Hello everyone! I just finished reading The Case For Miracles by journalist Lee Strobel, a surprising and uplifting book. Here are some facts from the book that stood out to me.
Although the percentage of people who believe that miracles happen tends to decrease as education increases, a 2004 survey found that out of 1,100 doctors, 55% had seen results in patients that they would consider miraculous and 75% believe miracles can happen (a higher percentage than the general US population).
Strobel interviews Michael Shermer, founder and editor of Skeptic magazine, about why he doesn't believe in miracles. His talking points include that miracles aren't well studied and could be a result of misperceptions or biased thinking, and a certain ten-year clinical trial (called STEP) of the effects of intercessory prayer on cardiac bypass patients that failed to show any positive effects (it is interesting to note flaws in this study that are pointed out by professor Candy Gunther Brown, whom Strobel also interviews. The group that the STEP researchers recruited to pray for the patients was a New Age -type group that didn't even believe in prayer. Brown describes two other peer-reviewed studies in which Christians prayed to the Christian God. Patients that received prayer in these studies had less heart failure, fewer episodes of pneumonia, and needed less antibiotic therapy, among other positive effects.)
The chapter "A Tide of Miracles" has stories of modern-day miracles that were documented by physicians and occurred as a result of prayer to the Christian God.
This is one I think you would be interested in, @windar12q. Strobel interviewed a missionary to the Middle East, Tom Doyle. He reveals that by some estimates, 1/4 to 1/3 of Muslims who have become Christians experienced a dream or vision of Jesus before coming to faith. The dreams often follow a similar pattern of Jesus saying He loves them and died for them, and telling them to follow Him (these would not be things a follower of Islam is already inclined to think about; The Qur'an teaches that Jesus did not die on the cross, that He is not the son of God, and that nobody can bear your sins in your place). It happened so often that Christian ministries have placed ads in Egyptian newspapers offering more information about Jesus to people who have had a dream about Him.
One of the most impressive miracles that God has done is creating the universe, and He has done it incredibly precisely. Oxford physicist Roger Penrose calculated that in order for the universe to have the correct state of low entropy (un-randomness that makes life possible) the setting needs to be accurate to 1/(10^(10^125)). This number is impossible to write out as a decimal because it has more 0s than there are particles in the universe!
Not everyone who prays for a miracle gets what they ask for. Strobel interviews Dr. Douglas Groothuis, a Christian apologist, about having faith and hope in the midst of illness in his family. He tells about how he learned to relinquish control to God and put his hope in Jesus's death and resurrection for everything to be restored when Jesus comes again.
I found this to be a very interesting topic. What do you think about miracles?
@ekrause1406 @S.M.S. @cwh @Kirk Peters @agetoage07 @burrawang @T_aquaticus @crtgavrilescu
Hello ekrause, I hope you are keeping well. Of course 'miracles' happen, but not the way you think they do. We see it on the Galapagos islands, with its diversity of life, where there are a variety of finches which are descendants of one species. The Galapagos cormorants are also in the process of mutating from flight to flightless, because flight is no longer needed. This also adds variety, just like the finches, but the variety is by coincidence and not by a divine power. Perhaps one day we will be able to harness this power given by nature and then the age of 'miracles' will be upon us. If prayer worked, we would have no need for science, no need for hospitals, no need for doctors etc, etc. The other point you mention about Muslims dreaming of Jesus, doesn't prove that it is true. I am an atheist and once in hospital under sedation I dreamed of the Virgin Mary. The subconscious is a mysterious place where memories lie hidden then appear to correlate with our situation. This reminds me of someone saying to me something that I hope you will accept in the manner it is intended and not malicious - he asked me a question while watching a football match, when one of the reserve players was called on to partake; the player crossed himself before playing and my friend asked if he was cheating. His team lost by the way, so his cheating didn't pay off. Like the player, we are all susceptible to thinking in this way, but it doesn't make it true. Proof of Jesus has to be demonstrated, or like the football player, we are living an illusion.
If we want an age of miracles, we have got to give up this notion of a God and settle down to dealing with the facts.
Keep well ekrause.
Hello Windar12q. As a Christian, I see a place for both science and miracles. One does not make the other irrelevant. My Christian friends and I freely take advantage of scientific, technological, and medical advances. This is because we believe that science is a gift from God in the same way that a miracle is a gift of God.
We also believe that God answers prayer in many different ways:
By sending people and circumstances to help (acting within natural law, and the most common way people see prayers answered. Natural selection, which you described above, is an example of God working through natural law)
By acting in a way that is beyond what is possible in nature (a true miracle, includes rarer events such as the healings with no medical explanation that were described in Strobel's book, or even Jesus' resurrection)
By saying "no" or "not yet" (sometimes what we pray for is not what God knows is best for us. Prayer was never intended to be a way of demanding anything we want from God, an expression that I have heard is "God is not a genie". The football player in your story seems to have gotten this answer!)
I hope this helps explain why I don't believe science and miracles are in conflict.
Best regards,
Ekrause1406
@ekrause1406 If you are happy with your convictions, then that is good for you, but to explain that these miracles come from God needs to be demonstrated to satisfy me. I have seen how these faith healers go around healing people, but the biggest mystery is, why don't they go around hospitals healing people? Is it because God doesn't like hospitals? It all appears like a farce to me. This brings me to the most important part of why I don't agree and my stance against religion will always remain. No miracle has ever grown back limbs, yet in nature we see mutations happening as I write. Instead of listening to these charlatans of false dreams, wouldn't it be better to research the wonders of nature and one day we may be able to restore limbs and eyesight and probably most illnesses, if not all. Religion has suppressed the progress of science for many centuries, sometimes with the fear of death, and this still applies to some religions today, if you dare question the 'wisdom' of their God.
No, ekrause1406, I shall never be converted, but to each his own.
Stay well.