Answered prayers

This has come from another thread, but I want to address one specific issue with prayer. As an initial disclaimer, I realize that prayer serves many purposes and different people have different beliefs regarding when and why they pray and what the benefits are.
This thread is specifically about the case where a person prays and the prayer is answered by granting the wish of the person praying.
An example given in the other thread was a case where a person prayed for an injured dog to get better and the dog, apparently against the medical odds, did get better.
Let us for a moment assume that the prayer was answered by God.
My questions are:
1. If the person did not pray, would God still have 'granted' the wish? ie if God felt it was what was best for the person praying, would he have done it anyway or did he need the person to pray first?
2. Does God ever answer such wishes even though they are not necessarily the best for the person, ie they are just personal desires, but not real benefits.
3. If granting the wish was what was best for the person, and the person did not pray and God did not grant the wish, is God not being negligent?
4. How did the situation come about in the first place. In the example above, could God have not simply stopped the dog from getting injured? Did the owner never pray for the dog not to get injured? Or was the injury all part of some lesson being taught to both dog and owner? Or was it the work of the Devil?

Originally posted by twhitehead
This has come from another thread, but I want to address one specific issue with prayer. As an initial disclaimer, I realize that prayer serves many purposes and different people have different beliefs regarding when and why they pray and what the benefits are.
This thread is specifically about the case where a person prays and the prayer is answered by ...[text shortened]... y all part of some lesson being taught to both dog and owner? Or was it the work of the Devil?

I suspect that worshipers of the "God of Gimme" refrain from asking themselves such questions.

george carlin said something that sums up my view on prayers. it goes something like this:

"i don't pray [...]. I wouldn't presume on our friendship".

Why should god answer my petty prayers? What makes my prayers better or more worthy than other prayers? What if my prayer to get a new ferrari means some girl doesn't get her prayer to cure her mother's cancer answered?

Originally posted by Zahlanzi
george carlin said something that sums up my view on prayers. it goes something like this:

"i don't pray [...]. I wouldn't presume on our friendship".

Why should god answer my petty prayers? What makes my prayers better or more worthy than other prayers? What if my prayer to get a new ferrari means some girl doesn't get her prayer to cure her mother's cancer answered?

Do you give your kid everything he or she asks for? In fact, growing up the majority of the time all I heard was "No". However, does that mean I refuse to talk to my parents?

Originally posted by twhitehead
This has come from another thread, but I want to address one specific issue with prayer. As an initial disclaimer, I realize that prayer serves many purposes and different people have different beliefs regarding when and why they pray and what the benefits are.
This thread is specifically about the case where a person prays and the prayer is answered by ...[text shortened]... y all part of some lesson being taught to both dog and owner? Or was it the work of the Devil?

God does things the way he sees fit. How's that for an explanation? I believe that he seeks our participation but, at the same time, he is not our servant.

Originally posted by whodey
God does things the way he sees fit. How's that for an explanation?

It isn't. You haven't answered any of my questions.

Originally posted by whodey
Do you give your kid everything he or she asks for? In fact, growing up the majority of the time all I heard was "No". However, does that mean I refuse to talk to my parents?

prayer is not talking to god. i know many people refer to prayer as such but then how do you distinguish talking to god from asking for stuff. i talk to god all the time. he hasn't answered yet which is a good thing for my overall marbles count. i don't pray to god.


praying to god would be like you asking your parents for a chocolate while a million of your brothers and sisters are starving, another million are going to die the next week, a million never yet received a chocolate in their entire lives and so on.