Everybody is an individual and everybody must make up their own mind about whether or not to take medicines.
I'd never faced this decision before... I didn't know what to do. When I was first diagnosed with the HIV virus, I read innumerable articles on it and later suffered from an information overload and depressing confusion. One article would speak in favor of taking the highly toxic HIV/AIDS medicines, and then I'd read another one that spoke against it with just as convincing of an argument.…
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— go to most recent comments76 - Timmy Jones (Mike)
Yes, all our school computers use the same ip address.
I was being sarcastic, relax. And my friend, did mispell truck, but it was just a typo. Josh is actually quite intelligent.
I obviously was not run over by a truck. I do believe that God heals though. My grandmother was diagnosed with a lung condition 4 years ago, that basically is unable to be cured and was marked with two years to live. I prayed ever night, and although it did not heal her, it did prolong her live. So, i think cases of people being healed by God is rare, however perhaps he increases the longevity of the person being prayed for's life.
77 - KYS
Keep asking, Gonzo. I reallly want to see how many times your question is completely ignored.
78 - Steve
Well, obviously, troll, if God were just a part of the creation, I think science would have discovered him by now, don't you think?? - that's why gonzo is arguing away here, isn't it??? Because God can't be found by science in the creation? Not a surprise to theists. We don't expect him to be. He wouldn't be God the Creator then.
The fact is, Gonzo, there are thousands of unexplained recoveries that happen across the world every day. Folks like yourself will attribute it to the 'body's amazing ability to heal itself', and others will argue it was the power of God. Either way, you require faith to believe either option because many cases are never proven either way. Why don't you just 'fess up to that, gonzo???
79 - gonzo marx
tuburculosis or gangrene...
ONE documented case, please
that is my only Question here
all the rest of your talk is pure sophistry, your perogative of course
but sophistry none the less
80 - Steve
gonzo, if you could put God in a test tube, that would disprove that he was the Creator. You really think I wanna help you on that score??? Not! The best one could do is prove it wasn't the body that heals itself. I think Ruvy has spoken on this on other threads.
81 - gonzo marx
Steve, you try and try and avoid a simple Question...
i have no desire to place anything in a test tube...
i ask a simple Question...
cite me ONE case of tuburculosis or gangrene cured by anything other than antibiotics
no dodging, no distraction, no bullshit
show your evidence or shut the fuck up...
k?
thanks
bye now
82 - Sojourner
Okay,
Apparently the one who began this thread is no longer current with it. I have no beef with any of you. I've seen Godly intervention... but I don't expect anyone here to believe that... not even David. I was merely offering David an answer to the questions he posed as to the way God heals.
Gonzo, I do not have the documentation that you seek. I can only speak from my own experience thus far. I have found the teachings of the Bible to be reliable in my life. The lack of scientific evidence does not derogate from the validity of God... but I can see where you would see it as such. I'm not asking anyone here to believe in me, God, or even in God's healing. I was just answering the questions as put forth by the author of the original blog.
Soj
83 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Sojourner, Steve, Gonzo,
I would carefully reread Gonzo's remarks at comment #54. They are worth copying down here for your convenience.
"as any doctor will tell you, from Johns Hopkins to the Witch Doctor to the Medicine man...
most healing comes from within the Patient, the physicians task is to do no harm and make the patient comfortable
on the other hand, the percentage of ill folks that are not aided but such treatments, require further care..."
On the other hand, Gonzo, will someone whose business is selling pills or operations, document phenomena which will put him out of business? The guy whose tumor mysteriously disappears gets sent home. He's grateful, praising the L-rd, and the doctor is glad to see the back of him, lest his new fancy operating room can't pay for itself because Someone Else is being credited with the healing.
I'm going to leave it all at that.
84 - Duane
Ruvy has discovered yet another conspiracy, the underlying aim of which is to suppress knowledge of the action of a Supr-me B-ing! Who would have ever guessed?
Bad ... no! ... EVIL ... doctors.
Ruvy: I'm going to leave it all at that.
Hope springs eternal.
And in another sense:
Hope springs eternal in the human breast;
Man never Is, but always To be blest
The soul, uneasy, and confin'd from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come
Lo, the poor Indian! whose untutor'd mind
Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind;
His soul proud Science never taught to stray
Far as the solar walk or milky way,
Yet simple Nature to his hope has giv'n,
Behind the cloud-topp'd hill, an humbler heav'n.
-- Alexander Pope
85 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
What conspiracy, Duane? Someone has to pay for the lab assistants, for the machines, for the consultants for the experimental designs, for the computers, printers, chemicals, etc. etc., for the mainfraim time when the research is broad enough, for the rent. These are legitimate expenses by people who want to make money.
You have heard of making money, haven't you?
If you are investing money in a new procedure or drug, you are not likely to spend it documenting mysterious cures that neither prove nor disprove the value of your procedure or drug. This is not a conspiracy, it is the prudent use of an investor's money.
If on the other hand, one has a few tens of millions laying around and wants to be on hand when the mysterious cures pop up to document them, one could do that too. But that would be a labor of faith and of love. No remunerative profit would come from it.
Only arguments from people like you calling it fake.
86 - troll
Steve - *Well, obviously, troll, if God were just a part of the creation, I think science would have discovered him by now, don't you think?? -*
uh...no
when you claimed a scientific 'disproof' I thought that you were talking about evidence rather than your personal 'logical' beliefs
troll
87 - Sojourner
Ruvy,
It's more than just money. Medicine has become a religion in itself with the Medical professionals as it's Priests and Priestesses, able to hear confessions, exact penance, perform sacraments and extend indulgences to it's wealthy parishioners. They are able to extend life and perform miracles... Who needs God? Hospitals are our new temples... medical science our new Patron. People's faith is in their doctors... God is the last resort when all other hope has been depleted. Despite the iatrogenic nightmare that exists, people would still rather worship a god they can see.
Soj
88 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Sojourner,
Much that you say is true - but the doctors are not all idols to be worshipped. As long as you don't worship at the temple of the pill pusher, but recognize Whose hand is guiding matters, you have some hope.
89 - Steve
By the way, I would like to make it clear, I am not suggesting that one must take an either/or position on doctors and God, as one or two here seem to be. Both can have their place in the healing process.
90 - gonzo marx
for Ruvy in #83
i must Answer a direct Question...damn me for even still reading this shyte...
Ruvy...the medical field took a huge turn for the worse in the 80's when folks started entering medical school as a Business instead of as a Vocation
think about it
can anyone remember the last disease that was actually Cured, and not just Treated?
unless i am mistaken, that would be smallpox
nuff said?
91 - Andy Marsh
come on gonzo - I watched the X-files, everyone knows the only reason they injected us with the smallpox vaccine was so the aliens could put markers in our blood systems!
but seriously, I thought I read recently that smallpox was back...no?
92 - Sojourner
Ruvy, Steve,
I agree, Doctors have their place... however, I think people are much too anxious to consume their elixers of monkey pus and urine of mare in hopes to illicit a cure. I think if they wore a wooden mask and danced around you with a shrunken head filled with extracted teeth on a stick, it would be as scientific as much that they do... I mean, in Afrika, many of the "cures" do work there too. They call it Juju... use herbs and incantations. I think if people saw the medical profession with all the hype stripped away, they would be alarmed.
But that's just me.
Soj
93 - gonzo marx
again i Ask...
show me a single case of where tuburculosis or gangrene was cured by ANY method not involving anti-biotics (created by medical science) and i will go along
otherwise you refuse to accept Facts in order to suit your limited viewpoint
nuff said
94 - Andy Marsh
I can think of one thing that medical science has supposedly cured...at least that's what the commercials tell me....E.D.
95 - troll
re #91...*but seriously, I thought I read recently that smallpox was back...no?*
no
(at least not outside of the labs where folks are trying to 'weaponize' it)
troll
96 - Duane
Ruvy: As long as you don't worship at the temple of the pill pusher, but recognize Whose hand is guiding matters, you have some hope.
That's your prognosis? A perfect example of how religion breeds contempt for Man.
You are supporting a mode of thought that was prevalent during the European Middle Ages, when Scholarship emphasized religious questions, and clerics were more interested in curing the soul than the body. Theologians considered disease and injury to be the result of supernatural intervention and insisted that cures were only possible through prayer. Human dissection was frowned upon, since the church maintained that Man was created in the image of God, and that dissection was equivalent to dissecting God. It was also believed that disease was inflicted by God as a punishment for sins. Physicians would often consult astrologers before making a diagnosis. The term given to medical handbooks was "leechbook."
No doubt, you know this, but cling to your beliefs anyway. You deny the obvious.
I, for one, am grateful that reason has triumphed over the superstitions that you push. If your type had dominated during the times when science was trying to emerge from the shadows of "spiritual" hocus pocus, we would be paying visits to our local leeches-and-bloodletting physician, who would be much like the stereotype described by Sojourner (#92).
If you give up worshiping at the temple of the foisters of mindnumbing intellectual dishonesty, dispense with the misguided misanthropy, and recognize that human intelligence and rationality have the potential to overcome the obsolete trappings of superstition, you have some hope.
97 - Sojourner
Gonzo,
That's rich.
Now are you asking for a case or a scientfically documented case of notariety? My youngest son had what I can only imagine to be some sort of spider bite with an oozing crater about the size of a dime with black skin surrounding it about the size of a quarter... that's what it looked like when he showed it to me. My husband took him over to the minister's house, got him anointed and the next morning, the whole thing peeled off his leg like it was one of those fake rubber sores.
But that doesn't really qualify does it? We want to set God up like a lab rat and see if he'll perform so we can determine if He is worthy of our belief?
Soj
98 - gonzo marx
which part of basic english is so difficult for some people to comprehend...
Question: can you show one factually documented case of either tuburculosis or gangrene healed by any method other than anti-biotics?
it's just that fucking simple...but all any can seem to do is dodge and distort the one very easy Question
i am NOT attempting to quantify or qualify anything spiritual, merely showing that is left to "faith" or "god" either of these two medical conditions kill...100% of the time
unless you can show evidence that my assertation is incorrect, then my point is made to any with a Mind to see it
and folks wonder why i am about a half inch away from deleting this site from my browser
argh!
99 - Andy Marsh
what? You didn't like my E.D. reference???
100 - Andy Marsh
I'm not sure if god would heal that affliction...Can you imagine? How would the prayer go? Please god...raise this dead appendage so I may go forth and multiply...in your name we pray....
101 - gonzo marx
Mr Marsh...ED is not cured, merely treated...
you need a pill each time you want the desired effect...a cure would mean one pill and things woudl work normally from then on
last lesson in Thinking, enjoy your Journey
102 - Duane
Hang in there Gonzo. They are impenetrable. They have had years to perfect their techniques of evasion and denial. To them, coincidence reveals the Hand of God.
103 - Christopher Rose
Sojourner: your wilful distortions are really getting old. Hearsay and stories like yours prove nothing. You are simply assuming there was a direct causal relationship and based on what? It could have been co-incidence for all you know.
Furthermore, you still haven't produced any evidence for the existence of this "god" of yours. No gods ergo no miraculous cures.
104 - Christopher Rose
gonzo: have you had a holiday lately? You sound tired, man; take a break, see a different sky or even get high.
105 - David Ben-Ariel
Creation is the PROOF of our Creator.
106 - Christopher Rose
Yeah, and bread is proof of the baker.
Next!
107 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
First to answer Gonzo,
No answer is really required. You and I track on this. The American medical profession degenerated from a vocation to a business about 20 years ago.
Now to Duane.
You certainly read great deal into what I wrote that I certainly did not mean. The greatest Jewish rabbi that lived was a doctor who prescribed knowledge of science and astronomy to his pupils as well as Torah and the Talmud.
For you information, Jews have never looked upon medicine the way Christians have. Your description of a mideaeval attitude is a Christian mideaeval attitude, not a Jewish one.
Without advanced science and technology, one of my sons very likely would not be alive right now. He was a "blue baby" born 13 weeks early. He weighed 800 gms. at birth. I'm not knocking any of this at all.
My point to Sojourner AND YOU is simply not to worship doctors like gods the way many of them seem to demand and to remember Whose Hand guides the hand of the most skillful surgeon and the most imaginative of physicians.
I'll thank you not to put what you imagine to be the ideas of a religious fanatic into my mouth.
108 - David Ben-Ariel
Some of us know God can, if He will, HEAL. But like those in the Book of Daniel about to be thrown into the fire, they said they would love and worship God whether or not He saved them - and they knew He could.
I love God and believe Him and know nothing is impossible for Him, but I always have questions, like everybody who thinks and reads the Bible or ponders life should. The preponderance of evidence FOR God convinces me that His Word is true, besides the proof of creation and various answered prayers that beat the odds over the years. But if someone chooses not to believe, that's between them and the God they'll ultimately discover is very REAL.
109 - Christopher Rose
David: evidence? Only in the privacy of your own mind.
110 - Christopher Rose
Ruvy: but you are a religious fanatic...
111 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Chris, so are you. You call your ideas by a different name, but you cling to them with the fanaticism of a Torquemada.
112 - Christopher Rose
Ruvy: I promise that you are completely wrong on the above statement.
I don't completely believe the sun is going to rise in the morning - and that's one of the things I have the most faith in...
113 - Christopher Rose
and Torquemada?
That's a pretty cheap and inaccurate shot from a guy that's happy to insult horribly his own people,the USA, Europe, the rest of the Middle East and anybody else that gets in the way of your deist dream.
Got any actual substance there or are you simply venting, again?
114 - Duane
OK, Ruvy, fair enough (#107).
In fact, it was the eastern Islamic world that made most of the medical advances during the European Middle Ages. They acquired knowledge and developed techniques that later passed to the Europeans.
115 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Sorry about the Torquemada part - I was looking for a name and he kept popping up. I know more about him than about other Spaniards and didn't want to look like like an idiot in my analogy...
Honest, no insult was intended, even though I realize why insult was taken.
116 - Christopher Rose
Now you've got me started, Ruvy, I'm reminded that you don't actually know what my views are, just a subset that expresses in these repetitive "conversations".
If I recall correctly, the only thing you know for sure about me is that I'm not prepared to believe something just because a whole bunch of people say so.
I don't even care one way or the other if there is a god or not, I just don't want to waste my all too brief and precious life in empty rituals and gestures.
When you get right down to the nitty gritty of it all, past all the posturing and rhetoric, what actually matters is what people are doing to help each other.
It's about how we express our common human heritage and our obvious connectedness with all the splendour we see all around here on Earth and in the heavens above.
It's not about putting our faith in mythical creatures or ancient books, no matter how cherished a cultural artefact they may be.
The simple truth is that there is just one race, the human race, and any ethos or creed that doesn't have that and a huge dollop of love at its very core isn't worth bothering with. So now you know a little more.
117 - Sojourner
David,
Regarding # 108... that's the bottom line... we know He can but whether or not He will, we still do not bow down to their gods...there is no need to discuss it further... good answer.
Soj
118 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Okay, Chris,
Now you'ver got me started. Enough people have died on the operating table and elswhere and come back with the same tale of a loving light to indicate that it's worth putting some credit in.
But not all have told of the loving light. Most have had no tale at all, and a few, a very small number, have told of a fearful darkness.
Consider. The vast majority of us are decent people, and we magnify our own sins out of fear or arrogance. We often do good without realizing it, and this good spreads exponentially - the point of the movie "It's a Wonderful Life."
Your good point, as I see it, it that you follow the concept of "numbering your days," following the precept that there is a limited time to do good, and by golly, you intend to do it, because time's a wastin'! Whether you "believe" in this or that set of ideological superstructures is irrelevant.
Another good point: You look for, and get excited over, things that can improve the human condition and make life more pleasant for the vast majority of us. Love and kindness makes that world more pleasant. You look to the good, rather than the bad, and do not want to waste time on the bad or the uncertain (including rituals to deities you cannot prove exist) - there is no time to waste.
That is what I see. So what is not good in this set? Not all of us can see the world the exact same way you do. It takes all kinds to make a world. Excoriating those of us who have strong beliefs in G-d wastes your time.
You've got a good product to sell:
1. Looking to the good.
2. Numbering your days.
Any salesman will tell you that to make a sale, you do not set out to prove the customer wrong. You educate him until he is willing to take your basic ideas seriously enough to lay money on the line.
So sell your product and don't waste your time!
119 - Christopher Rose
I don't number my days particularly Ruvy, I'm just living in the now, it just seems incontrovertible that we all only get so many.
I simply can't accept the admittedly mightily comforting thought of a heavenly afterlife for lack of anything remotely approaching the most basic of evidence, never mind actual proof. It ain't pretty but it's true.
Mind you, I may just have the chance to find out a little more about the wonderful mysteries of life if recent and ongoing research in the field of ageing comes to fruition quickly enough, by which I mean usable products and techniques that will offer seriously prolonged high quality life for anybody that chooses to take advantage of it.
If it does, I guarantee two things:
1) I'm going to take advantage of it even if nobody else I know does. If only because I want to see what happens when 2) Everything about our current understanding of the world and our entire social and cultural fabric is going to change radically.
I can't emphasise that last point strongly enough - just think about what it will mean for you, your kids, our entire human race if lots of people, possibly even the majority, start living full active lives of say just 125 years as a matter of course. Then imagine that number amped up. Where will it end? 150? 200? Can you imagine politicians trying to justify not funding that kind of research to their ageing constituents? Or how many faithists might just want a little life extension back-up, just in case?
I have been a salesman more than once in the past and I'm going to be one again quite soon but in this case, if there is anything at all to my understanding of the time and place I find myself in, I'm not proving you (my customer as you put it) wrong, I'm offering an enhanced model, a reality upgrade if you like, absolutely for free. That's a good deal!
120 - carol fowler
I know God can heal as my husband had parkinson's disease for 7 years then on may 14th 2003 God completley healed him, he stop taking all the anti parkinsons tablets ans has been discharge from the hospital. allow God to do it His way wether it be my doctors or himself, you will know as God always wants to reveal His plans and purposes for your life
121 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Chris,
I looked over the comments on this thread and saw the first 13 comments missing. Were they all that hateful?
122 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Carol,
I'm glad to hear that your husband was healed of Parkinson's disease four years ago. A fellow who was a neighbor of ours fell victim to heart stoppage some three years ago and now wastes away in a hospital in Jerusalem.
His wife tries prayer and going to rabbis but cannot seem to get rid of the anger in her heart. IMHO, this is a big obstacle to the prayers she utters being answered...
123 - David Ben-Ariel
Carol: I'm very happy to hear God healed your husband. Sometimes He heals, sometimes He doesn't, but I trust Father knows best.
Ruvy: I believe anger, if unchecked, can lead to a bitterness that can block answered prayers, but I also know God is even greater than our emotions and failings. Look how he healed the pagan Syrian Naaman who slandered the River Jordan. So many factors God takes into consideration, even if most folks don't have a clue what's going on.
It appears that woman is at least trying, if she's praying and going to rabbis. May God give her serenity, peace, grace under pressure, in His tender mercies.
124 - Pierre
Brother,
I too want God's will, but remember the Lord's prayer, "Thy Kingdom Come, Thy will be done, ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN." God's will is to bring heaven to earth. Now I realize earth as we see it is by no means heavenly, but we do get glimpses, yes tastes of heaven, and it is God's will for us to pray into for more of this manifestation.
God is doing a wonderful thing in our church by healing many people (see www.godhealstoday.com) Has God healed everyone? No. But we also believe God wants to save everyone, but is everyone saved? No. That doesn't stop us from praying for people's salvation or sharing the gospel. In the same vain, we should not so easily quit praying if we don't see the results right away.
One other thing I've learned is that healing prayer is often progressive, just like healing is progressive. Just like a cut takes time, so does healing often take time. So therefore we need to pray just as frequently as we take our medication knowing that every prayer counts.
125 - David Ben-Ariel
Hello Pierre,
Thank you for your comments and prayers.
I agree the Kingdom of God will be established on Earth, that Heaven is not the reward of the saved, for Yeshua clearly taught, "The meek shall inherit the Earth."
Born Again and Heaven and Hell
As for healings taking time, I only see a few possible mentions of that in Scripture. For the most part, whenever Yeshua healed - they were healed right then and there, no doubt about it, mission accomplished. Regardless, Father knows best, eh?
Does God Heal Today?