weeks and a friend of my parents was told by her eye doctor (about the same time we were praying) that her eyesight was too bad to drive,  she had known that it was bad for a while but she diddnt have any need to drive other then groceries and church which she had plans worked out for.  we got the car for a very low price and it is very nice and hasnt had any problems 


that is one expample where God changed circumstances with prayer

Someone needed a car and (amazingly!) someone else was getting rid of one. That's some solid evidence, msid! You're right: it must have been Yahweh/Jesus/Superman. 

i was explaining how God can change circumstances and not free will.  it wasnt meant to be solid evidence to convince anyone

[Crossless2.0]

And then we hear stories about children dying of treatable illnesses because their parents believed in prayer over medicine. Prayer is not consistent enough to be considered good evidence. One person's evidence is not the same as another, but if there was any concrete evidence for any god, we wouldn't be debating his existence thousands of years after people started writing about him.

there are many different reasons why people die and Jesus isnt going to save every person who is prayed for.  death happens, its the result of the fall of man.

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I have news for you. Death was happening long before the fictional events in your imaginary Eden.