The Hiddeness Of God

[TK]

Did Jesus heal amputees? there is one reference to him healing the "maimed" but not sure exactly what this means.

TK

[seer]

He did heal a withered hand. Which is pretty close - so why today, no amputees? I mean christians claim that they were cured by God of cancer, heart disease, bad backs, etc...

[steve]

In C.S. Lewis' treatment of the subject of miracles, he suggests that the kind of miracles Jesus did was nothing more or less than the kind of things God does all the time—but less suddenly—in nature. To wit, water is turned to wine, in nature, through grapevines. Bread (that is, grain) and fish are multiplied in natural ways, year-in and year-out. Recovery from various kinds of sicknesses is not unknown in the non-miraculous annals of history. However, regeneration of lost limbs, in nature, only occurs in lizards and octopi (and perhaps a few other species unknown to me)—not in humans.

Lewis points out that Jesus claimed to do only such things as He sees the Father doing. Lewis takes this as a guide to tell him that the miracles of Christ were just the same works (sped-up) that the Father continually does in nature.

I am not sure how miracles like walking on water and raising the dead fit into this theory, but at least it is evident that the majority of the miracles of Jesus tended to accomplish in a moment what might occasionally be observed on other occasions to happen without miraculous intervention. In other words, nothing was ever done by Jesus that resembled the pulling of a rabbit out of a hat (as if the hat itself generated rabbits). Nor did Jesus ever do anything in a human body that resembled something that nature does only in reptiles and mollusks. While I believe that the regeneration of a severed arm would be no more difficult for God than the regeneration of a tentacle or a tail, it might be that such an act is out of character for Him.

On the other hand, I know of two somewhat credible accounts of the regeneration of an eyeball and of a finger, from the first knuckle...which might make everything I have just said invalid. However, in doing so, it would also make the complaint that God does not heal amputees equally invalid. I gave details of those examples in a thread at the old forum a few years ago, when this amputee thing came up then. I don't know how to locate that old post.

[Suzana]

On the other hand, I know of two somewhat credible accounts of the regeneration of an eyeball and of a finger, from the first knuckle...which might make everything I have just said invalid. However, in doing so, it would also make the complaint that God does not heal amputees equally invalid. I gave details of those examples in a thread at the old forum a few years ago, when this amputee thing came up then. I don't know how to locate that old post.

the link is here if it works
and if anyone wants to follow up on the rest of the discussion; there are also other posts in different threads on the old forum (do a search on "amputees"), but this is what Steve posted there:

Posted: Mon Dec 18, 2006 11:10 am
The following two stories (as I recall them) come from Chuck Smith, pastor of Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa, CA. If they had come from someone like Benny Hinn, I could easily discount them. However, Chuck does not claim to have a ministry in healing, and has even publicly expressed disappointment that God had told him that his prayers for such a ministry were not to be granted, but that Chuck was, rather, called to be a teacher. There is only Chuck's word for these two accounts, so that our friends who insist that miracles do not occur will not be impressed in the least with them. However, for those of us who have open minds, and weigh the credibility of witnesses, these stories seem germane to the matter raised in this thread:

1. In Chuck's early ministry, a distraught mother came to Chuck with her young son, who had just had his thumb (or perhaps it was a finger) cut off at the first knuckle in an accident. She begged Chuck to pray for his thumb to be healed. Chuck confesses that he had no faith for this miracle, but that he prayed for the boy and sent them home. I believe it was the next day that the woman excitedly returned with her son and showed Chuck that the finger had regenerated and was whole--with fingernail and all. She also had the severed finger in a jar that she showed him. It is not impossible that this could have been a hoax perpetrated against Chuck's gullibility (for example, if the second boy was an identical twin of the first boy), though I imagine that CHuck's own skepticism would have caused him to look into that before repeating the story. I am willing to accept the story at face value. It is not the kind of thing that will convince a determined skeptic, but for those of us who have no prejudices, it may be a piece of data indicating that regeneration is actually among the various kinds of miracles that God may sometimes perform.

2. I don't remember the details of this second story, except that a person lacking an eyeball, and wearing a glass eye presented himself (or herself) requesting prayer after a service when Chuck was ministering to those who came forward. This person wanted his eye restored. Again, Chuck had little faith that such a thing would occur, but prayed as asked. Soon afterward (the next day?) this same person returned and reported that a new eye had grown into the socket and had pushed out his glass eye. Chuck could see for himself that the person had a real eye in the socket, so he took it as a genuine miracle.

Chuck doesn't tell these stories very often--perhaps so as not to encourage too many people to expect such a rare miracle for themselves, or possibly because he is not 100% convinced that there was no hoax involved--I have never asked his reasons, since I don't know him well or have much access to him. I just remember him telling these stories once or twice at Calvary Chapel during the Jesus Movement.

Again, I don't repeat these in order to prove anything to the skeptical. I have personally seen terminal cancer throughout a person's body disappear permanently through prayer and I have friends who were in the revival in Indonesia in the seventies who witnessed the restoration of sight to the blind and the raising of a dead man at his own funeral. These miracles have no documentation that would convince the doubter. Those of us who know the Father of Jesus Christ, however, see nothing particularly unreasonable about taking such stories at face value.

If one would ask why God would perform such miracles in a corner, to obscure individuals, without documentation, I would be inclined to conjecture that He might do so out of concern for the individuals, without wishing to accommodate the doubts of those who are hostile to HIm. It was Jesus' habit, after all, to keep His miracles as low-key and private as the circumstances would permit, and to tell those whom He healed to say nothing about it to others. Jesus (like His Father) was no exhibitionist.

_________________

[Homer]

Jim,

The same question would apply to numerous things. Why doesn't God make old people young again in answer to prayer? I'm 68. It would be nice to be 21 again (well, maybe not). I think his whole argument rests on a false understanding regarding prayer. As C. S. Lewis said, prayer is not weak, but rather, too powerful for God not to retain a veto over all requests. Otherwise we would destroy ourselves and everyone else.

The argument (re amputees) does't bother me a bit. What bothers me is all the false claims of miracles and calling anything unusual or wonderful a miracle. Even the conception and birth of a child is called a miracle while great numbers of people try very hard to prevent it from happening. All this only calls actual miracles into question.

Regarding fingers growing back (this does not refute the story regarding Chuck Smith) I read some time ago that in very young children, a finger severed beyond the first knuckle will often grow back if it is left alone. This means no treatment of any kind, no stitches, etc.

"...Like many discoveries, this one was made by accident. In 1974, a
child arrived at the emergency room of Sheffield Children’s Hospital
in England. A piece of farm machinery had sliced off her fingertip.
The standard procedure in such injuries is to smooth the exposed bone
and sew the skin closed, but due to a clerical mixup, the girl was not
seen by a surgeon that day. When surgeon Cynthia Illingworth caught up
with the error a few days later, she was surprised to find the
fingertip was growing back. She ordered staff not to touch it. Within
three months, the bone, cartilage, tendons, blood vessels, skin, nail,
cuticle and motor nerves had grown back as though the accident had
never occurred.
Studies have since documented more than 1,000 such cases. In fact, if
a finger is guillotined beyond the outermost joint, in a child 11
years or younger, it always grows back within 90 days..."
Source: "Newt and Improved", National Post, January 25, 2002

[steve]

Wow, Homer! That is a really interesting piece!

[seer]

I think we kind of got off topic. Let me state my point: Why doesn't God speak to us, tenderly, daily? If we really do have "free will" would not more evidence accomplish more conversions?

[TK]

an overly simplistic answer might be that w/o faith, it is impossible to please God.

i think He DOES speak to me daily. but you must mean in a more obvious, distinct, sense.

i think God speaks to us just often enough in direct, distinct ways so as to assure us He is indeed with us, but He doesnt go overboard.

TK

[Michelle]

This is probably the over-simplistic answer: You chose the words of wooing, Seer. In the way distant past, I've been on the receiving end of unwanted advances from would be suitors. Stepped up efforts are annoying, not convincing.

[seer]

So you guys don't believe that more would be saved if God spoke more directly? Why is that?