Who cares if God changes his mind or not? It's beyond our comprehension and ability to reason out, otherwise someone would've figured this out a long time ago. Also, whether or not God changes his mind doesn't change the fact that humans will believe whatever suits their situation best. Belief is a form of adaptation to one's environment, and humans live in a pretty hostile world most of the time.
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Originally Posted by duck0987
what is the point of praying for someone who is has a life threatening disease to be healed? If god is going to take them then God will, prayer is irrelevant. If it takes prayer to call God's attention to a situation then this would seem to contradict God being Omnipresent.
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This is why I have stopped praying, at least with any intent of "changing God's mind." If I pray, it's more like sending an IM to whoever/whatever this god may be... not out of an intent to change anyone's mind, but just to check in and way "What's up, this is where I'm at..." Why would I expect God to change anything for me? Not that I think he's malicious or unjust... quite the opposite. But lots of good, devout people pray all the time for good stuff to happen, or to prevent bad stuff (like a loved one's death)... sometimes it changes, sometimes it doesn't. Such is life. One's belief should not be predicated on the amount that your prayer changes God's mind.
As we all have time to sit around and argue about stuff like this, God probably sits up there shaking his head at us and saying "Do something else that's more productive for each other" (or at least do your work, which is what I should be doing right now!).
In brief: if anyone has a solid answer for any theological question (including myself), I'm pretty suspicious of their source.