Prayer

A new study has found that prayer does not heal people who have just gone through heart surgery. There were three control groups. (Group A) One group of patients knew they were being prayed for. (Group B) One group who didn't know they were having prayer, and the last (Group C) did not receive prayer at all. The group that knew they were being prayed for had more complications from the surgery than those who either didn't know they were being prayed for or weren't prayed for at all. 52% of patients in groups B & C had heart complications. In group A, however, 59% of the patients had complications.

What are Christians taking away from this study? Some are saying that we can't use science to measure religion. Others are saying that we can't control God through prayer.

Outside the religious world, this idea of praying for the sick is being ridiculed as now "proven fact" that prayer doesn't work.

In a world based on "facts" I say there are too many coincidences for me to believe that miracles are accidents of nature. If prayer can not be quantified by science, I can still pray. After all, God is not a tame god that I can take out and play with. Neither is he a genie that gives be special favours when I pray, read my Bible, and pay tithe. My prayers, my spiritual walk, my God MUST be bigger than science or my prayers, my spiritual walk, my god are nothing more than trinkets.