Prayers after tornadoes (America, prophets, atheism, agnostic)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
After man brought sin into this realm, it cursed everything and brought death. Even nature. So God set in forth a plan to redeem mankind and give us eternal life. That plan did not involve keeping the human body alive indefinitely. But apparently, that's what you are demanding of God. That's not the way it works. Our physical bodies are cursed by sin. The flesh has to eventually die. And there are probably a million ways you can die. Is God suppose to prevent all of them? Or just the ones that you personally feel are bad like tornadoes? Yeah, tornadoes are tragedies, but we all have at least one tragedy awaiting us and that's the way we will die. Just go look up the obituary of any celebrity. Most of them did not die in a pleasant manner. That's just life. God doesn't create the tornadoes. Those are just random weather events arising from chaotic nature forces. If God prevents the tornadoes then what should He prevent next? Eventually, it is only delaying death.
Christians are called to love and have a heart of desire to help others. Praying for them is an extension of that desire.
But, does God have a say-so in whose house is hit and whose is not? Does he determine who is killed and/or injured?
Perhaps it is as simple as being thankful that you were unharmed and hopeful that others are as lucky as you were. Never prayed and have never been in a tornado so my comment is just a guess.
So once again I am completely baffled about all the prayers believers wish upon others after tornadoes go through. Here are some things to consider.
1. All things are supposed to happen according to the will of this bible god
2. Some people's houses get destroyed while others are untouched. Impossible to know whether the ones destroyed had families that "sinned" more than the other families
3. So what exactly are the prayers for? That they "recover" quickly" from this disaster?
4. So god let's the tornado happen, and then the prayers are for this god to give them comfort?
This praying during disasters has to be the most idiotic thing. I never see any god walking around these disaster sites after it's hit. No sign whatsoever. The believers say this god is invisible but yet helping. Yes about enough evidence of helpful invisible pixies walking around helping. Ever notice how all the chainsaws cutting down trees and all the houses being rebuilt are the result of human activity?
Praying: Acting like you are doing something, when you are actually doing sh**.
In 1994 a tornado hit the Goshen Alabama Methodist Church during Sunday service, causing the walls of the church to collapse. Twenty people died including six children. Why would God allow the deaths of those in His own house of worship, including the most innocent, who were there in the very act of worshiping him, when all He had to do was to prevent the walls from collapsing, with a thought? The problem is that when put to the test, make believe is invariably unaffected by the harsh realities of real life. If a wall falls on you, or a mad man shoots you in the head, make believe does not serve as protection. Even for innocent children. Piedmont Journal - Tried by Deadly Tornado, An Anchor of Faith Holds - NYTimes.com
In 2012, after shooting and killing his own mother, a mentally unstable man went to the Sandy Hook Elementary School and methodically shot 20 six year old's and a teacher in the head. A Supreme Being would really have come in handy that day. Did God just sit there and watch the whole thing? Or was he distracted, too busy fulfilling the mundane prayers of others? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_...chool_shooting
The point is, in real life what we actually observe is that when the chips are down and faith is confronted by reality, reality will ALWAYS win out. When the chips are down and a Supreme Being would really REALLY come in handy, God, invisible unknowable but assumed to exist anyway God, will invariably act in exactly the same manner as a God who isn't actually there. In fact a God who refuses to act even in the face of the ultimate crisis of life and death for the most innocent of His followers is a God who corresponds in every way to A GOD WHO NEVER EXISTED TO BEGIN WITH! What exactly is the difference? A God who will not come through for you at your ultimate moment of need is a God who is no different from a God who was never there to begin with. This is as close to an empirical test for the actual existence of God as one might reasonably hope for. And in these sorts of make or break tests, the result for the question "does God exist," invariably corresponds in every way to a negative finding. Believing in the existence of such a Being is the supreme act of gullibility.
And this is where believers inevitably declare the virtue of faith. And what is faith? Paul defined it this way: "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." (Hebrews 11:1) In actual practice however faith is really nothing more than a conscious decision to be unwaveringly gullible, and to then declare gullibility to be a virtue.
Now let me make this clear. I do not blame God for what occurred at the Sandy Hook Elementary School, in EXACTLY the same way that I hold no grudge against Santa for not coming to my house each Christmas.
Yes well its still nice to say prayers for them Texan2008... They have been thru alot and no one would want that to happen to anyone!!
Some of my family lost everything yesterday, they was tornadoes buzzing right and left, hail stones coming down like 50 cent pieces, a hard crushing truth. I think they lost about a half a mill or so but all ten in the family didn't get a scratch.
Hell, I thought for sure the Lord had come to take me.
What it comes down to in the end is the evidence for a god really being there vs. evidence that it isn't. Trying to disprove it by pointing to apparently random natural acts that do harm does little good, as the disbelievers don't need any more evidence and the believers will find a pretext for saying 'God if good" whatever happens.
And in anticipation of the persistent misunderstanding of our rationale on this - atheists are not saying God is bad, or malevolent or psychotic (though he evidently would be if he existed) but that the best explanation for what we observe is that these are natural unplanned and sometimes unfortunate occurrences and for all we can tell, there is no god there.
Yes well its still nice to say prayers for them Texan2008... They have been thru alot and no one would want that to happen to anyone!!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hannibal Flavius
Some of my family lost everything yesterday, they was tornadoes buzzing right and left, hail stones coming down like 50 cent pieces, a hard crushing truth. I think they lost about a half a mill or so but all ten in the family didn't get a scratch.
Hell, I thought for sure the Lord had come to take me.
So sorry to hear that, brother. MY "useless" prayers are with you and yours during this trying time.
So sorry to hear that, brother. MY "useless" prayers are with you and yours during this trying time.
It was so weird, it happened in Sealy Texas. Where they lost their houses and horse barn, and everything else this week, 35 years ago, I was sitting in the same exact place in a tornado, a tornado struck the exact same place this week.
It wouldn't have been so bad for them, but they just had lost all their savings in a million dollar lawsuit. They have a garbage business and one morning they came into work and found the mechanic, the truck had slipped off it's lift and cut dude clean in half, imagine that sight. It's like God is angry with them or something.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
