The bible says it....?

Question

Mark 11:24:
Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.

Matthew 18:19 Jesus says:
Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them.

James 5:15-16 the Bible says:
And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.

Why don't these prayers actually WORK like jesus/god says they will.

My proof they don't work? Go to a childrens cancer hospital and pray for every kid.

You can say "god called them home" or he's "testing" people but the verses above DON'T say that.
Is my interpretation wrong? Then why pray?

sunestaurami!!!! "EVERY CASE"???? are you joking? how about ANY case?

kingreef7: I love making your answers look ridiculous. Ok, mine don't work because I don't have faith right? Then what's YOUR EXCUSE? You have faith? And faith in god heals the sick? Go pray for some cancer patients tonight and let me know how many of them god "heals"....

Ken D: "Greed"???? It's greedy for me to want to stop the sensless suffering and torture of children with bone cancer? Please give me one good reason why god would need a little child to spend it only few years on this earth in COMPLETE and TOTAL PAIN??? and no understanding of WHY they are in pain?

mesquiteers: thanks for pointing that out. So what you are saying is that real sickness and disease isn't cured by jesus/god? just the sickness of sin? Wow, then why do so many christians keep praying for the sick?

In Atlanta: Indians used to perform a rain dance too...and guess what??? sometimes it rained. Does that mean the rain dance has "magical" powers? Wake up!

Answer 1

you forget one thing, The will of God.

Answer 2

For prayer to be answered, we have to take the whole Bible in context. First we need to BELONG to GOD. Unless we have accepted Christ for salvation, we can not expect any of our prayers to be answered.

We then have to ask in God's will, not according to our greed. God never promised to meet our greed's or to answer our prayer so we can USE God for our own personal dog and pony show.

Check the links below for more information why why prayer is not answered.

NOTE...the questioner asked:

Ken D: "Greed"???? It's greedy for me to want to stop the sensless suffering and torture of children with bone cancer?

I was answering most of the statements you made here but since you asked why God would allow this. For HIS glory. Sometimes we cannot see how this will work here. I am sure a few thousand years ago, there was a boy that trusted GOD. He was sold into slavery and then later was sent to prison for a rape he did not do. Why would GOD allow this? Well, we know the story. God used this man to save a nation. Of course, his name was Joseph.

Why would GOD allow a child to have cancer and even to die from it? Maybe it is the only way their mom or dad would seek God. Maybe it would help bring many others to the LORD just as I am sure t he Amish girls deaths will be doing as they see how Christians respond to things like that.

Also, if these children die before they are aware of a need for Jesus, they will be with Him for all eternity. Some may have never accepted Jesus if they grew up and some may have become very evil. GOD knows...we sure don't so let's not try to 2nd guess HIM ok?

Answer 3

Maybe the person has sin in their life and maybe there is no faith, just wishful thinking. Sometimes the answer takes a while and sometimes the answer is no. The bible says we are to pray according to Gods will. It may not be His will that you win a million dollars. There are generational curses and word curses, be careful what comes out of your mouth. We will understand it all better when we get to heaven. There are more major miracles in foreign countries now, but those people live Godly lives, fast and pray and believe.

Answer 4

It may NOT be best that every case of childhood cancer be cured or healed. It may be a gift of God to future generations that some people do not live to have children themselves. Our viewpoint is too limited to KNOW what is best. God, who created time and lives outside its influence, sees all of history and future like an average human sees a wall. He sees time from the outside all at once and will end it at a "time" of his choosing...

He is beyond anything a human can understand.

The infant daughter of a family I have known for many years now had open heart surgery at a few weeks of age - the doctors would not perform the surgery until she weighed 10.1 pounds. Because of prayer, she was able to go home the day the surgeon had originally suggested as when she MIGHT get out of the ICU. One of the top pediatric hospitals in the country was turned on end by her recovery... Prayer does work!

Ken: Please STUDY THE SCRIPTURES. NOWHERE is "accepting Jesus for salvation" mentioned. Read the book of Acts, which includes EVERY ACCOUNT in scripture of people BECOMING CHRISTIANS. Note what they were told to do EVERY TIME. Accepting Jesus is NEVER MENTIONED!

Answer 5

It's a great question, but the god-believers have pat answers in their pockets for this one. They can always claim that God or Jesus didn't answer the prayers because the person offering them didn't have enough faith. The intellectual dishonesty of the faithful is truly shocking, and they are slippery as eels.

Ask all of those who know themselves to be true believers to visit a children's cancer ward this weekend and lay on hands/pray for all the children to be completely healed. Have them give us a report on Monday.

Answer 6

I have seen prayer work and work on curing incurable diseases.

We Christians are called not to pray for someone to heal but to actually heal the sick.

It takes the correct understanding of God and His purpose before we are trusted with that power though and not always will that happen if it is not what God wants to happen.

We don't know nor could ever know God's mind and so some things must be just accepted in faith that God knows best and we don't.

"We walk by faith and not by sight."

Answer 7

They do work. Every prayer has to end in if it be your will Lord.

If it doesnt end this way, we are be self serving and important and that is not what God wants from us.

Gods will sometimes is that the healing we ask for is not done in this fleshly life on earth. the healing that we ask for is done at the last breath of the person or child being prayed for. If God takes them home, they are healed and no longer in any pain. What more could we ask for? We could ask for it to be that the child remains with us and completely healed but only if it be Gods will and not only our own.

God gives us what we need, not always what we want. We need that child to be healed, we feel it in our heart and soal. We want that child to be able to stay with us in the flesh longer.

Answer 8

Most of the answers above are wrong. Nobody can know the thoughts or actions of God. yes he is a merciful God. However the bible cannot be taken literally as you have just done. At least not in the Roman Catholic tradition. What you would need is a biblical scholar to tell you what is actually been said in the passage. This thing of you not praying with 'faith', is classic sppech from those that can see the splinter in their brothers eyes and not the plank in their own. God welcomes everyone in prayer, and maybe listens a lot more to the sinner. remember he says it himself..about the man who beat his breast and said lord be merciful to me a sinner. We cannot thereofre know why God allows things like this to happen. As finite beings we cannot at all understand the ways of the infinite God.

Answer 9

Hey there are a few reasons that your prayers may not be working or at least appear to you right away, First of All Are you asking for the RIGHT MOTIVE? if you are acting like God is some kind of big genie in the sky they won't work, I do believe that what we ask has to match up to HIS will, not ours. secondly if you have sin in your life and are not doing what God said to do they will not even reach his ears..If we have unforgiveness and strife in our life it can also stifle our prayer from reaching God. So MOTIVE, UN-REPENTED SIN, AND STRIFE can all hinder our prayers. Hope this helps..Ps always look at the IF's and THENS for instance God said in Mark 11:25 And when you are praying and you have something against someone Forgive him.

Answer 10

God can use suffering to hammer a person into something for His glory as in the books of Job or Ruth or the life of Joseph

but there will be an awesome and total spectacular healing coming!! NOMORE DEATH NO MORE PAIN no death or suffereing or pain and GOD WILL WIPE EVERY TEAR FROM THEIR EYES and when God takes his finger and wipes the tears away the bitterness and pain will be gone forever
your just getting ahead of yourself
its not yet

the Bible promises victory in every situation in life by faith, but the terms are not in our hands, it is victory in God's terms

he may deliver you
he may give you patience to endure
he may heal
he may strenthen

the Bible also gives conditions for prayer
"if I regard sin in my heart the Lord will not hear"
"let not a doubleminded man expect anything"
"ask in faith"
"ask according to His will"

just as the 3 Hebrews said before they were thrown in the fiery furnace
"our God IS ABLE TO DELIVER US but even if he does not we will not bow to you"
our faith must be in God, not in healing although he can do that

Answer 11

for a long time I didnt know why God put me into the lifestyle that I had as a child. why we were homeless or why my mom left my sister and I for drugs when I was 12.

But I now I realize why. My life can be used as a testemony for others.

Even though they might not be healed and they die, God can still use them to bring people to Him through their faith love and joy regaurdless of the circumstances that they are in.

you also have to have enough faith and beleive it will happen.