MortiBlog

Have a read of this post from NHS Blog Doctor. He links to this story in which a nurse offered to pray for a patient and got suspended.

Forgive the cliche but what is the world coming to? Apparently it’s because the nurse was “failing to show a commitment to equality and diversity” in doing this. I kind of see what they’re getting at but has our culture become so insensitive that an offer to pray is somehow offensive?

I can understand people not believing in God because they’ve not encountered Him. After all, how could you? But I’ve had this response a couple of times as well, where people have specifically asked me not to pray for them. This is one I have trouble getting my head around. The closest example I can think of is that as a Christian I don’t believe in luck, when people wish me “good luck” I tend to think “I don’t need luck, I have Jesus” but rather than saying that out loud I tend to thank them because I see the good intentions behind what they’re saying. “Good luck”, even though luck doesn’t exist, is still a nice friendly thing to hear.

Is someone not a Christian responding to an offer of prayer the same as me with luck? Whether or not it is I still see no reason for getting someone suspended. Not praying with someone (laying on hands and all that) is fair enough, in our culture such a thing could be rather awkward. So here is the question.

If you don’t believe in God, what’s the harm if someone does go away and pray for you?

The only thing I can think of is that the person refusing prayer is angry at God, Christianity or the Church. Some slight with a Christian in their past perhaps or just feel (like many do) as though Christianity has been rammed down their throats in more offensive ways in the past so that a simple offer to pray comes under that mental heading of “annoying Christians being annoying” to just the same extent.

I’ve said it before and in fact still say quite often that Christians evangelise out of love but some of us (myself included) have trouble doing so sensitively. The reason is often due to the Christian’s own insensitivity (the case with me for many years) but it is also because the gospel is offensive by nature. It’s a scandalous story that sounds ridiculous and demands a complete change in somebody’s lifestyle. It says that everyone is a sinner and everyone requires saving. What’s not offensive about that? Of course it’s offensive. Offering to pray for someone, however, that’s not offensive. That’s a kind Christian person trying to show love to someone in the best way they know how. As Christians we believe that the prayer that follows the offer will be heard by God and He may intervene and change the situation.

In church yesterday we were encouraged to offer to pray for people and not to shy away from it because we might be ridiculed or whatever. If this is the sort of thing that can happen when Christians offer prayer then that makes it all the more challenging. However we must still not shy away and I hope that Caroline Petrie won’t shy away from offering prayers in the future either.

And to those who aren’t Christians, if somebody offers to pray for you and you would prefer them not to then by all means say so but don’t kick up a fuss. Once the offer’s made they’ll probably pray for you anyway because they care about you and believe it will help you.

I think this is another case where in fearing the necessity of the ideas of “equality and diversity” an element of freedom has been lost. It’s like the government would want us all to be quiet little robots getting on with our jobs and keeping our core beliefs and opinions to ourselves. What’s the point in that kind of life? God gave us the free will to turn to Him or turn away from Him and face the consequences ourselves, He does not try to control us, despite what you might think. The Alpha Course is, I think, a fine example of God’s way of doing things. Ask any question you like, discuss anything you like, as long as you’re searching for an answer it will be beneficial and, once you are genuinely searching for answers and open to receive them, the answers will be given to you.

Us Christians do not go out of our way to anger people or to make them uncomfortable. Our goal in our workplaces is to glorify God by what we do and to share the love that God gives us with those around us. We’re not saying we’re better than anyone else or trying to force our beliefs on you, all we want to do is show you something of the glory and the love of God because He’s been so good to us.

If the Christians can be suspended for offering prayer then the atheists can be suspended for saying “good luck”. And that, my friends, is madness.

I wrote this post already. I’m writing it again and backing it up this time. Here we go.

Cold isn’t it? On my way home from university yesterday I took a bit of a long walk because I had to pick up some tender vittles on my way. I was wrapped up fairly warmly so I was mostly fine against the harsh weather conditions (it was a bit cold) as long as I kept walking but when I stopped at a traffic light I began to shiver. Personally I hate shivering, it’s weird. Makes me feel like I’m not manly or something, unlike all the other people who are really tough and radiate extra heat that makes all the cold air that gets near them turn to steam. Or something. Anyway it’s not something I find pleasant, my body convulsing through no will of my own makes me feel in some small way that I’m not in control as much as I should be and, hence, weak.

And I think this topic can make people feel like that. I didn’t have the free will to stop shivering, I think naturally the very idea that we don’t have free will can be something that weakens us. We cling to the free will that gives us control over our own destiny as something that shows we are strong, resiliant and just generally powerful. When asked whether or not you have free will I reckon the answer would be in the affirmative and any notion otherwise would be preposterous.

This is a very modern way of thinking. When the early church first found its way into Africa they came across thought processes that put everything down to “the gods”. Even after becoming Christians some of these people would say things like “I shouldn’t have stolen the camel but God controls my destiny, He made me do it” and “I shouldn’t have slept with my neighbour’s wife but God’s sovereign”. It’s the ultimate “I didn’t do it”.

Were they right in saying that? I don’t think so. So then, do we have complete free will? Again, not by my reckoning. Can you choose to fly? Didn’t think so. Perhaps then you might define free will as the choice we make to do something rather than actually acting out that choice. If I can’t fly can I still choose to fly? For the purposes of this discussion, let’s assume no. To have the choice to do something you have to be able to do it in the first place and free will is merely exercising decision-making when the choice is available.

But that might fall down as well. Do we actually have any choices or is every decision we make simply a result of our DNA and upbringing in ways we can’t control? Let’s say I had an apple with my lunch today and chose to do so because yesterday I had a banana and I fancied something different. I had a banana yesterday because that particular supermarket had a sale on bananas, I went to that supermarket because it was on my way home, I live where I do because a trusted friend recommended it to me, I met that friend through university, I went to this university because it was the best academic option my grades allowed, I got low grades because my parents didn’t bring me up with the greatest work ethic…

See? Follow any decision far back enough and perhaps you’ll find that it all stems from something that was out of your control. I don’t know if that’s true about my parents by the way, it probably isn’t and I certainly don’t blame them, but I didn’t choose to be lazy at school I just was, whatever the reason. So maybe the guys in Africa had a point, that predestination does play a large role in the decisions we make, whether or not that predestination comes from God or our upbringing/surroundings.

In responding to the very idea we’re touching on here, the early church preached to the people about how they should exercise their free will and along came Pelagius. Pelagius put forward what I mentioned earlier as a modern individualism. He put forward a wishy-washy self-help sort of solution, anyone can live free from sin if they choose to do so regardless of whether or not they know God. Man is born into a position of neutrality, neither good nor bad, and can go either way. Following his logic on a bit then his teaching came to man having the free will to turn away from sin and turn to God with no actual intervention from God being necessary.

Then came correction from Augustine who said that man was created in Genesis with free will but then lost that free will once Adam used it badly (by eating the fruit). He stressed the necessity of God choosing us and until the reformation that’s where things were left. Around the time of the reformation John Calvin comes along and plays a big role in bringing what we now know as Calvinism or Reformed Theology which essentially agrees with Augustine.

Let’s test this out. If you’re not a Christian right now try declaring in all honesty that Jesus is Lord. Can’t do it, can you? And indeed, why should you? It’d be ridiculous to declare something honestly that you honestly don’t believe. We cannot choose what we believe, we cannot choose faith, we cannot choose God, therefore we don’t have free will. God chooses us.

One of the things Calvin said is that the dead do not know things of life. So just as a corpse cannot choose to come back to life those who are spiritually dead cannot choose spiritual life in God. Whether you want to take this idea of spiritual death as a fact or an analogy or metaphor it makes sense. We cannot choose things of which we are not aware and we are not aware of God until He reveals Himself to us.

Jonathan Edwards (born 1703, not an athelete), after the centuries of arguing about this, actually came up with a definition of “will”. He said the will is that by which the mind chooses any thing and the motive for that choice is self-interest. He also adds that therefore nobody will refuse salvation if persuaded of the value of it. So if I say the choice is live as you are and go to Hell or make a change and go to Heaven there’s one choice there which is clearly in your best interests. Why would you choose what’s not in your best interests? Because your will is not free to make that choice and indeed my will was not free to make that choice.

There is still hope. Jeremiah 29:13 says (and this is God speaking) “You will seek me and find me, when you seek me(B) with all your heart.” We cannot choose God, of course not, but we can choose to seek Him. Every bit of evangelism I do and every argument I make can never make you believe in God, all I can do is encourage you to search and assure you that it is in your best interests. God has chosen me and God chooses all who He saves, I’m not saved by my own merit or anything I’ve done to deserve it. I don’t know if He’s chosen you or not and if you’re not a Christian then you probably can’t say for sure either.

How many of you then would put off seeking God because of that? Saying that if you choose not to seek Him then surely it’s because He hasn’t chosen you? Remember the Africans I mentioned earlier? It’s funny how when understood by the world free will is absolutely true, we always have it, but as soon as God is mentioned immediately everything’s down to Him. I put it to you that there’s a balance between them.

I said earlier in the example about the apple that perhaps ultimately I chose the apple because of how I was raised. Well, not necessarily, because that’d mean I just made the decision based on having a banana yesterday. I could well have chosen to have an apple because it was closest to my hand or I could have picked another base for my decision which would have ended in a packet of crisps, avoiding the fruit aisle altogether! We do have decisions we can make and we can base our decisions on any kind of logic we like, free will exists to a point.

Therefore while it is up to God whether someone is saved or not it is still up to the individual whether or not they wish to seek God. There is evidence in the Bible of people asking God for things and God responding because they asked, as He’s the father He can choose to make Himself vulnerable to our petitions.

I didn’t choose to be a Christian, I just chose to go to church once and God chose me. I didn’t repent and get saved, I was saved so I was able to repent. Therefore free will exists but not completely, there’s a point at which we must all admit we’re not perfect and not powerful enough to make every decision. Free will suggests a complete freedom from compulsions and we certainly don’t have that. None of us do. My point is that Jesus or Christianity (however you want to look at it) increases rather than decreases my capacity for free will.

So, just to those of you who, like me, don’t like to shiver and hold onto free will because of the power it gives you: God does not take that away from you. It’s not in my power to save people but I’d urge everyone to seek God to increase their personal free will.