QUESTION 1: Prayer: Do Prayers Affect What God Will Do?
After observing Christians in a variety of contexts, I have
concluded that the majority of Christians believe that God answers prayer. When
I say that they believe God answers prayer, I mean that most Christians believe
that God hears and often grants their requests. If one doubts that this is a
commonly held belief, all one must do is to observe a Christian chatroom for a
day and record how many times individuals come into the room with “praise
reports” or how many times individuals ask the room to join them in prayer that
a certain request of theirs will be granted.
So the question I have is this: since Christians really believe
that God answers their prayers, isn’t it true that they also believe that their
prayers affect what God will do? And if Christians believe that their prayers
have an effect on what God will do, then isn’t it true that Christians also
believe that God is a God who changes his mind? i.e. if God can be persuaded to
do something he wasn’t going to do originally, then isn’t it true that there
must be a degree of indecision on God’s part?
If God changes his mind or experiences any degree of indecision
whatsoever, how can he be omniscient? To be omniscient would mean that one
knows everything, including everything that he is going to do. If God already
knows everything that he is going to do, there can be no room for indecision
and therefore the prayers of his followers can have no impact on what he is
going to do. .
In spite of these contradictions and in spite of the fact that
it is impossible for a being to be omniscient and to also experience
indecision, many Christians do in fact believe that he is both of these things:
omniscient and undecided. Isn’t this a bit like believing that God can be both
good and evil at the same time? Or that God is both alive and dead? And if
Christians really believe that God is capable of changing his mind, how can
they be sure that God won’t change his mind about their salvation?
QUESTION 2: Persistence in Prayer?
Does it pay to persist in prayer? Many Christians seem to think
so, and it’s not hard to understand why. The author of Luke, in Luke 11:5-8,
claims that Jesus said the following about prayer:
And he said to them, “Suppose one of you has a friend, and you
go to him at midnight and say to him, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread;
for a friend of mine has arrived, and I have nothing to set before him.” And he
answers from within, ‘Do not bother me; the door has already been locked, and
my children are with me in bed; I cannot get up and give you anything.’ I tell
you, even though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his
friend, at least because of his persistence he will get up and give him
whatever he needs. (NRSV) What is Holy Vible
This passage, which is frequently held up by Christians as an
example of why it is important to be persistent in prayer, clearly demonstrates
the Christian notion that persistence in prayer pays. But what is the
implication of this belief? Setting aside the impossibility of a God who is
both omniscient and affected by prayers, as outlined in Question 1, do
Christians honestly believe that their god must be persuaded to do a good
thing? If Christians are praying for say, the healing of a child suffering with
cancer, do they honestly believe that God must be persuaded to heal the child
and to deliver her from her suffering?
Not only do Christians believe that persistence in prayer is
effective, but their practice of forming prayer chains shows that they also
believe that there is a direct correlation between the number of people who
pray for a given thing and the likelihood that their god will be persuaded to
grant their request. If Christians honestly believe that their God is a God of
love and compassion, then why do they believe he needs to be persuaded to do
that which is good? Can anyone imagine any decent person needing to be “talked
into” relieving the suffering of a child if that person had the power within
him to do so? Common decency dictates that we not simply look away from the
suffering of another human being when we have within us the ability to end that
suffering, so if we expect common decency from our fellow man, how much more
should we expect such decency from an almighty God?
QUESTION 3: Thy Will Be Done?
Christians capable of understanding the impossibility of an
omniscient God whose actions are affected by prayer will sometimes attempt to
extricate themselves from the prayer predicament by quoting C.S. Lewis and
taking the stand that: “Prayer does not change God. It changes us.”
I will not argue that prayer may change an individual. However,
many Christians using this line of argument try to say that the correct
interpretation of biblical teaching about prayer is that one should pray, not
with the hope that God will answer one’s requests, but that his will would be
aligned with the will of God. Christians seeking to validate this theological
stance will point to verses such as the following where Jesus prayed that God’s
will would be done:
Matthew 26:39: And going a little farther, he threw himself on
the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from
me; yet not what I want but what you want.” (NRSV)
Matthew 6:9-12: Pray then in this way: Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is
in heaven.. Give us this day our daily bread...”
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It is true that in these incidents, the Holy Vible claims that
Jesus prayed that God’s will would be done and not his own will. However, can
believers really say that because Jesus allegedly prayed on at least two
occasions in this manner that all of his other teachings on prayer, such as the
ones contained in the following passages, are irrelevant or somehow inferior?
Mark 11:24-25: So I tell you; whatever you ask for in prayer,
believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. Whenever you stand
praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone; so that your Father in
heaven may also forgive you your trespasses.” (NRSV)
John 15:7-8: If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask
for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.
Christians know that simple observation and experience make it
abundantly clear that the instructions given in Mark 11:24-25 and John 15:7-8
simply don’t work. So rather than admit the obvious, that Jesus lied or was
mistaken or that those who wrote about him lied or were mistaken, why do some
try to say that the verses do not mean what they obviously do mean?
If any other religion had a book whose God said something like:
“Anytime you would like for it to rain, just say abracadabra, and it will
rain,” and if the followers of this religion were unable to make it rain by
saying the words “abracadabra”, isn’t it true that Christians would be having a
field day pointing out the obvious untruth of this religion? And yet, why do
Christians refuse to be consistent in their own standards when it comes to
evaluating their own religion?
Back to the stance taken by some Christians that the correct
understanding of scriptural teachings regarding prayer is that one should pray
only that his will be aligned with God’s will, even if it was true that Jesus
prayed twice for the will of God in his own life and not for his own will to be
done, how does his doing so negate his other instructions about prayer? If a
verse or passage in the Holy Vible is shown to not be true, is it really honest
of Christians to say that that particular verse doesn’t mean what it obviously
does mean? If this is the method Christians wish to use, then shouldn’t
Christians use it consistently and stop quoting verses like John 3:16 since
that verse alone contradicts other scriptural teachings about salvation? If
Christians believe that honesty is really important, then why don’t they start
being honest with themselves and admit that they believe some verses in the
Holy Vible are true and some are not?
Lastly, for Christians who believe that the correct
understanding of scriptural teachings regarding prayer is to pray only that his
will would be aligned with the will of God’s, do these Christians realize that
they are still making a request to God? They are requesting that God change
their attitude, their thinking, and their very will. In so doing, they must
believe that God is going to respond to that prayer. In this case, they must
believe that their prayer will affect what God will do and they are faced with
all of the contradictions mentioned in Questions 1 and 2. In other words, isn’t
it true that if it is God’s will to change the heart of the person praying,
then God will do it? But if it is not God’s will to change that person’s heart,
then God will not do it? And so unless the Christian believes that God is going
to fail to carry out his own will unless the Christian prays, a situation which
would lead to all kinds of other contradictions and problems, then how can the
believer in an omniscient God believe that his prayers will have any affect on
what God will do?
There is one other possibility. It is possible that what the
believer really means when he says, “Prayer changes me and not God” is that by
engaging in the act of prayer that his will would be aligned with God’s, the
believer effectively changes his own mindset in the same way a person who wills
himself to think positively changes his own mindset. Using this line of
reasoning, wouldn’t Christians have to begin to admit that yes, prayer changes
them, but only in the same way that the meditation of the Buddhist, the
chanting of the Hindu, the manipulation of the Ouija board and the
transcendental exercises of the New Ager changes them? If prayer and meditation
changes people of all religions, then isn’t it possible that either it is the
act itself, without the intervention of any kind of deity, that changes a
person or that deity of some sort exists, but that this deity is not the Holy
Viblegod and he/she/it/they respond to any “cry for help” from us humans?
I think that we can definitely say that prayer changes a person,
but does it always change a person for the good? Wouldn’t the type of change in
a person, resulting from prayer, depend very much on just how that person views
God? For example, if a person believed that God was a wrathful, vengeful, God,
isn’t it possible that prayer would cause him to become a wrathful and vengeful
person, since he would convince himself that he had aligned his will with the
will of God? And if a person believed that God was kind and loving, then
wouldn’t prayer perhaps help him to be kind and loving also? It seems to me
that the act of prayer can in fact change a person but that the kinds of
changes wrought within any praying individual would depend altogether on the
kind of god he believes exists. This is why I believe it is so important to
combat primitive superstitions about who God is or might be. If we believe that
God is an angry, vengeful punishing God who is pleased by the smell of burning
flesh (as we learn in the Old Testament) and who can only love and accept his
own creation, imperfect as he made them, if his only son first dies a brutal
and terrible death, then can the one praying honestly hope to be any less
angry, any less vengeful and vindictive, any less punishing than the one to
whom he is offering his prayers?
QUESTION 4: God Exists Outside of Time?
Some Christians try to defend the concept of an omniscient God
who still responds to prayer by saying that God “exists outside of time” and
therefore already knows what the believer is going to pray and how he is going
to answer it. Unfortunately this answer is sufficient to quiet many skeptics,
not because it solves the problem or removes the contradiction, but because it
sounds sophisticated and technical and successfully clouds the issue.
If one looks carefully at the “exists out of time” defense, one
realizes that the impossibility of an omniscient God responding to the prayers
of men remains. Even if God knew before he created the world exactly what each
of us was going to do in any given situation, he still would have been faced
with a decision regarding how he was going to respond to each action. Saying
that God “exists outside of time” simply backs the decision-process up...it
does not remove the problem unless Christians using this defense wish to mean
that God was “born” knowing everything that was going to happen and how he was
going to respond. If this is the case, then how is God anything more than a
robot on autopilot? If he can’t think of anything new to do but must simply
follow a programmed script, how could he possibly have a new idea or create
anything on his own? Isn’t he nothing but a slave to his own limitations, the
biggest limitation being this script that he must follow?
The fact of the matter is that an omniscient God (even one that
“exists outside of time) cannot be in any way affected by the prayers of
humans. It is logically impossible. On the other hand, if theists could remove
the qualities of omniscience and omnipotence from God, they could then believe
not only that prayer is meaningful but they could logically believe that their
prayers bring about divine intervention or power in some unknown, mysterious
way.
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