Another Kenyan escapade, this time in Nyahururu.
When I was there the place was full of stories of a man who terrorised the town. He ran about in a wild sort of terror by day and by night he would sleep under some corrugated iron sheeting (until the kids came in the morning and threw stones and rocks onto the sheeting to wake him up. Think I'd be mad too if that was me!).
Anyway, one day there was a very strong sense that God was saying that the man had a spirit of amnesia and that we needed to grab him and pray for his healing. So off some of the Christians went and grabbed him and brought him back. When they did he was in a most awful state, he was covered in dirt and his matted hair had things living in it and he was like a wild animal (reminded me of the time a feral cat came in to the house and ran amok ripping things and peeing everywhere - just bigger!).
Beginning to pray for the man resulted in his dropping to the floor, motionless, and me thinking, "Whoops, think we've killed him!". There was a smashing anointing knocking around and a few minutes after the praying finished the bloke suddenly sits up and asks (in Swahili) where he is. When he's told (Nyahururu) he explains that he is a butcher and had come to buy some meat when he was attacked. The panga scars on his chest and the fact that his pick up and money had gone all supported the story and when he realised he'd been in the place for a fair time it all got a bit interesting.
We took him off and stripped his clothes off him and he was hosed down and shaved from head to foot (the local barber, not me thank goodness). He was then given new clothes and was taken back to his home where the family and neighbours went absolutely bonkers (whilst he was overjoyed but sane). They thought he'd either gone off or been killed and had given up hope of seeing him again.
I heard a few years later that there were churches formed through this event and that it had been a pivotal moment in the Christian life of the area.
The more I think of what I have seen and been involved in, the more I begin to wonder why I have let healing slip as much as I have.
And then of course there is John Wimber . . . .
Mungu Akubariki
Showing posts with label does god heal today. Show all posts
Showing posts with label does god heal today. Show all posts
Saturday, 2 July 2011
Thursday, 30 June 2011
Healing and Theodicy
The more I have discussed this, and believe me I have asked many church people what they think about healing in the past twenty-four hours, the more parallels I see between healing and theodicy.
When theodicy was the focus of our Sunday evening 'Thinking Theologically' services many of those who came were a bit twitchy because they'd heard the word before. But theodicy is merely a reasoned argument that examines and seeks to understand and perhaps justify (a legal term meaning ‘to prove or find ‘innocent’ of the charge) God in relation to suffering and evil. The word itself comes from the Greek for God ‘theos’ and justice ‘diké’. So, we’re looking at a Just God and the justice He brings, gives or maintains.
Let’s consider a few examples from the NT, starting with Lk 13: 1 – 5 and the tower of Siloam:
“There were some present at that very time who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And he answered them, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”
Often people will equate illness, disaster and the like with sin (confessed and unconfessed) as we can see with the man ‘born blind’ in Jn 9:1 -2: “As Jesus passed by, He saw a man blind from birth and His disciples asked Him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?” (Sin and illness - now there's an area for consideration - used to be a common theme when I was a Pente' Pastor)
The questions of God and justice, and His intervention (or absence) are recurring themes for Biblical and other writings and for life since it began (I assume) and brings forth some interesting and challenging debate. One of those who were so engaged was a chap called Epicurus (341-270 BC) who proposed the contraction:
“Is God willing to prevent evil but not able? Then he is impotent. Is he able but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then he is evil.”
Epicurus extrapolated that if God is all-powerful and absolutely good then evil cannot exist, but if evil does exist than there cannot be an all-powerful and absolutely good God. This is extrapolated in the following ‘logical problem of evil’:
1. God exists.
2. God exists and is omnipotent (absolutely powerful), omniscient (infinitely wise or all-knowing) and is to be considered ‘perfectly good.
3. A ‘perfectly good’ being would desire to prevent all and every evil.
4. An omniscient being would know every way in which evil might exist or come into existence.
5. An omnipotent being, knowing every way in which evil might exist or come into existence would, being omnipotent, prevent that, or any evil, from existing.
6. A being who knows every way evil can come about and has the power to do so must be able to prevent that evil from existing if they so wish.
7. If an omnipotent, omniscient and perfectly good being exists, then evil cannot exist.
8. Evil exists.
Rather than resort to theodicy, a nice man by the name of Alvin Platinga came up with his ‘defence’, which goes like this:
A world containing ‘significantly free’ people is more valuable, everything else being equal, to a world with no free creatures at all. God can create free creatures, but He can't ‘cause, determine or make them do right’. If He does then they are not ‘significantly free’ after all because they do not do what is right ‘freely’.
Therefore, to create creatures capable of moral good, He must create creatures capable of moral evil. If he give creatures freedom to perform evil then he cannot prevent them from doing so.
Plantinga argues that even though God is omnipotent, it is possible that it was not in his power to create a world containing moral good but no moral evil – this would be a logical and moral possibility.
So the question before us is this: Is God impotent, malevolent, evil, spiteful and the like (select those you think apply) OR are there grounds to assume (and prove) that God is, as His billing would have it, a ‘good (and healing)' God? for surely healing is a sign of his goodness, care, compassion and might?
Pax
When theodicy was the focus of our Sunday evening 'Thinking Theologically' services many of those who came were a bit twitchy because they'd heard the word before. But theodicy is merely a reasoned argument that examines and seeks to understand and perhaps justify (a legal term meaning ‘to prove or find ‘innocent’ of the charge) God in relation to suffering and evil. The word itself comes from the Greek for God ‘theos’ and justice ‘diké’. So, we’re looking at a Just God and the justice He brings, gives or maintains.
Let’s consider a few examples from the NT, starting with Lk 13: 1 – 5 and the tower of Siloam:
“There were some present at that very time who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And he answered them, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”
Often people will equate illness, disaster and the like with sin (confessed and unconfessed) as we can see with the man ‘born blind’ in Jn 9:1 -2: “As Jesus passed by, He saw a man blind from birth and His disciples asked Him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?” (Sin and illness - now there's an area for consideration - used to be a common theme when I was a Pente' Pastor)
The questions of God and justice, and His intervention (or absence) are recurring themes for Biblical and other writings and for life since it began (I assume) and brings forth some interesting and challenging debate. One of those who were so engaged was a chap called Epicurus (341-270 BC) who proposed the contraction:
“Is God willing to prevent evil but not able? Then he is impotent. Is he able but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then he is evil.”
Epicurus extrapolated that if God is all-powerful and absolutely good then evil cannot exist, but if evil does exist than there cannot be an all-powerful and absolutely good God. This is extrapolated in the following ‘logical problem of evil’:
1. God exists.
2. God exists and is omnipotent (absolutely powerful), omniscient (infinitely wise or all-knowing) and is to be considered ‘perfectly good.
3. A ‘perfectly good’ being would desire to prevent all and every evil.
4. An omniscient being would know every way in which evil might exist or come into existence.
5. An omnipotent being, knowing every way in which evil might exist or come into existence would, being omnipotent, prevent that, or any evil, from existing.
6. A being who knows every way evil can come about and has the power to do so must be able to prevent that evil from existing if they so wish.
7. If an omnipotent, omniscient and perfectly good being exists, then evil cannot exist.
8. Evil exists.
Rather than resort to theodicy, a nice man by the name of Alvin Platinga came up with his ‘defence’, which goes like this:
A world containing ‘significantly free’ people is more valuable, everything else being equal, to a world with no free creatures at all. God can create free creatures, but He can't ‘cause, determine or make them do right’. If He does then they are not ‘significantly free’ after all because they do not do what is right ‘freely’.
Therefore, to create creatures capable of moral good, He must create creatures capable of moral evil. If he give creatures freedom to perform evil then he cannot prevent them from doing so.
Plantinga argues that even though God is omnipotent, it is possible that it was not in his power to create a world containing moral good but no moral evil – this would be a logical and moral possibility.
So the question before us is this: Is God impotent, malevolent, evil, spiteful and the like (select those you think apply) OR are there grounds to assume (and prove) that God is, as His billing would have it, a ‘good (and healing)' God? for surely healing is a sign of his goodness, care, compassion and might?
Pax
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