If prayers go unanswered....?

Long time lurker...first post...hope I don't stink up the joint. Here we go then.I would imagine that every day there are millions of faithful people who pray for a multitude of reasons, some very specific and some not so. I was thinking more along the lines of current events that may inspire specific, and therefore very personal and possibly emotional prayers. The events that came to mind include:1. The Iraq War: prayers for the safety of loved ones in harms way2. The Pope: very ill, thousands show up daily outside his hospital building to get a glimpse, and to pray for a recovery....and I would assume that Catholics everywhere are also thinking of him3. Jerry Falwell: Has fallen ill as well, and surely there are plenty of his followers and other christians that pray for his well being4. Teri Shiavo: Daily on the news we see poeple praying for her life and recovery, and surely there are people all over the U.S. that also have Teri in their prayersIf a soldier in Iraq dies, if beloved religious leaders fall ill and pass, and if a tragically ill individual who has captured a nation's attention should fail to recover and then also die....what of all the unaswered prayers that hoped for a different ending?So what happens, what is the outcome, when a sincere, highly emotional, and personal prayer, from a very faithful person goes unanswered? Is there a loss of faith? Do you justify these unanswered prayers by claiming that it was God's plan and we just can't grasp it?What is a faithful person do in the face of an unaswered prayer, or from a list like I presented above, from multitudes of unanswered prayers?

Hey Mike, Sounds abit selfish. Christ was amazingly altruistic, so I would think that praying for others would have been right up his alley. And surely the Pope, Jerry Falwell, and the members of their respective congregations believe in Christ and should be very receptive to prayers on thier behalf, and I would think they would have reason to feel that an earnest, selfless prayer would garner some sort of divine attention. Actually, thats not really what I was getting at. I think its pretty logical to think like that, but I was more interested in how these situations affect believers. In intense situations like I listed in my OP, people are praying for big specific things. No one is praying for the mundane, that wouldn't make sense, and instead are asking God for things that are out of thier control, and in these cases, pretty serious and pretty uncertain.So how will it impact a believer when their most serious prayers int he most serious situations seem to have no impact at all?

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.

Hey jar, I don't think its that simple. I can say that there certainly have been evil people and evil acts, but I do not think that evil is required for good to be acknowledged. I think that good can stand alone without having evil to judge it against. I feel that suffering, which can be caused by evil or compeltely independent thereof, allows all the backdrop necessary for comprehending what is good.OT: Going by your signature, are you excited about the new LW&W movie coming out?

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.

I think evil would be a better wording than bad for this discussion. 'Bad' just doesn't seem like strong enough a word. Hitler was evil...the egg salad is bad. I can work with you on the good/evil slant better than the good/bad. So lets go with your first notion of good and evil as prerequisits.

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.

well...I kinda already answered that in post 22. But I can agree for discussion's sake, otherwise we will just spin our wheels and not really get anywhere.How 'bout turning it around and saying that evil cannot exist without good? Does that make sense?

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.

Absolutely. Of course 'simply natural' is how I feel you can eventually describe everything. Nothing supernatural about 'bad' things happening, I mean it sucks and all, but it is all just part of life.

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.

Sure...we can say evil is a part fo life, but I am not sure it is inevitable. But lets continue.

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.

Well thanks and Hello. If certain events MUST happen...its sounds alot like predetermination, and I thought that free will was what it was all about.Jerry Falwell is... I don't live too far from Lynchburg, VA and sure Jerry Falwell is no Pope, but don't think that there aren't alot of very fervent followers throughout the southeastern states...VA is the 'buckle' of the bible belt. So don't belittle Falwell's influence or authority (not to be read as me being a Falwell fan!) because lots of people love this guy and think he's right on target.As for the starving african child...what are we praying for exaclty? Are we praying that the child's suffering ends? If thats the case, your prayer is answered if the child starves to death. Or are we praying that the child gets enough food to be able to grow up big and strong. Or pray for them to avoid AIDS, and civil wars? Or do we pray for rain to stop the drought, so that crops will grow, so that people will be fed? Or do we pray for philanthropic nations halfway around the world to be generous enough to provide for those in need? After 12 years Terri has passed, and all I can see that it raised the awareness of is the need for living wills, and the intrusiveness of our federal government. Tell the TV evangelists in TBN that people shouldn't pray for what they want. That's pretty much all they do. And if what does happen is within God;s will...then that does not speak too highly of God's will. So you have a prayer and don't understand God's answer...so you pray for understanding. And if you still don't understand...you pray for understanding some more? So by this point, maybe your original prayer wasn't answered, and now your second prayer to understand the outcome of the first prayer is unanswered. I would think that eventually, you might lose some faith, if you keep talking to God and it begins to seem like you're only talking to yourself. I'd say I'm agnostic at best, and am just wondering/asking to see what others think about these things. People always ask for things via prayer. The format usually follows somethnig like this (or at least from my church going experience) You start off being thankful...then you ask for something you want...then get all thankful again. Then you sing some hymns. So I think that alot of people out there praying are definitely hoping for an answer to a very specific, sincere, selfless prayer.

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.

When I went to church, most often the organized prayers would be a combination of your list. As I discribed in another post, there was typically a format something like this....Be very thankful (thank you God for the lovely weather and this chance to gather together in worship)...ask for something specific...(whats-his-name is in the hospital and we want him to get better and come back to church)...be thankful and humble (all glory to God, thank you God, in Jesus' name).Prayers that request something.(anything that you ask for)
Prayers that are praise/thanksgiving.
Prayers that are conversational.That's a base list.

Yeah, I agree with that, but you probably also pray the way you are taught, and the way you are accustomed too. Little kids going to sunday school and church learn how to pray the way their church prays. So an individual prayer, I think, would be some reflection of how a person learned. But I agree that personal prayers would in most cases be different that organized ones.

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.

If I just sit and think about something for long enough, say meditate on an issue I have...I will likely arrive at similar answers as someone who prayed for guidance. The conclusions I reach could be just the same as your prayer, and yet I was not asking anyone for anything.But if this is what the person praying believes, then I guess you have to go with it. If you pray for guidance and you think you recieve some divine inspiration, most of the time, then I guess I can't argue.I could say it was all coincidence like so many of the other posts that have arisen in this thread, however, I am looking to see how a believer reacts in these situations. If you pray and feel it gets answered, then so be it. But I feel you can reproduce these "answered prayers" without actually having to pray.

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.

But a prayer has a specific destination. Regardless of the type of prayer, it has a direction...a sender and a recipient. If you meditate, or just think really hard for a really long time, you aren't sending a request to anyone. So I think the path has to matter. If I take yoga or Ti Chi, and it relaxes me enough to where I can think clearly about a personal problem, and I reach a conclusion that I was unable to otherwise...I wasn't praying, I wasn't asking for guidance. So if you want to say that what I would consider as not praying...actually IS praying...then I don't know if I agere with that. But is anyone saying 'You're Welcome' after lifetimes of thank you's?

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.

Sure. we can move along to the next type of prayer.This message has been edited by clpMINI, 04-08-2005 07:55 AM

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.

If you want to take one of my OP examples...say the Irag war...where there are plenty of personal prayers flying about the world everyday for soldiers to live through the day, not to be mangled, and maybe just to make it home alive. And at a rate of nearly one a day, a U.S. soldier dies (much higher than that if you start counting Iragi units and civilians), and potentially each death can be matched to multiple prayers that request a different out come. So obviously, this prayer, that your (son/husband/father/daughter/mother/wife) make it home alive, was not answered the way you wanted it to be...if at all.If you spend an honest amount of time in the other types of prayers we have mentioned, and you ask God to protect your loved one, and then that doesn't happen...what do you think? Did God let you down? Did you pray incorrectly? Maybe you just didn't have enough faith?How do you reconcile, if you claim God is accepting your praise, listening when you just want to talk, and even at times offering up guidance, but when you ask for something tangible and extremely important to you, God shrugs you off?

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.

Then what was the point in asking in the first place? If you ask God in a prayer to keep your loved one safe...any outcome can be considered God's will. You pray and you like the outcome, or you pray and dislike the outcome...either way its God's will and whether you prayed for something or not doesn't matter. God is mysterious and we can't understand his master plan? That goes back to the old saying that (and I'm paraphrasing)...God made us smart enough to know there is an answer, but not smart enough to figure out what the answer actually is.In an earlier post in this thread we were commenting on 'bad' things happening as being just a natural part of life. But here you seem to be stating that the 'bad' thing would be all part of God's unknowable will. Is this correct?What is the point of praying for something specific? Or for that matter what would be the point of the other types of prayers as well?

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It's not selling out if nobody's buying.