Expectant Prayers for Healing

[FormerlyFundyLite]

Informal poll time: has anybody else noticed that some Christians are suddenly praying out loud for people to heal and expecting televangelist-style instantaneous results?

I've seen or heard of at least three instances in the last two weeks. At a recent picnic, a man that we don't know at all put his hands on the fella's injured parts, prayed three or four times each for my fella's shoulder and back--and then expectantly asked "How does it feel? Did it work? No? Let's try again."

It felt like the guy was putting a lot of pressure on my fella to "be healed". The most awkward part was that he only actually said a full prayer once. The other times, he just said, "in the name of Jesus...amen."

I felt kind of uncomfortable about it, but assumed he was just very charismatic, and thought that was that, but then I heard from two more people who "announced" that God had miraculously healed people in the past week after they prayed in similar fashion.

I do happen to believe that God is perfectly capable of healing people, and there is plenty of biblical precedent for believers praying for healing, but I've never been closely connected to this particular kind of agressive healing prayer efforts, and it seems really odd for it to pop up three times in two weeks. Is there some new Christian movie out (like the time everyone was suddenly texting "God's not dead" to everyone they know)?

[2manyKidzzz]

It is very interesting that this has happened a number of times. I don't know what to make of it. Prayer can definitely heal and I certainly don't know the parameters of what makes it "come true". 

[paganbaby]

54 minutes ago, FormerlyFundyLite said:

Informal poll time: has anybody else noticed that some Christians are suddenly praying out loud for people to heal and expecting televangelist-style instantaneous results?

I've seen or heard of at least three instances in the last two weeks. At a recent picnic, a man that we don't know at all put his hands on the fella's injured parts, prayed three or four times each for my fella's shoulder and back--and then expectantly asked "How does it feel? Did it work? No? Let's try again."

It felt like the guy was putting a lot of pressure on my fella to "be healed". The most awkward part was that he only actually said a full prayer once. The other times, he just said, "in the name of Jesus...amen."

I felt kind of uncomfortable about it, but assumed he was just very charismatic, and thought that was that, but then I heard from two more people who "announced" that God had miraculously healed people in the past week after they prayed in similar fashion.

I do happen to believe that God is perfectly capable of healing people, and there is plenty of biblical precedent for believers praying for healing, but I've never been closely connected to this particular kind of agressive healing prayer efforts, and it seems really odd for it to pop up three times in two weeks. Is there some new Christian movie out (like the time everyone was suddenly texting "God's not dead" to everyone they know)?

Ugh. This practice can range from embarrassing to cruel. A charismatic Catholic who used to butt into my brother's life insisted that whenever she held his hand to pray, he could squeeze hers. He couldn't. He was a quadriplegic, and even if she started babbling in tongues, she wasn't enough of a special snowflake to change that. I always thought my brother was an amazing person, but he went above and beyond by never telling her to fuck off. She even had the nerve to look offended when he refused to agree he could move his hand when she touched him.