Petitionary Prayer And The Will Of God

[Brother_Mike_V]

Normally I would bypass these types of threads.....BUT

Didn't Jesus Christ tell us to 'ask' (petition) the Father somewhere....? (Now where did I put that Bible search engine.....hmmmmm)

 

[bobsmith76]

It is apparent that you have no idea what the word trust actually means.

That's an unnecessary statement.

If I trust a bridge, I will walk across it without fear, fully expecting to get to the other side.

You used the word "fear". Fear is defined in terms of belief. x fears y means x believes y will harm x.
Expecting is also defined in terms of belief. x expects y means x believes y will become actual.
But to be quite honest all actions are defined in terms of belief.
x actualizes y and y is an action means x believes z and x moves matter such that z agrees with y.

If you think belief = trust then not only do you have an un-Biblical view of faith,

This is just begging the question.

it is no
wonder that your prayers are not answered.

I don't do petitionary prayers. I don't ask for anything. So it's impossible for my prayers to go unanswered.

Christ's life served an an example to all of us, you are in error.

Then why don't you do the equivalent of entering a temple and throwing out the money-changers.

The rest of your post reflects a complete lack of understanding of my post.

This is just begging the question.

Why do you keep bringing up the notion of disappointment? Is that some personal issue of yours?

I'm trying to make a point that if you do petitionary prayer then you just set yourself up for disappointment or living outside of reality.

 

[bobsmith76]

There is a distinction between faith, and blind faith.

If my life wasn't the evidence of God working in me, I wouldn't believe. If you have salvation in Christ, then haven't you experienced His power to break the chains and fell the strongholds in your life? What greater evidence do you need than the power you have personally experienced? Faith because of that evidence isn't blind faith.

If you define faith as believing in something because of evidence then you can't distinguish it from justification. So what's the difference between justified belief and belief due to faith?

We don't have faith blindly. We have faith in what we haven't witnessed because of what we have witnessed -- His real, transforming power in our lives. Our faith is further strengthened, not by what we can demonstrate through our own wisdom, but by how God continues to prove Himself by the demonstration of His power as we continue to step out in faith.

You're just using the word faith to stand for justified belief.

I'm not trying to get in a fight, or win an argument here, man.

Jesus wants us to debate with one another because that's the only way we can come to learn anything. A debate partner is there to help you resolve your confusions. I learn from you and you learn from me.

If there only appears to be a contradiction, and we are in error in our reasoning, then we will run the risk of dismissing truth.

We have to make decisions now. We can't wait years and years for contradictions to be resolved. We need to decide today if we're going to make a petitionary prayer or not. The only reliable means for making a decision is reason. The Bible is evidence but reason interprets the evidence. When the Bible contradicts we have to decide which passage to give up.

How much faith can we possibly have in human reasoning to be without error?

If human reasoning were deeply flawed then we wouldn't even exist long enough to reproduce. But of course reason need not be perfect.

In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost.

 

[Glomung]

In conversations like this it really makes me wonder where this all is coming from.
Let's take "the Lord's prayer" as an example.

Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name,
(who we are addresssing)
Thy kingdom come, thine will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven
(statement of the obvious)
Give us this day our daily bread
(a petitionary prayer)
and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us
(a petitionary prayer)
lead us not into temptation
(a petitionary prayer)
but deliver us from evil
(a petitionary prayer)
for thine is the kingdom, and power, and glory.

You notice a trend?

 

[Glomung]

The word pray means to ask.
ALL prayers are either praise or petitonary.

 

[Roads]

We have to make decisions now. We can't wait years and years for contradictions to be resolved. We need to decide today if we're going to make a petitionary prayer or not. The only reliable means for making a decision is reason. The Bible is evidence but reason interprets the evidence. When the Bible contradicts we have to decide which passage to give up.

If human reasoning were deeply flawed then we wouldn't even exist long enough to reproduce. But of course reason need not be perfect.

If I wanted to, I could find a way to make every single verse in the Bible contradict another one. It's really easy to do. All I have to do is take a verse out of context from the rest of Biblical teaching. Using my own reasoning, I can take any verse I want to and offer an explanation that seems reasonable for me to "give it up." My own wisdom, with it's obvious flaws, is not a sufficient way to determine what is or isn't true in the Bible.

Some things in the Bible, I don't understand. But, I understand now more than I used to. As I continue to study the Bible, I continue to understand more of it. If I had simply "given up" the passages that I didn't understand, then I would have given up Biblical teaching that I now understand to be consistent. Maybe some things are going to take years and years, and I am okay with that. If we make "decisions now," it's inevitable that we will dismiss truth. Understanding takes time, patience, perseverance.

The Bible teaches that it's not intended of us to arrive at Truth through our own reasoning. Should I dismiss this teaching as illogical? Is there some other Biblical teaching that contradicts it?

In my opinion, what you've reasoned out has resulted in your dismissal in certain Biblical teaching, it seems, simply because an explanation that's consistent across Biblical teaching didn't immediately occur to you. If there is a consistent explanation for the problem you've posed, and there's no need at all for you to be tempted to "give up" any passage at all, would you want to know about it? We can walk through it if you're interested.

 

[bobsmith76]

Basically, you're using the tactic: "when you can't prove something, prove something else." Whatever happened to your distinction between blind faith and faith?

If I wanted to, I could find a way to make every single verse in the Bible contradict another one. It's really easy to do. All I have to do is take a verse out of context from the rest of Biblical teaching. Using my own reasoning, I can take any verse I want to and offer an explanation that seems reasonable for me to "give it up." My own wisdom, with it's obvious flaws, is not a sufficient way to determine what is or isn't true in the Bible.

No, because reason is based on the principle of non-contradiction. Anyone who makes a deductive argument must state their premises and how their conclusions follow from those premises. There are certain rules which allow you to make inferences from certain premises and if those rules aren't followed then the reasoning is invalid. Logic isn't some tool that you can bend anyway you like.

Some things in the Bible, I don't understand. But, I understand now more than I used to. As I continue to study the Bible, I continue to understand more of it. If I had simply "given up" the passages that I didn't understand, then I would have given up Biblical teaching that I now understand to be consistent. Maybe some things are going to take years and years, and I am okay with that.

This is not an argument.

If we make "decisions now," it's inevitable that we will dismiss truth. Understanding takes time, patience, perseverance.

Sometimes you have to make decisions now.

The Bible teaches that it's not intended of us to arrive at Truth through our own reasoning.

You have to use reason just to understand what the words means and how to apply those words to your own life.

In my opinion, what you've reasoned out has resulted in your dismissal in certain Biblical teaching, it seems, simply because an explanation that's consistent across Biblical teaching didn't immediately occur to you.

This is only an opinion, hence it's not an argument and should not be taken seriously. To me, God is the first cause and nothing causes God. Hence, it is impossible to change God's will. That reasoning is much more solid than just a simple wish that your prayers be answered.

If there is a consistent explanation for the problem you've posed, and there's no need at all for you to be tempted to "give up" any passage at all, would you want to know about it? We can walk through it if you're interested.

We're walking through a passage right now.

 

[Roads]

No, because reason is based on the principle of non-contradiction. Anyone who makes a deductive argument must state their premises and how their conclusions follow from those premises. There are certain rules which allow you to make inferences from certain premises and if those rules aren't followed then the reasoning is invalid. Logic isn't some tool that you can bend anyway you like.

Agreed (although I think not enough information is available to us to construct fully reliable premises about the nature of God or His will, i.e., 1 Corinthians 13:12, which is why faith is necessary), but the implications of what I've said is that one of the premises of your argument requires that scriptures be taken out of context.

Your argument seems to be:

1 The Bible teaches that we should petition God through prayer
2 The Bible teaches that we cannot change the will of God
3 God responding to petitions requires that we change His will
Therefore it follows that either 1 or 2 is false, and we can dismiss one of them.

Without the third premise, the argument is not sound, and I would argue that the third premise requires that certain scriptures be taken out of context or dismissed altogether. Does the nature of God's will need to be fully explainable in order to follow what the Bible tells us is His will for us? Can we be okay with it if God's will is more complex than what we can understand? Doesn't the Bible teach that God is beyond the scope of human comprehension? Are you confident enough in that third premise to deny what the Bible teaches is His will for us?

The Bible is not a challenge to see if we can figure it all out or not. We have to be able to accept that there are some things that we can't understand, because God has seen fit to give us only partial information, for now. So we rely on the authority of scripture, since we don't have enough information to know if any premise not derived from scripture is valid.

Maybe I could phrase it in another way: What do you make of 1 Corinthians 1:18-31? What about 1 Corinthians 2:14?

 

[bobsmith76]

It's clear that you're not interested in truth wherever it leads but will simply say anything rather than admit that you're wrong. I asked you to draw the faith/reason distinction and you ignored this. If you were really interested in truth you would have replied that you could not draw the distinction and therefore would have revised your beliefs accordingly. I cannot learn from someone who refuses to answer my questions and is just interested in saying anything so as to save face.

 

[Jeffin]

This is something I will never understand fully but I am fine with that. As soon as I interpret the scripture there is the probability of me being wrong. So if the scripture says that we cannot change the will of God but we can ask God for anything and it will be done, I hold them both true. I can ask Jesus for anything John 14:14. That's all that matters for me.

 

[Ian Kris]

You can not change that faith of one's prayer. In my life, i have had the experience. I had difficulties and I had a a complicated like. Sometimes, I blame not only to God but also to my prayers, but I then realized, you can not break your prayer. You can not break your promise to him. Because in the end, you will be the one who will suffer great. You will disappoint some times, but you have to wait.