Talk Elections

Many Christians claim that their god, through prayer can heal physical and mental ailments. People have come forward to testify that they have been cured of tumours, cancer and semi-paralysis for example through prayer. Medical science would contend however that spontaneous recovery is not out of the question; cancer can go into remission etc. Also such recoveries are recorded in people who are not religious or indeed of a different religion and attributed to their god and may include a larger element of ‘human intervention’ than the sufferer would care to admit.

However what would assist the religious in their claim, would be evidence that there has been recovery from illnesses that specifically cannot be explained away or ‘mended’ through medicine. Two examples perhaps would be a quadriplegic and a child with significant physical and mental disabilities. Yet there have been no reliable reports of bones and sinew growing back to form legs and feet, no reports of pathways reforming in the brain and children regaining their abilities. Why is god able to ‘rid’ countless people of cancer, sore backs and every ailment you cant think of but can’t re-grow lost limbs through prayer? Would that not mean that he is perhaps not particularly skilled in his abilities and instead only heals illnesses and conditions that can already be (if the person is lucky) treated or that the body can recover from independently? Would that not lead you to believe that there is no intervention at all?

Past experiences suggest to me that all supernatural phenomena are fabrications people use for making sense of things in the world that are unknown, unknowable, or otherwise difficult to sort out using their limited resources, intellect, rationality, and the (perhaps inescapably) imperfect understandings of reality. I am open to the possibility that a God or gods exist, and that such a higher power could be capable of healing people in a seemingly miraculous fashion but in practice - at least from my perspective - it seems like a pretty impractical, fanciful belief to espouse.

What do you mean "no reports of pathways reforming in the brain"? People have been known to recover or develop out of all sorts of neurological problems - whether you want to call it a miracle or just examples of neuroplasticity.  People have long believed they have been healed of something medical science can't explain, then some one comes along with a possible explanation.  But whether something is a miracle for someone doesn't have much to do with whether there's a scientific explanation, finally. It comes down to something they hope for that someone told them can't happen, and then there it is.

I meant someone who is seriously mentally disabled with retardation, cognitive difficulties and severe brain damage. That is pretty much non reversible.

Speaking from personal experience, God can and does heal people. Alfweich, limbs being restored from amputation was common at the Azusua St. revival. I know a girl who much like myself had a condition which needed the use of glasses to correct. I was there when the healing took place.

Really? Were these people ever documented? Were they seen by a doctor? Because the growing of bone, cartilage, muscle, veins and skin from a 'stump' into a brand new leg would be world news. Seriously; it would make the first face transplant seem like childs play.

Andrew, you’ve known me and my testimony for a while now.  So, how it is you are asking for documented miraculous cases when you can’t even explain my own testimony, which I have documented in great detail?

I'd imagine God made sure to include some convenient reason that this couldn't be documented. ;)

You regrew a limb that was cut off?

You're going wildly off topic. I can summarise; as a rationalist your testimony of your religious 'revelation' is as relevant to me as is the testimony of someone who found Allah in the desert, someone who espouses the benefits of Dienetics or a farmer who has told me about his voyage to Sirius in a spacecraft. Any supernatural intervention is in essense a 'miracle' as it would go against our understanding of the world around us. Even if you choose to believe in the 'supernatural' then you still have to contend with others who believe in it to, but not in the manner to which you believe. To another man your testimony would be considered a 'deception' as it does not correlate with their understanding of the supernatural.

I would advise you to read David Hume's An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding

Andrew, your argument seems based upon the faulty premise that if there is a God, he should do whatever we want him to, and he should do it now and he should do it without charge.  (Sort of like how stereotypical left-wingers expect government to work, but I digress.) The problem is, the Bible in both the Old Testament and the New Testament makes it quite clear that Elohim does not work that way.

You know what I’m referring to - the provision God gave me to fulfill my God given commission.

Why do my commission and testimony so perfectly match the bible?  Why does the provision given to me so perfectly match my commission and testimony?

Unless we’re discussing extra-biblical history, you know my arguments are organic (I didn’t glean them from other people) and not cut and pasted from the internet.  You know I only use the bible to interpret the bible.  You’ve see others, time and time again, come on here with something cut and pasted from the “experts” (both Christian and non-Christian), yet seen me effortlessly pinpoint where they logically jumped the tracks.

You’ve seen me time and time again enter a scriptural argument and not even flinch at the credentials of whatever author the poster is quoting.  Now, on the surface you may find that arrogant, except for the fact that, from your POV, my interpretation best matches the intent of the NT writers.  In addition, you also respect my approach to scripture.  You know I use many built-in safe guards (e.g. using 2 or 3 witnesses) in order to keep me balanced doctrinally.  And you know that I’m not pushing any denominational agenda, for you’ve seen me self-correct when the scriptural evidence warrants.

You know my testimony does not advocate one group or church over another.  In fact, I wasn’t even a member of any group at the time of my testimony.  Furthermore, even though I wasn’t a member of a group at the time of my testimony, I did seek out a church, so I am not seeking my own followers, nor am I advocating other Christians to remain without a church.  What’s more, when I did find a church, I didn’t attempt a coup or even to rise through the ranks, rather I stayed true to my own calling (commission) and am content with being a Sunday school teacher.  And even though my testimony claims God spoke to me, I’ve never attempted to climb to a position within my church God didn’t call me into.

In fact, I was so outside of an organized church when I was saved that night alone in my apartment in Oct 92, I didn’t even know whether my experience was common or uncommon, and I wondered for a day or two if I were the only one on earth God was talking to and if it meant I would become a minister.  But I feel back on what God actually said to me and he did NOT tell me to become a pastor, rather he simply called me to express his truth to others.

Also, the truth that I am advocating is not something wildly half-baked – I’m not pulling a Joseph Smith – rather it focuses on the profoundness and the simplicity found in Christ.

So, how do you explain that my testimony, commission, and provision are completely “organic” (I didn’t glean them from other people) and in such agreement with the bible?

So, when presented with the evidence you seek from Christians, you then require it be proven superior to the evidence of other religions?

Yeah, I do, which is why I asked a rhetorical question. Afleitch was asking for documentation about a specific claim about amputated limbs growing back. Your testimony involves something happening to you that wasn't a demonstrable physical change, whereas the claim in question was about something that clearly would have been a demonstrable physical change if it indeed happened. Do you not understand why the two things are in different categories, hence why your testimony isn't relevant to the question?

Considering the "evidence" for other religions can hardly be called as such, I believe that that was indeed what he was implying.

That always tends to happen. ;)

Well, since I have had neither a limb restored nor even a limb that has fallen off (knock on wood), why don’t we stick to the category of claimed miracles we do have in hand?

I mean, what’s more impressive, the fact that Moses’ staff physically changed into a snake, or the fact that God’s spiritual provision to Moses granted him victory over Pharaoh to the glory of God?

Which is more impressive is irrelevant if neither of them happened. What source outside of the Bible do we have to confirm that this ever happened?

That wasn’t my argument. Besides, making it clear he ‘doesn’t work that way’ is the eternal cop out.

My argument was that if God ‘heals’ why do his abilities appear so limited? Why are his abilities limited to recoveries that have been documented numerous times, can happen to the religious and non religious alike from recovery from depression to aggressive cancers going into remission? None of which of course require a supernatural explanation. Now if someone recovered from something really serious, something completely inexplicable just once, that was without any medical explanation then that would be really impressive.

As I said, if a full leg including bone, tissue, veins, muscles and digits grew back because a believer prayed then wow; wouldn’t that be something! Wouldn’t that be proof! I mean just think of it, the doctor in awe, , no need for a prosthesis, medical experts swarming to find out more about it. Even if the person shunned the limelight it would still come to the attention of his doctor, or chiropractor or social security office. But nothing. I’m not asking for regular examples. Just one that could be looked at with the conclusion ‘well, it has to be a miracle’

Now examples I could have used just a few years back; face transplants for example, I can no longer use. Now it can be done by medical professionals. So they can do something that a few years ago was out of their reach, but god has never done for anyone who prayed. Do you see where I’m coming from?

Now we get claims of course; hokum snake handlers claiming people have recovered from everything because of prayer. It has been the entire basis of the claim for Mother Theresa’s elevation to sainthood (a routine recovery claimed to be supernatural) for example. Of course in all cases, there is usually a natural explanation. People who recover from cancer after undergoing treatment often thank god either with or above the professionals and science; that’s just human nature. But if godly assistance exists, then it’s only apparent in rather banal or if not banal, impressive but explainable recoveries. Which means he’s not particularly good at dealing with the truly inexplicable as no examples exist. If they did, they would help people believe would they not?

As I said, your argument is that if God doesn't make use of the abilities you want him to use, He must not be God.  As you point out, we can do things now that would have been considered miracles in ages past.  Perhaps God wasn't interested in keeping us from learning how to do them by doing them for us?  Perhaps that explains why he doesn't do other things your "I want it all and I want it now" philosophy demands he do?

No, his argument is that there's no evidence for the claim that God heals.

If you believe the claim that God miraculously heals people then how would you go about demonstrating that the claim is actually true? How would you go about distinguishing between the healing that occurs by natural process and those that occur by divine intervention?

Indeed. There is no evidence that god heals because claims made by those who say ‘he healed me’ can be countered by medical evidence to the contrary. However medical science is now in the domain of repairing injuries that have never been repaired before. A face can now be transplanted (alongside underlying work) to give someone a new face after a serious deformity. This was impossible 10 years ago. When it was impossible in science, did we ever see any out of the blue examples of it happening to confirm that god could cure it without scientific intervention? Did we ever see anyone pray to make the impossible possible through God? No.

Also, now that it is possible, do we have people praying and it therefore happening without medical intervention as a result? No. Have we possibly had people undergo a once impossible surgery and then thank god, even though god never intervened prior to mankind learning how to repair it? Yes. So we therefore have people claiming that ‘god heals’ if it is something that mankind can already heal or that the body can spontaneously overcome (tumours, cancers etc)

If god had any abilities at all, surely examples of the impossible being cured would be occurring before medical science caught up or before study of the human body caught up? Indeed, now that we have caught up, some of the ‘miracles’ of the NT are in fact fairly banal. Even the very heart of the story; the death and resurrection of Jesus comes under scrutiny;

Can a man survive a crown of thorns? (yes)
3 days without water? (yes)
Being nailed to the cross (yes – see Meiji Japan and countless modern examples)
Being pierced in the side (yes – see contemporary skeletons of gladiators or a trip to a modern A&E award)
Being pronounced dead (yes – compare our understanding of what it means to be ‘dead’ which in itself is not 100% accurate with the understanding of the ancient world re comas, the Glasgow Scale etc)
Being in a cold tomb? (yes – ideal conditions in fact for resuscitation)

All survivable by themselves and together. If we take the NT account at it’s word (debatable if we should, but we can make the concession); what is more likely? That Jesus was not ‘dead’ however much the odds are against any many surviving all those injuries and concussion or coma…or that he was dead as we know dead to be and he defied the impossible by coming back to life through his god.

If there weren't documentation, then how did I find out? I've been to the historical site of that revival. There are plenty of books on the miracles that occurred there.

So where is the documentation then? Who had lost a limb previously, what documentation shows that they really had lost it, and what documentation shows that their limb grew back? What specific source makes this claim, and what evidence is given to back it? Come on man, give us some specifics.

Dang, Dibble, I waited nearly a week to open this thread because I thought the response to my comment would require my having to write a long post, and I wanted to make sure I had the time to do it properly.  But you proved me wrong – there was no need for me to wait, for you step-sided, once again, my whole point.

You simply refuse to turn on the lights to examine the miracle staring you in the face (most likely due to the fact you can’t explain it away), and instead attempt to discount miracles you don’t readily have available to examine.  

You know in my last post I only referenced Moses as an analogy to demonstrate a simple point: that the provision God gave me and the results of that provision, are more impressive than a physical healing.  So, since you don’t have a physical miraculous healing in hand to examine, but you do have in hand a more impressive miracle, why not examine what’s available to examine?

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You've known me long enough to know I don’t run around half-cocked – I don’t claim God is constantly talking to me and/or giving me signs.  But I do claim to know his voice.  And I do claim to have been given a commission by his voice and the provisions to fulfill that commission.

Now, you obviously can’t examine my claim of God speaking to me and giving me a commission, but you can examine some of the provisions he gave me and whether or not I was able to accomplish my claimed commission through the use of those provisions.

So why not examine it?

John 3:20 “Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. 21 But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God.”

You asked a loaded question, so of course I sidestepped your point.


I see no miracle staring me in the face. I instead see you making claims that can't be distinguished from delusions.


Your beliefs changed and so your actions changed accordingly. That is not miraculous since beliefs inform actions, regardless of whether or not those beliefs are based on the supernatural. Only whether or not God actually talked to you to change those beliefs is related to the subjects of miracles, and as you outright admit here that claim can't be examined.

again, you're ignoring the provisions.  but, that's ok, I'm not really interested in going through it.

And again, the provisions are irrelevant if you aren't actually talking with God.

you're talking out of both sides of your mouth.   you're basically saying, "you miraculous healing is irrelevant if you weren't actually healed by God."  On one hand you're asking for proof God has done something miraculous, then on the other, you say, "doesn't matter what happen if God didn't actually do it."

If not from God, then how do you explain the provisions and how they align with the supposedly fake commission and testimony.

No, I'm saying that I don't buy that your healing was miraculous. If you can't demonstrate something is actually a miracle, then a question about how impressive a particular miracle is really isn't particularly interesting.


Since I don't have a time machine and a remote brain scanner to see exactly what was going on in your head at the time I can't say anything for certain. However, given at the time you were already studying the Bible I don't particularly find it odd that if you had a religious experience which meshes with the subject matter you were studying. As I've told you before people in other religions have had experiences that match their religions. I find it far more plausible that you and other such people who have experiences such as this entered into some brain state, euphoric or otherwise, that you had not experience with before and used a religious belief to explain it.

It's not all that different from people who claim to have been abducted by UFOs. Quite often their testimony matches that of various media, but do you take them seriously just because they make a claim that matches up with something else that isn't exactly a reliable source of information? No, of course you wouldn't, so why should I do so with your testimony?

I am not talking about testing my conversion experience after read just 3 chapters of Galatians, which you can’t test directly.  Rather I am talking about testing the provision God gave me during that conversion experience.

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This is a perfect example.  If this abducted person claimed to have been given new skills (in an area he was neither acquainted with nor trained in) that fit a specific commission he was given while abducted…and successfully completed that mission, and had demonstrated his skills in your presence time and time again over a period of years…it should give you more than a moments pause.

So it is in my case – you have much more than a life changing experience on your hands, and you even have more than observable results of a completed commission.  You have the demonstrable skill (provision).

Ok, for the sake of refreshing everyone's memory and for the sake of me not arguing with a strawman if you really want to continue this can you give the specifics of your provision - exactly what skills have you been granted? Be succinct if possible, you don't need to go over the whole story again.

My testimony has God opening my eyes to the meaning of scripture and anointing me with his Spirit and commissioning me to go preach the truth to my friends in a legalistic church…and the provision he gave me was the ability understanding and teach the scripture and to dissect doctrinal error.

Now, if my testimony is simply a figment of my imagination, then why is it that you, a non-believer with no denominational biases, agree with my interpretation, even though I have had no formal training?

So not only are the results of my testimony clearly seen (I was friends with several families in the upper leadership of the World Wide Church of God, and I was summoned before it’s leadership, involved the world headquarters in Pasadena CA, used as an instrument in the breakup the World Wide Church of God, helped bring numerous members of those families to the truth, and ended up marrying one of its members and have had four kids with her)…but the provision God gave me to do all that is clearly visible.

In fact, my provision is so clear to you, that you probably can’t name one other Christian, famous or non-famous, whose interpretation you agree with more than mine.

Because you were much more informed of the actual contents of the book at the time, having read them many times after your experience, and once I was informed of those contents appropriately I have this skill called "reading comprehension" that allows me to interpret the contents. I happened to agree with your interpretation on the matters at hand. That's hardly miraculous.

Also, are you saying you didn't have "reading comprehension" in your skill set before your experience?


Churches collapse and schism. People convert to and from different denominations. This happens in pretty much every religion. It's not evidence for a miracle.


You seem to have forgotten I have still argued against some of your interpretations on some things in the Bible - slavery for instance. The particular agreement in interpretation you reference is largely in regards to what is considered a sin in the Bible, like homosexuality.

EDIT - also who goes to hell and who doesn't. But honestly, by making me have these interpretations all you did was convince me of was that your god was more monstrous that I had previously imagined. Why are you proud of that?

1)   my conversion experience included many doctrinal details (like the fire in my bones) that I was so unaware of at the time, I thought I was the only one on earth who had experienced such a thing.
2)   And I immediately started to be able to digest the “meat” scripture, so it wasn’t a skill I “developed” by reading it many times.  And this is provable in the fact that even though I am untrained, I was able in my own spare time to interpret it better than anyone you’ve read or listened to.  If it simply came through study, then why are you in agreement with me and not those who have had more hours of study?

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No, I couldn’t understand the bible before that night.  I had attempted to read sections of it before, but reading it back then was like was like being lost in a vast ocean.  It was only that night that everything just began to click and I could spiritually understand what was written.

So, if my “reading compression” in regard to the bible was not a gift from God, then why did you need me to bring you into a better interpretation?!




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So, it’s just a freak coincidence that I was in exactly the right place (having spent dozens of nights at the homes of several of the most important members of its leadership) at exactly the right time (’92-‘95) and had exactly the right skill (ability to correctly layout NT theology as it related to that church) – a skill I didn’t have before my conversion?

That’s a pretty huge coincidence – but it doesn’t come close to the evidence of my God-given provision.

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Yes, I know you ignore the book of Philemon and other passages in an attempt to claim Christianity promotes slavery…but name a single Christian, whose OVERALL interpretation (even when you’re being a obvious hack as in the case of slavery) you are more in agreement with?

Let me be very clear:  I am neither claiming perfect interpretation nor complete knowledge of scripture.  But I am claiming a true calling with true provisions.  Provisions sufficient enough to successfully complete my commission, and sufficient enough to run circles around the vast majority of those with formal training.  And not because I am more intelligent than them, but because me calling is REAL.  Nor did I seek, desire, of choose my calling.  In fact, I had no knowledge of what it meant to be called by God.

And not only is my provision evident to you, but the details of my testimony (the unstructured setting of my apartment, receiving the Spirit after understand but a brief message, the fire in my bones, God speaking to me and revealing to me that the events of my life that led me to have contact with the World Wide Church of God were all planned out by God years before that night, receiving a commission from God, being given provisional gifts from God to accomplish the commission that were not based on man’s strength, being led by God throughout my mission, succeeding in my mission, having my life defined by that success) are in complete agreement with the bible and mesh with many biblical examples of people being called into God’s service.

And you are aware of this and see a parallel between the attributes of my calling and those biblical examples, whether it be Moses’ calling, or Paul’s calling (not that I am equating myself to them).  So, not only does my provision meet your interpretational agreement, but the details of my calling are reflected in many biblical examples.

So, not only does my testimony and commission agree with scripture, but the provision given to me is in agreement with the bible, and is, overall, the best interpretation of the bible you’ve ever heard  -an interpretation you didn’t even share until I explained it to you.

So, my provision not only is able to preach the Gospel to believers, it also presents an overall interpretation that even non-believers like yourself agree is understandable and the best undistorted version of NT theology.

2Cor 4:1 Therefore, since through God’s mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart. 2 Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.

Various humans have reported "out of body" experiences and attribute it to all kinds of things, and those who later experience them often attribute it to whatever the first similar thing they read says it is. Humans have common strange experiences like that. Why should I treat your "fire in the bones" thing any differently? How do you know that the biblical author who wrote about that didn't just have similar experiences and falsely attributed it to the biblical god, and that upon reading about it you just latched onto the explanation yourself?


By the time you and I came into contact you'd read the Bible multiple times and had years of practice at evangelizing. To claim otherwise is intellectually dishonest. And as I stated before, you simply informed me of passages in the Bible that I didn't already know. New information that contradicts an interpretation demands old information be reinterpreted in a new light - it's that way for pretty much anything.


Couldn't, or didn't care to put in the effort? Didn't you only start seriously reading the Bible in the first place so you could get married to the woman you live? Lack of interest in a subject often makes it hard to get into it, especially if the subject is a large book. I certainly didn't care about interpreting the Bible before I started caring about how religion affects the world, so I just went along with the feel good interpretation that my peers did.


As stated, you simply gave me new information on the Bible's contents to process. Had I actually read those parts beforehand I would likely have already had a different interpretation.


Why not? Improbable things happen to people all the time. Put together, how many improbable events does it take for someone to be put in a position where they might become a world leader, or a famous artist, or any number of things? Even as improbable as it is that any one person might get maneuvered into such a position, the sheer number of people in the world dictates that it's going to happen to some of us.