Do you believe in [God’s intervention/fate/karma] in the world? (with bonus question added)

Periodically, I’ll say that my husband was “destined to come to the U.S.” (the backstory for less-than-dedicated-readers is that he came her for grad school and stuck around after we met) because, for all his Germanness, his name is a fairly familiar one to the English-speaking world, unlike the rest of his family (Wolfgang, Herbert, Detlef, Bodo, to name a few).  But do I really believe that?  If he had stayed in Germany, he would have met some nice German girl, I would have met a nice American boy – or maybe not – but (much as I love my husband and my family) I don’t believe that “destiny” or God brought us together.

In the same way, I took a rather roundabout path career-wise, studying history in college and specializing in medieval history in grad school, before simultaneously meeting my future husband and realizing that I was just not going to make it as a future history professor.  Was it my destiny to follow this path, because it meant that I crossed paths with my future husband in grad school?  No.  It was the result of choices I made and the various influences I had, or didn’t have.

Final example:  we lived in Germany for two years, when my older two boys were small — when we arrived, they were two and four; when we left, four and seven.  It was a great experience, and we hope to go back again for another long stay, but more likely as empty-nesters.  As our time there was drawing to a close, we had an opportunity to extend our stay another two years.  I was pregnant with our youngest, and Germany had just introduced a new form of maternity leave that replaced a healthy portion of pay (the prior benefit was more means-tested), so the thought was that I would try to experience the German world more fully by being a “stay-at-home-mom” rather than working part-time, for the first time (since such infant daycare as does exist doesn’t really start until age 1).   I’d go to the German mom-and-tot groups rather than the expat version I’d attended with my middle son, for instance, and find ways to help out at the rare family-friendly church in the neighboring town.

But the circumstances under which our “deal” with the company would be extended weren’t ideal, as it would now be a “local” rather than “expat” package.  We kept working out the numbers, trying to assess what the net impact would be.  And for quite a while, I kept trying to make it work, thinking that this pregnancy was “meant to be” because it would bring me a whole new set of opportunities in Germany, and hence, the extended stay was “meant to be”/”God’s plan for us.”  Finally, though, I had to let go of this and recognize that it would be better for all of us to return home to the U.S.

Why does this matter?  For the most part, it doesn’t, really — I was just thinking about this the other day and wanted to work out my thoughts.  But I do think that, once you adopt this mindset, you can end up taking the wrong path, and miss opportunities that present themselves to you.

UPDATE:  Bonus question:  do you believe in the power of prayer, that is, do you believe that prayers for healing, for instance, will (or might) be answered?

Yeah, I struggle with this.  Very often, people use the cop-out of “I pray that God’s will will be done” — but if that’s the case, why bother praying?   Same thing with “God answers prayers — it’s just that sometimes the answer isn’t what you expect.”

If I believe, for instance, that God will bring about an outcome with respect to our friend’s cancer battle (the cancer isn’t hypothetical – he’s in a clinical trial right now – just the belief) that will be the “right” outcome for his Divine Plan, then is there a point to praying for healing? Should we instead pray that, whatever the outcome, God provides emotional and spiritual strength to the family?

Or do you believe that, given a sufficient quantity of prayer, we may win the “miracle lottery” and he may be the recipient of a genuine miracle, or the minor miracle that this experimental treatment proves to be successful?  (This is the early stages of a trial, just establishing whether the drug has potential, so we’re not looking at double-blind randomized trials, where we don’t know if he’s got the placebo or not.)

UPDATE:

Thanks for the comments.  I do struggle with this.  And the news got worse today, as his wife posted that he may be booted from the clinical trial that was pretty much his only chance at beating the odds, because his cancer seems to be a different, and ineligible type.  But it’s crazy, really:  I try to pray, and this nagging voice says, “several dozen people have announced they’re praying on Facebook alone; do you really think that any prayer you offer would make a difference?”  Is it just another entry in the answered-prayer raffle that God is holding, boosting the odds that he picks us?

Oh, and brief update on my dad (backstory for new readers:  he’s 75 and lives in the Detroit ara. Back just before last Easter, he had a fall and injured his head and spent until Labor Day-ish in rehab):  he’s just not doing well.  He can’t focus, and the big achievement of the day is typically lunch at the Senior Center.  Mom reports periodic incidents of dementia, such as the time when he suddenly forgot that she was his wife; he didn’t know where his wife was or what Mom was doing there, and she was going to have to sleep in the spare bed — and the next morning he was back to normal (well, his current “normal”).  Back in December, the neurologist thought he might have something called “hydrocephalus” — too much fluid accumulating in the brain — that would require a brain stent; I looked this up and it seemed to offer a fair amount of hope in clearing up some of these issues.  But they were scheduled to go back for an appointment mid-January, and the doctor’s office called once to reschedule due to a surgery, for yesterday, then rescheduled again for a month from now.

So either the doctor thinks the chances of this treatment being appropriate are slim, or the staff has this down as if it’s just a regular check-up of no particular importance, or else the office truly is slammed and this is a doctor-shortage issue.  But in any case, Mom’s approach (and her way of coping with the whole thing) is very passive — “we’ll just wait and see.”

So what do you pray for?   For Mom to get a spine and push back at the rescheduling? For Dad to recover “spontaneously”, regardless of this potential diagnosis and treatment that’s hanging out there?  For her to finally take to heart our encouragement that she consider moving out by us so we can help?   Or something else?

Your thoughts, as always, appreciated.