Book of Acts: Pure Fantasy

[KichigaiNeko]

And you being unreasonable...meh

[Minimalist]

Sorry man. Just calling it as I see it. I understand the dilemma you have and the lack of proof I have.

Then open your eyes because you can't see anything.

I have no dilemma. Your god is as phony as every other god created by the human mind to soothe its fears. None of you have any evidence at all of your fables.

[Doubting Thomas]

Anyways, she went to Mexico on a missions trip and ran into a group of YWAMers (missions organization) who were at the same place as them. Through a series of events a mother accidentally dropped her baby on the fire. The baby suffered burns all over its body. The YWAMers gathered together and prayed for it and she watched as the baby's burns disappeared. At this time she did not believe God could do this. The YWAMers continued to pray for other sick people in the area and my friend's girlfriend was describing to me how she saw a man's arm grow back...she said it was the weirdest thing and freaked her right out.

Video or it didn't happen.

[Zen Badger]

Have you ever seen an amputee healed after praying?

Have you ever seen an amputee healed after praying?

Nope I haven't. I was thinking about writing a story from one of by best friend's girlfriend but it's really not mine to tell you know what I mean? I could possibly butcher it or get some facts wrong. For what it's worth I'll tell it to you but just know that this from my best friend's girlfriend.

She told me this a couple months ago over a Skype conversation with my best friend. She was raised in the church but hasn't been following God since she moved out (which was 3 years ago). She came from a very conservative background and didn't believe that God could do supernatural things. Anyways, she went to Mexico on a missions trip and ran into a group of YWAMers (missions organization) who were at the same place as them. Through a series of events a mother accidentally dropped her baby on the fire. The baby suffered burns all over its body. The YWAMers gathered together and prayed for it and she watched as the baby's burns disappeared. At this time she did not believe God could do this. The YWAMers continued to pray for other sick people in the area and my friend's girlfriend was describing to me how she saw a man's arm grow back...she said it was the weirdest thing and freaked her right out.

She's very distressed because she doesn't really believe in God. She's been raised her whole life in a Christian little box but now that she's moved out she has walked away from what she was raised as. But she has an internal dilemma which she was telling me about: she doesn't think that she believes in God but she believes in the supernatural because of the crazy things that she saw which have stuck with her.

This is the story that she told me. As far as I can see she has no reason to lie. She's not trying to prove anything. Yet this is from a third source so feel free to take it or leave it.

Love ya

---

More subjectivity... any wonder people will not debate you...

How can one debate the utterly delusional? He's a fruit cake - which is common among jesus freaks....speaking of which we seem to have exhibit "B" of that ilk right above.

Oh, boy. "Science" is under no obligation to explain why your fantasies can come true with "faith." The problem is yours to explain how faith can do jack shit.

It's called "burden of proof" and you seem to have no comprehension of it.

Sorry man. Just calling it as I see it. I understand the dilemma you have and the lack of proof I have.

Love ya

Bullshit pal.
Where are the videos or photos?
What are the names of the people involved?
Where did these events happen and when?
You forget that we're not credulous halfwits like your christen buddies. We want evidence.
And it always amazes me ghat in this age of video cameras everywhere no one thought to record these truly astonishing events.
So again, without evidence your claims are lies.

[KichigaiNeko]

Indonesian?? I am thinking this was debunked as pure fantasy and a con-job on a very gullible muslim public in Indonesia twenty or thirty years ago

Sorry yoshii...no sale.

[Doubting Thomas]

If my baby was accidentally dropped on the fire and was badly burned, I'd be incredibly pissed off that a bunch of religious idiots would sit around and pray for him to get better, rather than summoning medical treatment.

[Faith No More]

If some guy's arm spontaneously grew back it would be international news. Even if the poeple around him didn't say anything, the first person he bumps into on the street that knew him would be like, "Um, what the fuck? Didn't you used to have one less arm? Let me take a picture so I can put this on the internet."

[Doubting Thomas]

Exactly. I don't know why Christians think they can pass off these urban legends as fact and expect us to believe it. Sorry, but an unnamed friend of a friend is not reliable eyewitness testimony. Not to mention the fact that we've heard these claims of prayer miracles many, many times but have not once ever seen a scrap of evidence.

But I can pray and make my short leg grow longer to match my other one.

[DeistPaladin]

Exactly. I don't know why Christians think they can pass off these urban legends as fact and expect us to believe it. Sorry, but an unnamed friend of a friend is not reliable eyewitness testimony. Not to mention the fact that we've heard these claims of prayer miracles many, many times but have not once ever seen a scrap of evidence.

Could it be because the very Gospel accounts, the only detailed sources we have on Jesus, are themselves urban legends that they think morph into "historical documents" just on their say-so?

Look at the Book of Mark, the first Gospel on which the others are based. It's by an anonymous witness, said to be John Mark, who never met Jesus personally. He's believed to have heard the story from Peter, a man who couldn't have even been present for many of the parts of Jesus' alleged life (the 40 days in the wilderness, the trial by Pilate, etc.). So essentially, Mark is anonymous hearsay of hearsay written down 40+ years after the events, the final product of which we know was significantly changed in at least one instance (Mark 16 was later expanded).

Anyone who can seriously call this a "reliable eye-witness account" has strange ideas of what constitutes "evidence".

[brotherlylove]

Continuing the "Historical Documents! No, Really!" series, we now come to the Book of Acts.

One of the things that lept out at me when I read the Bible cover to cover was how chock full it was of overt supernatural activity, where Yahweh apparently felt neither shyness nor concern for "free will" as he demonstrated his power in ways that could not be confused with natural coincidence. Rivers turned to blood, columns of fire killed blasphemers and Yahweh once gave a speech to the entire nation of Judea (Judges, chapter 1). When I put the Bible down and looked about, the universe couldn't offer a more dramatic contrast with the alternate reality depicted in the Bible. The world we know today is one dominated by natural law, where the most Yahweh can ever seem to accomplish is to appear on a piece of toast.

(Maybe he's just gotten old and feeble or perhaps finally getting laid 2000 years ago caused him to seriously mellow out). Sorry, I digress. Ignore this paragraph.

The Book of Acts takes similar flights of fancy. It goes beyond asserting that Yahweh, Jesus, angels and demons can perform miracles or work magic. Mere mortals can do the same with just enough faith. Such acts of magic include:

1. Speaking in tongues (Acts 2:1-14, 19:6-9)
2. Cause earthquakes (4:31)
3. Cast out demons (5:16, 8:7)
4. See God (7:55)
5. Heal Palsy (9:33-34)
6. Raise the dead (9:36-end)
7. Cause blindness (13:11)
8. Heal a crippled person (14:8-10)
9. Heal the sick (19:11-12. 28:8-9)
10. Survive poisonous snake bite (28:4-5)

Did I mention that these are not angels or Jesus doing these things but mere mortals by the power of their faith? And should I mention all the verses with Yahweh, Jesus, The Holy Spirit or various angels speak to mortals? Or overtly supernaturally act on their behalf?

One more time, it bears repeating, these were the acts of MERE MORTALS

OK, so the Christian has two choices:

1. Believe that such magic is possible for mortals and that angels do get personally involved in real life, in which case you are so loony that there's no point in having a rational conversation with you.

2. Admit that the Book of Acts is kind of fanciful and shouldn't be regarded as a historical document.

And before anyone whines about my "prejudice against the supernatural", all I'm doing is operating by the same rules we all do in every day life. ECREE. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Since you don't lend the same credence to the supernatural claims of other religions, you should understand why I don't let such credence to yours.

So, if I understand your argument correct, if you affirm that miracles are possible, the conversation is over. Your evidence that miracles are ridiculous is that we do not see any miracles happening today.

Well, first of all, there are many reports all over the world and throughout history of miracles occuring, supernatural healings and the like, and encounters with angels. I am going to assume that you will dismiss every single one of those as delusional. If that is the case, I will remind you that personal testimony does count as evidence, especially when corroborated. Many of the things we know about history comes solely from personal testimony.

Second, it is simply fallacious to say that because you do not see any miracles today, that they couldn't have happened in the past. Your justification for this belief seems to be that because God openly revealed Himself at that time, that He should be doing so today. This just doesn't follow. First, there was no such thing as universal communication at that time. His miracles were not witnessed by so many, and were limited to a small area. So, although He was acting openly, it was not to the entire world, but in general, only to the israelites.

God could also have good reasons for not openly revealing His existence to the world. I would say, as you mentioned, that it is a free will issue. Obviously, God could reveal Himself to the world at any time. That He does not do so is to offer His creatures the free will to choose for or against Him without undue coercion. This does not imply that He does not act today with supernatural intervention. As I mentioned earlier, there are millions of reports of this kind of intervention, which I am fairly sure you will dismiss out of hand. The point is though, with the universal and instananeous communication that we have, which could provide indisputable proof to the world that He exists, when He intervenes supernaturally it must be in ways that could not provide that sort of proof to the world.

As a deist, I also don't see how you can rule out supernatural intervention. Perhaps you can explain how supernatural intervention is incompatible with your deist beliefs? Do you think it is impossible for God to do so? You use the term ECREE, yet do you have any extraordinary evidence for a deist God supernaturally creating the Universe? If not, then why do you demand it for other supernatural claims?

Also, in the Christian worldview, we accept the supernatural claims of other religions. What we reject is their explanation for these events. What scripture says is that Satan also has supernatural power, and as the bible indicates, he can disguise himself as an angel of light, and his ministers, ministers of righteousness. He has the supernatural power to create what the bible calls "lying signs and wonders". He can back up belief in a false god with supernatural evidence.