How are we to explain these "miracles?"

[[serious]]

IMHO, he got scammed big time.

Little worse than that, Heis claims to BE the faith healer:

You do remember I was the one who prayed to Jesus to heal the child. What I have held back, what you did not know, is what I did "before and during the prayer". I held the child. The child was in my arms.

...

The little arm was cupped in my hand during the work Jesus did.

...

Yes, I took the child from the mother, I love kids! And I love holding them and talking to them!

I spoke for a while to the child, during which time I felt the desire of the mother's heart. It penetrated me. It was a spontaneous prayer once I handled and then cupped the little deformed arm. Deep within me I knew the child would continue to live with the deformed arm in my hand IF God on High did not do the Miraculous. It was like I could see into the future and was asking God "how should his arm be in his days to come?" The atmosphere became electric. I could give more but let's just say God showed up. Period.

I'm guessing it's more a case of self deception than an intentional scam. Guessing the kid probably had some unspecified deformity and held the arm close generally. If the kid was wearing a long sleeved shirt or a jacket, the arm could have appeared shorter just from being carried that way. He did say that he was holding the arm, so light traction put on the arm, consciously or not, could have encouraged the child to temporarily hold the arm out in a more typical fashion making him think the arm had lengthened.

I asked him a series of questions seeking more details, he refused to answer them despite being asked at least 3 times, so I'm assuming silence implies my guesses were right.

 

[Lord Emsworth]

it's still Branham who gets the money.

Branham is dead. In 1965 he got into a car accident and then "lived for 6 days after the crash, but died on December 24, 1965, at 4:49 PM at the Northwest Texas Hospital in Amarillo."
William M. Branham - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Thousands and thousands of unheard prayers. Tsk, tsk, tsk.

ETA: Merry Christmas

 

[Heissonear]

it's still Branham who gets the money.

Fake humility is what separates the religious con from the would-be cult leader.

In a 1952 meeting one of the many "healed" was Jeanne Sonmore. I got to know Clayt Sonmore in the 1990's until his passing. Jeanne was healed as per Clayt's witness.

I have Clayt's word against yours.

Your conclusions are showing a trend. There is something called whitewash: where people knowingly or not color over the real with what they select to show to others. Since He is, people who know Him watch unbelievers whitewash things all the time.

Now, who really is free in mind and has been learning and promoting the truth they have found in life?

.

 

[charliehcf]

Two things.

First, here's what faith looks like:
The Bible tells me to pray, so I pray. The Bible tells me that supplication should be part of my prayers, so I ask God to help me with my circumstances. The Bible tells me that God performs miracles, based on God's own will, His timing, His reasons. So I pray for miracles. When I see miracles, I thank God. When I don't see miracles I thank God. If I'm doing it right, my thankfulness to God is no different when I see miracles than when I don't see miracles. If I pray for a miracle to save my dying father, and my father lives against all odds, I praise God. If I pray but my father still dies, I still praise God.

What I read a lot in this thread is not faith, but religiosity: A highly unlikely event happens, and it happens to be related to a church, and it happens to have a positive outcome, and I see a miracle. But wait, not only do I see a miracle, I demand that you see a miracle, too. But hold on, I don't just demand that you see a miracle. If you don't see a miracle, that tells me a lot about you. You must not believe in God. As a matter of fact, your failure to see the miracle that I see tells me that you don't just disbelieve God, you have a detailed agenda to undermine God and all His people. As a matter of fact... it goes on and on, and some time along in there we must assume that the religious person prayed to God and told Him that he saw a miracle and that he appreciates it.

We believe in a God who created everything out of nothing. He created all the physical laws, even time itself. So in His world, where He lives, everything would appear to us as impossible. In fact, to us, God's ordinary, predictable, everyday creation is way more awesome than miracles. I'm looking at the vastness of the universe, from the unimaginably tiny to the unimaginably huge, the symphony of the laws of nature, the complexity of the simplest of beauties, people, everything. It just blows my mind. But if I see a little glitch in all that, a miracle, it's more like, ok, that's what I would expect from God. Not all this wondrous order and predictability.

Second thing, God gives me a brain and He expects me to use it. And so I can comprehend very large numbers and statistics, and I know that the universe is not made out of blacks and whites, it is made out of probabilities. And I know that given enough events, I would be surprised not to see highly unlikely events happen.

Therefore, for a great many highly unlikely events, I can't really tell you whether it was a miracle or just the expected rare occurrence of the highly unlikely. And it doesn't really matter to anyone but me and God, anyway.

God's relationship to His people is personal. I'll try and discern miracles from expected rare occurrences, and the Holy Spirit will guide me in this discernment. But in the end it really doesn't matter. It's either God's astonishingly amazing creation firing off an extraordinarily rare event, or it's God bending his own laws to make a miracle. Either way I just praise God.

I don't understand what the big brouhaha's about.

 

[theophilus777]

Little worse than that, Heis claims to BE the faith healer:

Yes - horrible! And immoral. Burn him, he's a witch! We can't have anyone going around doing good now, can we?

You do realize that means we need to keep the Gospel out of Asia, right?

 

[[serious]]

Yes - horrible! And immoral. Burn him, he's a witch! We can't have anyone going around doing good now, can we?

You do realize that means we need to keep the Gospel out of Asia, right?

... Are you quoting time cube or something?

We just somehow made jumps from faith healers, to witches, to missionary work in Asia. I didn't follow any of it.

 

[TLK Valentine]

In a 1952 meeting one of the many "healed" was Jeanne Sonmore. I got to know Clayt Sonmore in the 1990's until his passing. Jeanne was healed as per Clayt's witness.

I have Clayt's word against yours.

The word of the man who made a fortune writing books praising the healer more prolific than Jesus.

Your conclusions are showing a trend. There is something called whitewash: where people knowingly or not color over the real with what they select to show to others. Since He is, people who know Him watch unbelievers whitewash things all the time.

Now, who really is free in mind and has been learning and promoting the truth they have found in life?

.

The one who isn't getting conned.

 

[theophilus777]

The word of the man who made a fortune writing books praising the healer more prolific than Jesus.

FAIL. Compare the two, and reassess. Also, is there a problem with selling books?

 

[TLK Valentine]

FAIL. Compare the two, and reassess.

Are you saying that Clayt didn't make money promoting Branham as a faith healer?

Also, is there a problem with selling books?

Not at all. Stephen King does it -- but I still don't believe in ghosts.

 

[PsychoSarah]

The best miracle that I prayed for was for Malala. When the Taliban first threatened her, I made a prayer that if they had attempted to kill her, that it would look like they will kill her, but in the end that wouldn't happen. When she was shot, but survived. I knew my prayer had been answered. To me that's a miracle.

And what of all the people who pray and their prayers remain unanswered? You see, this is a logic fallacy people are prone to. You zero in on the one instance in which your prayer appeared to be answered, not thinking of the many more times that your prayers weren't answered. And if you pray every time before a turning point in your life or someone else's, chances are eventually it will seem that prayer is "answered".

 

[theophilus777]

And what of all the people who pray and their prayers remain unanswered? You see, this is a logic fallacy people are prone to.

Sorry but no this is not a fallacy. The only logical flaw here is you, thinking that miracles are going to be logical.

You zero in on the one instance in which your prayer appeared to be answered, not thinking of the many more times that your prayers weren't answered.

You know no such thing. In fact, this is abusive of you. I do hope that this poster is strong enough to be unaffected by it, but please don't do that.

And if you pray every time before a turning point in your life or someone else's, chances are eventually it will seem that prayer is "answered".

You are proselytizing your atheism. I thought you said you don't do that?

 

[PsychoSarah]

Sorry but no this is not a fallacy. The only logical flaw here is you, thinking that miracles are going to be logical.

You know no such thing. In fact, this is abusive of you. I do hope that this poster is strong enough to be unaffected by it, but please don't do that.

You are proselytizing your atheism. I thought you said you don't do that?

This is a common attribution fallacy humans are prone to. Ever heard of the myth after a couple who has trouble conceiving adopts they are more likely to have a baby? These sorts of myths spring up from the fallacy of zooming in only on instances which support the myth and ignoring all the, say, instances in which people who have trouble yet don't adopt eventually conceive, and how many people who don't conceive after adoption. The same goes for this.

 

[PsychoSarah]

And I learned that from a professional psychology text book, I am not pulling ideas out of my butt. And pointing out the logic fallacy is not me trying to convert.

 

[quatona]

The best miracle that I prayed for was for Malala. When the Taliban first threatened her, I made a prayer that if they had attempted to kill her, that it would look like they will kill her, but in the end that wouldn't happen. When she was shot, but survived. I knew my prayer had been answered. To me that's a miracle.

So you are assuming a causal connection between your prayer and the result? Wow.

 

[Heissonear]

So you are assuming a causal connection between your prayer and the result? Wow.

.
The distinction of meeting Him and His Power, even His Kingdom in our midst, is that you pray with no faith, expectation, nor dependence from pure motives, with the result of any and all prayers equal to zero. That is your witness! But in reality your witness is the Heavens are closed to your prayers!

While there are others who pray the opposite, they pray in sincere faith, even with expectations, watching and looking for Him and the Heavens to open and to Rule over the natural in answering their prayers. They witness prayers answered by Him on High.

Answers to prayers come in all forms. The more we walk with Him the more we see this.

You pray not expecting; we pray expecting. You pray to no one; we pray to Him who Created all things. Your witness is there is no Heaven; we witness the Power from on High, even the Heavens open to to answer prayers.

Quite a REAL distinction. The doubt filled, spiritually empty handed crowd claims that they NEVER see answered prayers. Answered prayers is a Realm they do not know. Who are the experts about prayer, unbelievers? Yea, we notice you promote the final word of such: what you say is how it is. Do you get it? We sure do!

Now "teach us" how we see casual events and if we pray enough the odds of correlation goes up! How Spiritually immature and clueless.

In the Kingdom in our midst peoples thoughts are louder than their spoken words.

.

 

[Heissonear]

And I learned that from a professional psychology text

.

That is called listening to and following men.

And you want to correct those who hear and are taught by Him on High?

.

 

[TLK Valentine]

.

That is called listening to and following men.

And you want to correct those who hear and are taught by Him on High?

.

Who says anyone has ever heard and has been taught from Him on high?

 

[PsychoSarah]

.

That is called listening to and following men.

And you want to correct those who hear and are taught by Him on High?

.

Do you doubt humans have flaws? Do you doubt attribution errors? Humans make mistakes, humans have bias, labeling the common ones anyone can observe is hardly allowing myself to be force fed, because I see people make these errors all the time.

 

[theophilus777]

Do you doubt humans have flaws? Do you doubt attribution errors? Humans make mistakes, humans have bias, labeling the common ones anyone can observe is hardly allowing myself to be force fed, because I see people make these errors all the time.

You think that because you learned it in a text book that it is necessarily so. that is not how one engages in critical thought. You also fail to recognize you are only giving your subjective opinion, having no idea about what happened, where, or when.

 

[PsychoSarah]

You think that because you learned it in a text book that it is necessarily so. that is not how one engages in critical thought. You also fail to recognize you are only giving your subjective opinion, having no idea about what happened, where, or when.

I see people make these errors, the only thing those books taught me really was that those errors had a name (which, ironically, I seem to have forgotten most of). Perhaps I notice them more now as a result of being aware more of their existence, but anyone can see people misattribute the actions of others and events all the time.