Miracle Or Misinterpretation?

[AgnosticBob AtheistPants]

During your time as a christian, did you ever experience something incredible? Something that at the time you just KNEW was a miracle? Something that strengthened your faith and made you believe in "God" all that much more? Was the true source of that miracle ever revealed to you? Did you feel like a complete moron or dumbass when you learned what the "miracle" truly was?

 

Tell about it!

 

My "miracle" occurred one night when the Sunday School class that my fiance (now ex-wife) and I were part of was having a prayer meeting. We were a pentecostal charismatic bunch and so believed in all the wacky shit like annointing with oil, praying over things, placing boundaries around things, and on and on. So this particular night, we were praying protection over our church as we walked around it. As we prayed and walked, I looked up into the dark and overcast sky. To the south of the church, the clouds began to slowly glow redder and redder until they were a luminous orange-red. I stopped, my mouth hanging open and just gaped. Everyone around me asked me what was wrong. I pointed up and said in a slight croak, "The sky..." they looked and turned back to me. "Good or bad?" they asked. "Good" I croaked. And we went on with our prayer walk for another lap. I kept watching the sky as we went and the colors eventually began to fade.

 

We went inside to conclude our prayer walk with prayer on your face. Afterward, the girls (teacher, fiancé, and a few of her friends) crowded around me and went on about how the lord had let me see that because of my faith. The men acted strangely and left.

 

I continued for a year or more thinking that I had experienced a miracle. However, I should have taken a hint from the men’s behavior that night. It turns out that the small town this church was in contained a steel plant. That steel plant was a few blocks south of the church. Apparently, the glowing red sky was caused by a large vat of molten steel being moved from one location to another. What kind of a dipshit was I?

 

There have been other more inexplicable occurrences in my life, but nothing that had absolutely no possible explanation other than a miracle. For instance, my ex’s brother had some problems with his vision just before my wedding. He was supposed to sing at it. He went to the doctor to see why the vision in his left eye was blacking out occasionally. They did a CAT scan (or some other scan) and found a “tumor” on his brain. The family, friends, and even a few of the nurses prayed for him and “believed” that he was healed. His vision lapses stopped. He believed he was healed. The doctor said he was going to go in to remove it anyway. When they had the surgery, all they found was a fluid filled sac, which they drained. There was no tumor there. Of course, this was cause for celebration! The LARD had HEALED him! No possibility of course that all there had ever been was a fluid filled sac and never any tumor. And when he had another lapse of vision a few months later, that was just the LARD getting him to go back to the doctor to “get confirmation” of his “miraculous healing”.

 

The real miracle is that her brother sang at our wedding three days after the surgery to drain the fluid from the sac.

[Dra_Mucd_Uha]

Miracles are one thing that keep my blind faith going for as long as it did. I was never able to explain the miracles of others' other than using God. Of course, you never really know the whole story of others' testimonies either.

 

The only thing that really ever happened to me was somewhat small. As a Christian I was running a Christian website in my attempt to reach out to others on the web. However, my site was only a subdomain of my father's site. I wanted my own domain for my site so it would be easier for others to remember the URL. Buying a domain cost $50, according to my dad. Me, being the poor guy I was (some things never change), only had $15. I needed another $35. I prayed for the other $35 for the website. About a month later I recieved two "late" birthday cards in the mail, and when combined, both had a total of $35.

 

This can be easily explained as coincidence. I get late birthday cards every year with money in them.

[Guest Mr. XC]

I think we should be careful not claim to have experienced miracles unless we fully understand the probability of all of the variables that contributed to the possible miracle, unless we want to risk ridicule.

 

I have a friend who has experienced well over 8 improbable, very improbable, and extremely improbable situations (a mix of those). They all occurred after my friend set an intention for something to happen, and it would. There were many (although less than 5 times as much) that did not work, although I think that still goes way over what was probable. An intention is not like a prayer, because you assume that you have the authority to authorize or create the conditions for the intention to occur (without the help of a separate divine being, such as God or Jesus). I suppose a prayer that is asked of with great confidence could be similar enough to an intention to make the prayer come true. My belief (which is classified as New Thought) is that we create this world unconsciously as a person in a dream would create their dream world, except with stronger physics. Therefor, setting intentions are quite powerful and can be very natural. One of the things that I have learned about setting intentions is that if you leave room for doubt (very easy to do), use it to test faith, or prove a miracle to someone, it does not work. I guess it is one of those things that you have to try.

[garrisonjj]

Not a godamn fucking thing! A lifetime of prayer and worship brought me fuckin anxiety and guilt. Now that I am free I feel totally fine! I regret a lifetime of empty worship and talking to myself! I pray that more rid themselves of the fucking binding of religion, all BULLSHIT!