Did You Ever Witness A Miracle

[OnceConvinced]

The New Testament pretty much promises we'll see miracles. Healings particularly. Did you ever see any bonifide miracle such as healing as a Christian? I'm talking about one that was obvious.

 

In my experience, I have always heard of miracles taking place mainly in foreign countries. I hear about these things, but never have met anybody who had a miraculous healing. Hell I haven't even seen video footage of such things and you'd think there would be heaps of that around.

 

All I ever heard was of things happening elsewhere. Once I thought God healed me of the flu, because I was conducting spiritual warfare against it and seconds later I felt fine. But now I realise that was just mind over matter.

 

There is one particular evangelist in New Zealand called Bill Subritsky. He used to do a lot of Faith healing meetings, particularly in the 80s. I was always hearing rumours of amazing healings taking place at them. Limbs growing to the right size and stuff like that. I was told that once a mysterious black cloud hovered over a building he was holding a meeting at, while inside Bill was casting demons out of people. Apparently the bodies of possessed people would slide up the side of walls. This is the stuff I was hearing and people were convinced of it! But I went to several of his big healing meetings and apart from being able to pick people out of rows for various things that God was supposedly telling him, I never once saw anything particularly remarkable.

 

What about you?

[infidel666]

That would be a big Negative. I think it would be hard to witness a miracle and then lose your faith.

[BlueGiant]

Every day that I don't punch some idiot out or otherwise mangle them is a miracle of self control.

 

Closest I came was the fact that I caught mono (with a positive blood test) and escaped the fatigue (only symptom I missed, so I sat there awake with the worst sore throat of my life). Then again, different symptoms manifest in different people.

 

There are other things, but nothing I have tangible evidence of, just anecdotal from me and my friends. All minor-ish.

 

Miracles don't prove anything anyway, just that the rules can be broken. Really doesn't say which god is doing it.

[Minstrel]

It seems that a lot of those "evangelists" have such stories told about their meetings. I've been to so many, it's embarassing...all the while talking about the "last crusade" and the tremendous miracles... I even "prayed-up"...only to be there for a lot of nothing happening.

One time, the evangelist (actually, they called him a prophet) had everyone in the church that wanted him to lay hands on them stand in a line... Well...that was everyone...so the line went up and down all the aisles and around the back... When he saw what he was up against, he had to change his plan of attack...so, he went like whirlwind, and used the charismatic "Shock-Shove" to the foreheads...and each person was going down... He got to the back, before making his final run toward the platform, and gave the treatment to a lady...and she went down like a tidal wave hit her...but, she was on concrete, and even though the place was alive with loud hallelujah's and praises and the like...everything went quiet...because her head hitting that concrete was a terrible sound. That was 5 years ago. The last time I saw her, she was still having migraines.

Oh...perhaps I should add...migraines weren't a problem before her miraculous bounce off the floor.

[Fweethawt]

Did You Ever Witness A Miracle

I know that many people here would not agree, but in my opinion, witnessing the birth of your own child(ren) is the closest thing to an actual miracle.

 

[Dianka]

witnessing the birth of your own child(ren) is the closest thing to an actual miracle.

 

 

Why?

 

Honestly, I'm not being a jerk

[Fweethawt]

witnessing the birth of your own child(ren) is the closest thing to an actual miracle.

 

Why?

 

Honestly, I'm not being a jerk

You left out the part where I said, "but in my opinion,".

 

It just is. (in my opinion)

 

When you're in a room containing four or five people then POOF! all of a sudden there's another person there...

 

I don't know. It's just awesome.

[Dianka]

A lot of people share your opinion. It's why I ask

[Fweethawt]

A lot of people share your opinion. It's why I ask

No biggy. It's cool.

[Lorena Rodriguez]

 

When you're in a room containing four or five people then POOF! all of a sudden there's another person there...

 

I love the simplicity with which you express such an awesome thought.

[xrayman7040]

I've spent twelve years working in a large hospital. I have spoken to so many patients who profess that they survived a certain condition because of a miracle. I met my very first person who survived liver cancer this year. The survival rate is around 1%. That is the closest thing to a miracle I have ever seen, but when you think about it, and I have said this in other posts:

 

WHAT MOST PEOPLE CLAIM TO BE A MEDICAL MIRACLE, IS SIMPLY A VERY HIGHLY UNLIKELY, BUT STATISTIALLY POSSIBLE EVENT.

 

Unfortuneately 99 out of 100 people diagnosed with liver or pancreatic cancer will be a compost heap very quickly no matter how many people are praying for them.

 

I loved it when DATELINE NBC found some of Benny Hinns patients he supposedly cured of cancer, residing in their local cemiteries.

 

 

I was a kid before cable TV, so I used to watch this faith healer on Sudays named Ernest Angsly, due to the lack of the Cartoon Network. As a kid I bought into his bullshit hook line and sinker.

 

 

Check out this site:

 

www.godisimaginary.com

[xrayman7040]

Unfortunately in the hospital setting I've seen the reverse of a miracle also become reality. Every once in a while someone will go in for a porceedure with a 99.9% survival rate and be the unlucky statistal death. Several years back a kid bled out and died from a tonsilectomy. Every once in a while a healthy young woman will die during childbirth. It's very rare but shit like that happens.

[BTDT]

I've never witnessed a miracle but I've witnessed the attempt to convince me that I had witnessed one.

 

Is anyone familiar with the amazing 'leg growing' miracles? Apparently it's very easy to do and used to be a wildly popular way (admittedly this is like 20 years ago) to convince people they'd been 'healed' of something they often didn't even know was wrong in the first place.

 

I went with a friend of mine to the residence of a couple of members of our church. I guess I was 16 or 17. This friend had actual scoliosis and wanted healing. So they sat her down in a chair, stretched her legs out in front of her, and noted that - shock! - they were not the same length.

 

They prayed in tongues, sweated, shouted to the lord to heal her, all the while 'drawing out' the shorter leg with their hands. I watched her pretty carefully for signs that she was really being 'touched by the Lord.' At the end of the whole episode, her legs that had been extended were pretty well even and she was smiling and saying oh yes, the lord has healed me but she seemed less convinced than I would have expected from someone who had just experienced a miraculous, divinely induced straightening of her badly curved spine?

 

They actually turned to me then and asked if I wanted to be prayed over as well, and they did the same thing to me! They sat me in the chair, extended my legs straight out in front and noted that my legs were not the same length! I didn't even know I had this ailment!

 

So the prayer began, and I was DYING to know what I was going to feel. Well...I felt nothing, except the gentle 'pulling' on my shorter leg as they attempted to miraculously facilitate its growth.

 

By the end, my legs too were quite even. But I KNEW I'd felt absolutely nothing...no 'touch' of anything, no warmth, no presense, no sensation of bones lengthening or spine straightening.

 

I smiled and thanked them but that was all I could do.

 

Would everyone here please just for a moment, extend your two legs out in front of you, in a casual manner in the posture you are currently seated in your chairs, and see if your legs are perfectly the same length? If they are not, is there any shift in position you could make, however slight, that would make them so? Especially if one were encouraging a shift by tugging?

 

End of discussion.

 

Christians have to lie for Jebus.

[white_raven23]

A LOT of people have mild to moderate scoliosis and never know it. Severe scoliosis is pretty hard to miss though. Mine is somewhere between mild and moderate, meaning I had to do floor exercises and learn to swim as part of my therapy. Just glad it never got bad enough to need a brace. Pretty sure it contributes to my overall balance being shot to hell. I should get back into Tai Chi.

 

Anywhoo....the trick with the leg thing. If your hips are tilted the right way, your legs even out. It's kind of like when a guy sucks in his stomach and puffs out his chest for a pretty girl in that, you can DO the pose for a minute or two.....but it's not natural for that person and you revert back to what is comfortable....though misaligned.

[BTDT]

True. Lots of people have crooked backs and don't know it, I suspect I do. The point is, no one's spines were straightening and I'm not sure the 'legs casusally extended in a chair' demonstrates scoliosis anyway. I know for a fact neither mine nor my friend's spines straightened. (I checked on her later and it was crooked again. This was not attributed to the miracle not having happened; just that the miracle wore off later). It's the simplest thing in the world for a person to encourage a leg shift with someone's legs extended straight in front of them in a chair, with actual gentle touching/tugging of the leg that needs to shift forward, a lot of prayerful commotion and everyone's vested interested in a successful outcome.

 

What a fraud. The question is, how can these people feel GOOD about themselves, going around perpetuating this for their Lord? How can THEY believe their own religion knowing they have to fake things to convince others?

[Kurari]

I don't know about miraculous, but I've had some fascinating episodes with Reiki.

 

The first time I tried Reiki, I was extremely sick with Fibromyalgia. It's a curious disease that effects your central nervous system, and it can cause a wide range of symptoms, but some of the most characteristic are painful chronic exhaustion (no matter how much rest or sleep you get, your body never "recharges" from it), and arthritic like pain in your joints that makes your body throb constantly like you have a severe flu. Anyway, I had been to many doctors and I was on many medications, none of which were helping me much.

 

So one day I was at an alternative bookstore looking for a gift for a friend, and there was a Reiki Master there giving free mini Reiki sessions. I had no idea what it was, but it was a slow day and she invited me to sit. She didn't really explain what Reiki was to me and that's all she did was put her hands on me. She didn't say anything, and didn't do anything else, so I was like "Ohhhhkaaaaayyy."

 

Then after about a minute, I started feeling a very curious sensation like warm soda pop was running down my spine. I've never felt anything like it. She wasn't massaging or doing anything with her hands, just resting them on my back, but I could feel energy moving. It felt incredibly good, warm and peaceful, and it made my nerves tingle and the pain started to ebb and finally dissapear. I also felt energized and refreshed like I had finally gotten my first good nights sleep in over a year. That feeling lasted the rest of the day.

 

I don't know how to explain that, but I thought that first session was pretty miraculous, especially since I had no idea what it was supposed to do. After that, I started studying it and got my own Level II initiation in it so I could perform it on myself and others, and I think it helped a lot with my illness. That combined with using mostly holistic medicine put my fibro into remission.

[AgnosticBob AtheistPants]

Never seen anything that could legitimately be considered a miracle. The closest thing would be my ex-wife's brother's "disappearing brain tumor". Except it was most probably never there to begin with.

 

Oh...perhaps I should add...migraines weren't a problem before her miraculous bounce off the floor.

 

OMG, that made me laugh out loud at work! They're gonna think something's wrong with me...I never laugh!

 

Miraculous bounce off the floor...

 

I was a kid before cable TV, so I used to watch this faith healer on Sudays named Ernest Angsly...

 

Oh my humanity...I haven't even THOUGHT about Ernest Angley in over 20 years! Whenever we went to my grandmother's house, she was watching him. I thought he was a shyster even at the tender age of ten. I should have continued with that line of thought instead of buying into the whole load of horseshit for the next twenty years.

 

And the fuck is still kicking! Haha! His website has a link that says, "View Actual Miracles!" Let's check it out...

 

http://www.ernestangley.org/

[Guest Shiva H. Vishnu]

 

 

I was a kid before cable TV, so I used to watch this faith healer on Sudays named Ernest Angsly, due to the lack of the Cartoon Network. As a kid I bought into his bullshit hook line and sinker.

 

 

 

 

I remember Angley all too well. I used to watch him as a kid, fascinated by his hairpiece and sideshow swagger. They'd shuffle some deaf woman onto the stage an Angley would put his index fingers in her ears and roll em around saying, slowly and dramatically...

 

Angley: Thou foul deaf spirits COME OUT-AH! YOU'RE HEALED!

 

Then he'd yank his fingers from her ears and make a high pitched "BOOP" sound with his mouth, like a champagne cork popping.

 

Angley: Show everybody your healing. Say BAY-BEE!

 

Woman: blehbleh

 

Angley: SAY BAY-BEE!

 

Woman: blehbleh

 

Angley: SAY MAH-MAH!

 

Woman blehbleh

 

Angley: MAH-MAH!

 

Woman: blehbleh

 

Angley:Praise Jaysuss! Thank ya Lord!

[chefranden]

No, Never did witness a Miracle.

[Johnny Smith]

I hesitate to mention my "experiences" with the miraculous, because it will certainly show how gullible I was in my younger life. Ah hell, why not. I'm only twenty-six, so I suppose that is not too elderly of an age to realize one's own naivete. I'll list the miracles by age:

 

Age 6 - I was "born again" and believed that to be a miracle. Shortly thereafter, I began to see angels and demons. The born again adults around me affirmed these "visions" and it was around that time that my father and step-mother began to think of me as "called to the ministry" by the Lord. The world would be a truly sick place if all adults affirmed their children's imaginary friends as evidence of their "prophetic gifts."

 

Age 8 - Experienced the "miracle" of speaking in tongues after my father prayed for me to received the "baptism in the Holy Spirit."

 

Age 9 - Attended a Benny Hinn "miracle crusades" for the first time. This was before he became a Christian celebrity. At that "crusade," I experienced a profound heat sensation and was "slain in the spirit" (fainted) for the first time. At that young, impressionable age, I was certain I had been "touched" physically by the "Lord."

 

Age 15 - As I was reading the Book of Mormon, I had a "miraculous" encounter with the "Holy Ghost" that confirmed to me by a "burning in my bosom" that the Book of Mormon was "true scripture." Amazing how often the fanatical religious equate tears and emotion with miracles.

 

Age 18 - After leaving the Mormon church, I began watching Benny Hinn on television and reading his books. Around that time, I was watching his program called "This Is Your Day" where Benny would stretch out his hands at the end of the program and ask people with illnesses to extend their hands in faith for prayer. I did so, and then placed my hands on my eyes as he was praying. My eyesight was the only "illness" I perceived as wrong with me. Nevermind I was mentally ill for believing these shanigans (sp?). Well, after Benny finished his prayers and I opened my eyes, I was CERTAIN my eyesight had been healed and I was now seeing 20/20. I even went to the eye doctor who confirmed that my eyesight had indeed improved. My step-father, who is an atheist, and my mother, a Jew, were dumbfounded but they could not argue with the improved eyesight. A year later, I enrolled in Bible School, and my eyesight diminished incredibly. I now have terrible eyesight, and am typing to you through my coke lens glasses.

 

Age 17 - 21 - Was "slain in the spirit" many times. I paricipated in the "Toronto Blessing" wherein I was also "drunk in the spirit" many times. I was filled with "holy laughter." I spoke "prophetic words," and sang "prophetic songs." One woman from Toronto claimed that I was singing in ancient Hebrew. I believed her, but never thought at the time to question the fact that she did not know ancient hebrew. http://religiousmovements.lib.virginia.edu/nrms/tbless.html

 

During one particular "Toronto Blessing" meeting, I was rolling around on the ground like a lunatic, believing that the Holy Spirit had possessed my body and was giving me "freedom in the Lord." As I was rolling around down on the church carpet, I slammed my head against a speaker. All the old pentecostal women came immediately over to me, and began laying hands on my head. "Heal his head, Lord, in Jesus name." Oh the insanity. That spiritual headslam left a major bump.

 

Age 18 - 21 - As part of the "curriculum" for the Bible School I attended, we were required to volunteer during Benny Hinn's "Miracle Crusades." I attended several of them between the age of 18 and 21. I was even asked to help on stage with "Pastor Benny." I never did see one legitimate miracle.

 

Age 18 - 21 - Underwent many exorcisms at Bible school. I believed those to be miraculous.

 

... and there were others ... but I MUST say after all those "supernatural" (NOT) experiences...

 

THE ONLY REAL MIRACLE I EVER EXPERIENCED was...

 

Having sex for the first time at 24 years of age. Now THAT was miraculous.

 

Johnny Smith

[AgnosticBob AtheistPants]

Well, the first one of Angley's "Real Miracles" that I watched was supposedly a 19 year old boy who had been run over by a truck when he was 2. It left him blind in one eye with no sense of smell and a brain injury (all this according to dad).

 

Ernie started by rubbing the boy’s nose. Of course if God was telling him what to do then God is a fraud because the boy received a brain injury. His nose was perfectly normal. If indeed the boy had no sense of smell, the root cause was in the damaged olfactory bulb in his brain. He did his trademark “Thou foul spirits…come OUT!” routine and then held a cloth doused in cologne up to the boy’s nose. The boy looked like he was acting out a previously suggested response. His eyes got wide, and his eyebrows raised. He grinned and began nodding his head. “It’s amazing” the boy says with lackluster enthusiasm.

 

Ernie then moved on to the boys eye. He began gently rubbing his thumb over the eye saying, “Recreate the eye…recreate the eye…” over and over again. Once more, if God was telling him what to do then God is again a fraud. The boys injury should have been in the occipital lobe of the brain which is in the BACK of the head. There was nothing at all wrong with his eye. There was so MUCH nothing wrong with his eye that I had to doubt the entire experience had any veracity at all based solely on its appearance. It seems to me that when someone loses the use of an eye at such a young age, the muscles in the eye get weak. As a result, the eye drifts. I’m sure you’ve seen this before. This boy had supposedly been blind in that eye for 17 years, but they eye looked as perfect as any seeing persons eye…and this was BEFORE Ernie prayed for him.

 

The eye that supposedly had sight seemed to be the blind eye. As a matter of fact, something just occurred to me. After Ernie did his “Spirits come OUT” on the eye, he told the boy to open his eye. The boy left his eye closed. Ernie had to ask several times for the boy to open his eye. Finally he did. I am willing to bet money that the OTHER eye was actually the blind eye and when Ernie told him to open his eye, he was opening the BLIND eye UNDER ERNIE’S HAND! Then he realized his mistake and opened the good eye (which he had been instructed to point out as the blind eye). Poor kid probably expected to be healed and see out of his blind eye.

 

Both he and his father showed an absolute lack of excitement at the boy’s having been healed of his brain injuries after 17 years of partial blindness and lack of olfactory senses. It was obviously staged.

 

Shame on you Angley.

[Ouroboros]

I used to belong to the most hardcore fundamentalist church in Europe, for 10 years, they prayed for sick and handicapped aaaaaaall the time, and so did I, my friends and everyone I knew...

 

The number of true miracles that can not be explained away by natural causes... zero, zip, nil, none.

 

Strangely enough, the only big miracles happened at conferences in foreign countries, and even when I went on mission trip to hopefully see one, I managed somehow to pick the wrong trip, because there never was anything spectacular, besides all the shackabahaya tongue-twisting-speaking and people getting excited for small things.

 

The closest you'd get to miracles probably was when people "fell" under the influence of the Holy Spirit (after being slightly pushed by the spirit filled preacher).

 

The only one I really saw was a vide with this preacher lady that went up on stage and got stigmata while praying. When I saw this video, and when she was claiming that God had given her this gift to spread the gospel, I didn't believe it. I was thinking "why would God make this kind of miracle that can be faked, when sick and dying people are all over the world needs help?" I discared that whole video as bull, but I didn't tell the others. I felt sick. My friends watching the video where all excited and "glory to Jesus" and "hallelujah" was phrases repeated at least 10 times a minute. That was just one thing that never would leave my mind. I could never get rid of the distaste I felt.

[Johnny Smith]

I could never get rid of the distaste I felt.

 

Hence your current status as an Unapologetic Bundamentalist and Cute Choco Bunny Archbishop that worships sticky notes.

 

Ulf, Ulf, Ulf. I wonder if he and his ilk will evern learn...

 

Probably not. They have mastered the art of self-deception, and have found it to be a good way to make money.

 

JS

[Ouroboros]

Johnny, so true. It's kind of scary to know what kind of people are attending these churches. Cute Bunnies are definitely more cuddly.

[OnceConvinced]

Is anyone familiar with the amazing 'leg growing' miracles? Apparently it's very easy to do and used to be a wildly popular way (admittedly this is like 20 years ago) to convince people they'd been 'healed' of something they often didn't even know was wrong in the first place.

 

Wow, I've heard so many stories of this sort of thing. I had no idea it was a trick. My uncle even experienced it once himself. He believed it was for real.