Flip a coin

If you are a Christian who believes in the power of prayer, here is a very simple experiment that will show you something very interesting about your faith.

Take a coin out of your pocket. Now pray sincerely to Ra:

Dear Ra, almighty sun god, I am going to flip this ordinary coin 50 times, and I am asking you to cause it to land heads-side-up all 50 times. In Ra's name I pray, Amen.
Now flip the coin. Chances are that you won't get past the fifth or sixth flip and the coin will land tails.

What does this mean? Most people would look at this data and conclude that Ra is imaginary. We prayed to Ra, and Ra did nothing. We can prove that Ra is imaginary by using statistical analysis. If we flip the coin thousands of times, praying to Ra each time, we will find that the coin lands heads or tails in exact correlation with the normal laws of probability. Ra has absolutely no effect on the coin no matter how much we pray.

Even if we find a thousand of Ra's most faithful believers and ask them to do the praying/flipping, the results will be the same.

Therefore, as rational people, we conclude that Ra is imaginary. We look at Ra in the same way that we look at Leprechauns, Mermaids, Santa and so on. We know that people who believe in Ra are delusional.

Now let's try the experiment again, but this time let's pray to Jesus Christ instead of Ra. Pray sincerely to Jesus like this:

Dear Jesus, I know that you exist and I know that you hear and answer prayers as you promise in the Bible. I am going to flip this ordinary coin 50 times, and I am asking you to cause it to land heads-side-up all 50 times. In Jesus' name I pray, Amen.
Now flip the coin. Once again, after the fifth or sixth flip, the coin will land tails.

If we flip the coin thousands of times, praying to Jesus each time, we will find that the coin lands heads or tails in exact correlation with the normal laws of probability. We can gather together a group of Jesus' most pious followers to do the praying and the result will be the same. Jesus will have zero effect on the coin.

This makes complete sense. It is not like there are two laws of probability -- one for Christians who pray and the other for non-Christians. We all know that. There is only one law of probability because prayers have zero effect. That goes for all prayers. Jesus has no effect on our planet no matter how much we pray. We can prove that conclusively using statitical analysis.

If you are a Christian, watch what is happening inside your mind right now. The data is absolutely identical in both experiments. With Ra you looked at the data rationally and concluded that Ra is imaginary. But with Jesus... something else will happen. In your mind, you are already coming up with a thousand rationalizations to explain why Jesus did not answer your prayers:

It is not his will
He doesn't have time
I didn't pray the right way
I am not worthy
I do not have enough faith
I cannot test the Lord like this
It is not part of Jesus' plan for me

And on and on and on...

One rationalization that you may find yourself developing is particularly interesting. You may say to yourself: “Well, of course Jesus doesn’t answer me when I pray about a coin toss, because it is too trivial." Where did this rationalization come from? If you read what Jesus says about prayer in the Bible, Jesus does not ever say, "don't pray to me about coin tosses." Jesus clearly says he will answer your prayers, and he puts no boundaries on what you may pray for. You invented this rationalization out of thin air.

If you are a Christian who is offended by the notion of praying about a coin toss, then let's try this instead. Get down on your knees right now and pray as follows:

"Dear Jesus, son of God, the almighty, all-powerful, all-loving creator of the universe, we pray to you to cure every case of cancer on this planet tonight. Please hear our heartfelt, unselfish, non-materialistic prayer and fulfill your promises in Matthew 7:7, Matthew 17:20, Matthew 21:21, Mark 11:24, John 14:12-14, Matthew 18:19, Mark 9:23, Luke 1:37, James 5:15-16 and many other places. We pray knowing that when you answer this prayer, it will glorify God and help millions of people in remarkable ways. In your name we pray, Amen."

Will every case of cancer be gone tomorrow? Of course not. If you are a believer, you can create dozens of rationalizations for this unanswered prayer. But that does not change the reality of the situation. There is zero effect from praying, and it does not matter what you pray for.

If you are Christian and find this incorrect then please share your experience of how prayer worked for you. I am interested in your view points. thank you!

You spend a lot of time putting down something you don't believe in. Personally I think you are offended cuz your missing something. I could say a lot more but that wouldn't be representing God very well. After all I am only human.

because maybe through having faith in ones prayer..and trusting god and trying to please him...

prayers can be answered.
it sometimes takes time

Smiless,we Christians pray acording to His WILL....which by the Way, is FOUND in His WORD......we do NOT pray, according to any old hocus pocus nonsense WE want to Believe.
That is FOOLISHNESS.




Get that book, "Faith versus Foolishnes" by Fred Price ,that I reccomended.... I feel reading it will help you understand so much better about Faith.

Couldn't read tonight to remotely comment or touch this..

Will read tomorrow...cause I am very interested of what this topic is about...

And what is the purpose of praying for the cure of an 89 your old person that is suffering from a recurrence of cancer?

Here's a much better idea, why not pray for healing for YOURSELF and refuse medical treatment of any kind. Is your faith that strong?

Of course not, that's why one must rationalize to others that their god expects them to TRY all possible avenues of treatment, as in "god helps those who help themselves".

Really? So if you are helping yourself, by eating right, exercising, avoiding stress why did you get ill in the first place? And if your god allowed you to get ill, in the first place, why do you think your prayers will create a miracle healing now when they didn't protect your health in the first place?

And if you pray every day for the health and well-being of your loved ones - why do they still get sick? And why would further prayer be required for a healing?

Considering all of these things it seems to me, the only value to prayer is a 'perceived' one, based on belief alone. Of course we know, scientifically, that faith can reduce stress and that prayer has the effect, like other forms of relaxation, of reducing stress, which builds the immune system. So while there can be benefit to prayer, the same benefit can be seen, as the OP suggests, by praying to any old mythological creature in faith.

I am going to assume your flipping of a coin example is just a mental exercise.

I am going to assume that these tests were not actually performed right?

Why not?

If you are going to make a point, you should have actually done the coin flipping tests in a controlled setting and recorded the results, otherwise it is all just speculation.


Belief is very powerful in the implicate order of the holographic universe.

In high school I flipped quarters with three guys everyday at lunch. I won their lunch money everyday. Every single day. We flipped quarters. They wanted to win so bad. I didn't care whether I won or not, I was so far ahead of them. I had NEVER LOST ONE SINGLE TOSS.

NOT ONE.

That is against the law of averages. How is that possible?

Each single toss of the coin has a 50% chance of coming up heads or tails. It has a 50% chance WITH EACH TOSS.

I egged them on and bragged and boasted that I NEVER LOST A TOSS. This really bugged them. They kept on playing with me because they just wanted to win ONE to prove that I was a wrong. The law of averages was on their side. I HAD TO LOOSE SOMETIME at least they thought.

They changed strategy thinking I was cheating. I would flip then I would call and they would flip. It did not matter, I won every time. I won their lunch money every day.

Soon I was approached by a teacher who was concerned that these boys were not eating their lunches anymore. They told the teacher that I won their lunch money from them flipping quarters every day. The teacher told me to stop doing that. I told the teacher that they came to me every day begging me to play.

The teacher told me to stop gambling with them. I agreed not to do it anymore. They still came to me wanting to play again. I told them no, that I had been told not to play with them any more. It was a good excuse to end the game as a winner. Even I knew that I could not keep winning forever.

But why did I win so much and so against the law of averages?
It has to do with how our minds effect the implicate order of the holographic universe that we live in. It has to do with the Law of Attraction.

It did not have anything to do with my belief that I would win, because I did not know if I would or not. I simply told them I never loose and they heard that and they believed that. Yet they did not want to believe it, they kept on trying to disprove my assertion that I always won.

It also has to do with attitude. I did not care if I won or lost. They wanted to win so bad all they could picture in their minds was loosing. They were attracting the loss experience to them.

That's my theory.

JB

interesting

Like a dog chassing it's tail...

The guy is on a posting tear....

He is obsessed...or possessed...LOL

I use to have a dog that would run in circles until she got all tuckered out. I'm just gonna stand still until this one tires himself out. Like I did with my dog. LOL

Same here. I am so sick of the influx of haters we have seen here lately. They aren't here for the purpose of learning why someone else believes one way or another, they are here to condemn others. Maybe a sliver of the pie as to why they are single? Haters are lonely people. So sad. Fortunately I am so busy that the little free time I have is used for sleeping and I miss out on the verbal raids of the pitchfork wielding mob.

Smiles,
Praying works because it involves the use of thought and visualization which does effect the implicate order in this thought universe.

When the chances of something is 50% - 50% it is so much easier to effect the outcome. The dividing line between 50%-50% is infinity. It is a neutral dividing line. One simple emotional opposing thought can influence the outcome.

It is not only the thought picture that influences the outcome of a prayer but the feeling put into it. The belief influences the outcome too, only because the belief supports the picture of the wanted outcome. This is what creates the dream scape of the reality we live in according to my holographic model.

The holographic reality is projected by the universal mind which is fed and supported and changed by individual minds focused inside of it.

JB

You spend way to much time on this subject all prayers are answered maybe not in your time or your way but they are answered

I belive in God alot. Explain to me why when a bus piece came flying off and amlost hit me it didn't? explain to me when a car just about ran me over while waiting for my bus, it didn't? It stop a few inches away from me and I backed up. Explain to me while i was in the parking lot and a car hit me, I didn't get injured really bad? Explain to me why I had a bad feeling that my friends were going get in to a car accident and I prayed for them in my head and they didn't get hurt? Explain to me a few years back when I prayed for my grandpap he was laying in bed and he could,ent walk at all and a few days after I prayed for him, he started to walk? Of course I also wanted to go see him, but I prayed for him all night and he started to walk. I can't explain all this, all I can say is miracles do happen and they have to be from God. Of course you get gifts too from God. The coin test, don't show our real faith of God. Our real faith of God comes from close things in life or praying for others and other things.


Anybody wanna commet on what are faith comes from?

Your obsevations on the "nature" of prayer are correct. Prayer is not like ordering food at a fast food counter. You ask, and you expect to recieve within a narrow time frame. God does not work at a fast food counter. More often than not, the response from God to prayer is increased awareness - not action. That is not to say that action will not accompany prayer, just that it should not be expected. Especially not at the expediency of the petitioner.

Another misnomer - is that many do not realize that all prayers are answered, it is just that the answer may not coincide with the desires of those praying. Many times the answer is "No", or "Yes, but wait". This immediately translates into "God does not exist". One could fervently pray for the end of War on the planet - concluding through a natural sense of logic, that this would certainly be high up on the list of God's plans. But the actions of War are a result of the decisions of man. So a prayer of this sort - with expectations of fullfillment - shows a lack of knowledge and wisdom on the part of the petitioner. The same could be said for world disease, hunger and famine. These ills are the consequesnces of the actions of men over a lengthy period of time. Selfishness, power and greed being the contributing factors. God is not about changing the circumstances of men, only the hearts and minds of men. This is where the answers of prayers come to fruition.

So - does this stand in contradiction to your scenario? I don't know. But in terms of a biblical perspective - the exegesis of all of the quotes you've cited span the realm of metaphorical to practicle, and you're attempt at drawing a complete picture with these building blocks will only bring about a Picasso at best. A distorted image of the purpose and usefulness of prayer.

A Christain's perspective - if you will. Hope this helps.

You are awesome...I'm sure God is smiling on you. Yes...I find that when I bring my concerns to God he tells me what to pray for & I get results. I don't pray for what I want...I just talk to God about things that bother me & He tells me what to pray for. It's that easy...right?

I agree too... We know God does divinely intervene. However, God is also a farmer. I love that analogy. He has to sow & plow the ground...plant seeds etc etc...whatever it takes to create a great harvest. God doesn't count time or success the way we do, but He DOES get results.

God bless...

In my own personal opinion, I think that the Christgod is dead. I just had a deep conversation about that last night. There is no spiritual power stopping me from committing sin. There never will be.

I saw a shirt that read: Religion, For those who need to make up imaginary friends to fit in.

Really all that matters is if it makes the individual happy though.