Prayer is useless?

[H2Andy]

or we are flying through space at thousands of miles per hour and no one is in charge. :06:

actually, Newton is in charge

 

[Green_Manelishi]

If god created the universe than who created god? God can not just merely exist, he had to come from somewhere. By the way, isnt the bible man made?
Green, if you question how this world could just sprang into existence...how could you not question how your god came to be?

It is a rather mute point as nobody will ever know the answer...we can't even get the facts straight about what happened a minute ago let alone billions of years ago.

No, He did not have to "come from" somewhere. He only needed to be. Everything else was created by Him. That's what is meant by omnipotent. To say nothing of omniscient and omnipresent.

 

[Potapko]

I asked someone at work what faith meant to them, or how they could explain it. THis person is very religious and was raised and is a practicing catholic. She said "to put it simply, its like being at a traffic light...knowing that when its red,people will stop and its safe for the green to go...that is faith"

well....i am not sure about that....i always look even if its green....and make my own decision about going....lol

Faith Is for Wimps?
From my own experience and from listening to many objections to Christianity, I have found that the subject of faith is often offensive to the nonbeliever. My own thinking was that faith was for the weak-minded, for little old ladies, and for those near death. Yet every belief you and I have about history, other countries, science, biology, etc., exists because of faith. You only believe what you believe because you believed the person who told you the information you believe. You don't know who discovered America. You simply have faith that what was told to you is indeed true. Neither do you know if General Custer died at the hands of Indians, or if Napoleon really existed.

We can't live without faith. Try it. Say to yourself, "Today, I refuse to exercise any faith at all." Then before you eat your corn flakes, go through every flake, scientifically testing it before you eat it. Refuse to trust that the manufacturers have obeyed health regulations and mixed the ingredients correctly. Do the same tests on the milk before you pour it on the corn flakes, in faith. You don't know that the milk processors have done their job and given you pure milk. They may have mixed in something that could be harmful to your health. Don't trust the sugar producers either. God only knows what they did while they were processing the sugar. Check the microscope and other tools used for your analysis. How can you really trust that the information you gather from them is reliable? Don't trust your weight to the chair at the breakfast table. Don't believe today's weather report or any news item until you actually go to the proper location and see for yourself if what they would have you believe is true. Even then you will have to trust your natural senses (which can't always be trusted).

Before you drink your coffee, don't trust that the cup is perfectly clean. Wash it out yourself. Don't use untested water, in faith. We really don't know what's in it nowadays. It may be contaminated. Analyze the coffee. If you decide to take a taxi to work, you will have to trust your life to the vehicle and the taxi driver, and trust the other drivers to stay on their side of the road. You will have to trust elevators, stairways, airplanes, the post office, and banks. Believe me -- we either live with faith or fall victim to paranoia.

If, then, faith so evidently surrounds us, why should it be so offensive? It is simply because faith is as essential to the spiritual realm as oxygen is to the natural realm. The professing atheist thinks that if he can get rid of any thought of faith, he can get rid of Christianity. In trying to do so, he saws through the branch he is sitting on. His own faith in the erroneous information he has, makes him think he is atheistic in his beliefs.
Ray Comfort

 

[Green_Manelishi]

I'm telling you.....its the longest running story that keeps people scared.

Who is scared?

 

[Green_Manelishi]

just a few quick thoughts: no one can prove or disprove the existence of God.
by his/her/its very nature, God can not be proven or disproven. talking about it is
futile. you either believe or you don't.

i found prayer of mixed use. a few times, things got worse, a few times, they
got better. most of the time, i couldn't tell much of a difference.

personally, i decided to stop talking to myself and calling it something else.

Perhaps you should have talked to God instead of yourself.

 

[00scuba]

Faith Is for Wimps?
From my own experience and from listening to many objections to Christianity, I have found that the subject of faith is often offensive to the nonbeliever. My own thinking was that faith was for the weak-minded, for little old ladies, and for those near death. Yet every belief you and I have about history, other countries, science, biology, etc., exists because of faith. You only believe what you believe because you believed the person who told you the information you believe. You don't know who discovered America. You simply have faith that what was told to you is indeed true. Neither do you know if General Custer died at the hands of Indians, or if Napoleon really existed.

We can't live without faith. Try it. Say to yourself, "Today, I refuse to exercise any faith at all." Then before you eat your corn flakes, go through every flake, scientifically testing it before you eat it. Refuse to trust that the manufacturers have obeyed health regulations and mixed the ingredients correctly. Do the same tests on the milk before you pour it on the corn flakes, in faith. You don't know that the milk processors have done their job and given you pure milk. They may have mixed in something that could be harmful to your health. Don't trust the sugar producers either. God only knows what they did while they were processing the sugar. Check the microscope and other tools used for your analysis. How can you really trust that the information you gather from them is reliable? Don't trust your weight to the chair at the breakfast table. Don't believe today's weather report or any news item until you actually go to the proper location and see for yourself if what they would have you believe is true. Even then you will have to trust your natural senses (which can't always be trusted).

Before you drink your coffee, don't trust that the cup is perfectly clean. Wash it out yourself. Don't use untested water, in faith. We really don't know what's in it nowadays. It may be contaminated. Analyze the coffee. If you decide to take a taxi to work, you will have to trust your life to the vehicle and the taxi driver, and trust the other drivers to stay on their side of the road. You will have to trust elevators, stairways, airplanes, the post office, and banks. Believe me -- we either live with faith or fall victim to paranoia.

If, then, faith so evidently surrounds us, why should it be so offensive? It is simply because faith is as essential to the spiritual realm as oxygen is to the natural realm. The professing atheist thinks that if he can get rid of any thought of faith, he can get rid of Christianity. In trying to do so, he saws through the branch he is sitting on. His own faith in the erroneous information he has, makes him think he is atheistic in his beliefs.
Ray Comfort

Perhaps you believe in Ray Comfort...not god.

 

[H2Andy]

Perhaps you should have talked to God instead of yourself.

sadly, i was...

i say "sadly" because i really believed in God ... to slowly discover it didn't quite
work, wasn't quite what it was supposed to be, was not easy

 

[dherbman]

Once I embraced mathematics and the concept of inifinty, acceptance of God followed. Prior to that, I was agnostic.

 

[Potapko]

Perhaps you believe in Ray Comfort...not god.

I do believe in Ray Comfort. He is a godly man. I believe my Bible too. I believe it from cover to cover. I even believe the cover. It has my name on it. Jeff Allison. I believe that.

I am also too lazy to type what someone else has written well.

 

[garyfotodiver]

it's possible. but it does me no good, does it?
it's also possible that there might not be.
my point is not "it's impossible for God to exist."
my point is, "you can't prove God exists, by his/her/its very nature."

I commend to you all the 13 Principles of Faith written by Moses Maimonides. This came from the Orthodox Union website.

1. I believe with perfect faith that G-d is the Creator and Ruler of all things. He alone has made, does make, and will make all things.

2. I believe with perfect faith that G-d is One. There is no unity that is in any way like His. He alone is our G-d He was, He is, and He will be.

3. I believe with perfect faith that G-d does not have a body. physical concepts do not apply to Him. There is nothing whatsoever that resembles Him at all.

4. I believe with perfect faith that G-d is first and last.

5. I believe with perfect faith that it is only proper to pray to G-d. One may not pray to anyone or anything else.

6. I believe with prefect faith that all the words of the prophets are true.

7. I believe with perfect faith that the prophecy of Moses is absolutely true. He was the chief of all prophets, both before and after Him.

8. I believe with perfect faith that the entire Torah that we now have is that which was given to Moses.

9. I believe with perfect faith that this Torah will not be changed, and that there will never be another given by G-d.

10. I believe with perfect faith that G-d knows all of man's deeds and thoughts. It is thus written (Psalm 33:15), "He has molded every heart together, He understands what each one does."

11. I believe with perfect faith tha G-d rewards those who keep His commandments, and punishes those who transgress Him.

12. I believe with perfect faith in the coming of the Messiah. How long it takes, I will await His coming every day.

13. I believe with perfect faith that the dead will be brought back to life when G-d wills it to happen.