Specific Answers to Prayer

Posted by: J.P. Moreland

July 8, 2024

Forgive me for the length of this post, but I wanted to give you a thorough understanding of my journey for the last two months. I hope this will allow you to know me better and to be encouraged by things the living God has done.

How do we KNOW an event was a miracle and not a coincidence? (Skip this if it is too long.)

In the world, there are two kinds of causes that produce effects: impersonal physical causes and rational free agents who do something for a purpose. If a flash of lightening causes a tree to split, the cause is impersonal. If Hope sets the dinner table for guests, the cause of the table setting was a personal rational agent. The hard sciences focus on impersonal causes and the soft sciences (psychology, archeology, anthropology, forensic science) and jury trials focus on personal agent-causes.

Science has developed a clear, successful way to determine when it is legitimate to conclude that some phenomenon is the result of a purposive, intelligent act by an agent and when such a conclusion is unwarranted.  For example, insurance employees, police, and forensic scientists must determine whether a death was accidental (no intelligent cause) or brought about intentionally (done on purpose by an intelligent agent, e.g., murder).

Whenever two factors are present, people are rationally obligated to draw the conclusion that the event was brought about intentionally for a purpose by an intelligent agent (whether a human or God):  (1)  The event was a very unlikely one; it had a small probability of happening; and (2)  The event is capable of independent characterization (capable of being identified as a special occurrence beside the simple fact that it did, in fact, happen).  There is some independent description of the event itself that implies that if an event satisfies that description, then the event is a special one.

To illustrate, consider a game of bridge in which four people receive a hand of thirteen cards each.  There is a $500 prize for the winner. To simplify matters, let’s focus on just two of the four people—random person A and the dealer, person B. Let one hand dealt to person A be a random set of cards—call it hand A—and the other (B) be a perfect bridge hand dealt to the dealer himself on the very first deal (person B).  Now if that happened, we would immediately infer that while A was not dealt intentionally, the perfect bridge hand was and, in fact, represents a case of cheating on the part of the dealer.  What justifies our suspicion?

First, since hand A and the perfect bridge hand have the same number of cards (13), each is equally improbable.  So, the small probability of an event is not sufficient by itself to raise suspicions that the event (person A getting a random set of cards) came about by the intentional action of an agent. Still, small probability is necessary to be confident that the result (the dealer getting a winner on the first deal) was done on purpose.

To see this, suppose that A and B were the only two players. In their rather odd game, each person is dealt three cards and the winner must have at least two black cards out of the three dealt to him.  A gets two red cards and one black card.  The dealer—B—gets a winning hand with two black cards and one red one.  If this happened, no one would suspect B of rigging the deck intentionally to win the first deal. Why?  Because getting two black cards and one red card does not have a small probability of occurring. In fact, it is fairly likely and, thus, it can easily be explained by pure chance.

As we have seen, by itself, the small probability of the dealer in the bridge game getting a perfect hand is not enough to charge him with cheating.  Highly unlikely coincidences happen all the time. Something else is needed to infer intentional agency (including a divine one), and the second criterion makes this clear:  The perfect bridge hand can be described as special independently of the fact that it happened to be the hand the dealer got, but this is not so for hand A.  Hand A can be described as “some improbable hand or other that someone (e.g., person A) happens to get.”  Now that specification applies to all hands whatever and does not mark out as special any particular hand that occurs.  So understood, A is no more special than any other random deal.

But this is not so for the perfect bridge hand.  This hand can be characterized as a special sort of combination of cards by the rules of bridge, quite independently of the fact that it is the hand that the dealer received.  It is the combination small probability (this particular arrangement of cards was quite unlikely to have occurred), and independent “specialness” (according to the rules, this is a pretty special hand for the dealer to receive, and we know that independently of the fact that it happened to be the hand the dealer got) that justifies us in accusing the dealer of cheating. Small probability + independent specialness = done on purpose by an intelligent agent.

The same principle applies to miracles. If one is praying for a very specific thing to happen even though if God does not act, it is very unlikely to happen on its own, then if the prayed for event happens, you can be sure it was brought about by a Personal Rational Agent (God) as an answer to prayer. With this in mind, let me share seven miracles (specific answers to prayer) I have seen in two months. They all conform to the scientific principle: small probability + independent specialness = done on purpose by an intelligent agent (in these cases, God). 

Divine leading and provision for Radiation treatment

I have had 7 surgeries on my right cheek, 5 of which were done at UCI by Dr. Tao in the last 3 weeks.) Two months ago, he told me the surgeries were no longer working (for each surgery, the cancer was coming back more quickly) and I needed another plan. I had 2 problems I needed to solve. First, I needed God’s direction among 3 options going forward: chemo, radiation, and radical surgery. Second, UCI doctors are in such high demand that new appointments can take up to 6-8 weeks to secure and I needed to start treatment asap. I prayed specifically for God to solve both. Two weeks later, I was at UCI for a urology appointment, I had some time before the appointment, so since I now have a PPO, I decided to go to the radiation dept. and schedule an appointment. The problem was that while the department has 25 radiation oncologists, only 2 specialize in head, facial, and throat cancers. Plus, as a new patient, the wait time for an appointment might be quite long. I approached the receptionist, and she told me that even though I had a PPO, I have to get clearance from the department to get an appointment. I tried to persuade her otherwise, but she would not budge. So, she gave me the number of their department center that handles these matters, I talked to an agent who would not budge either. I asked to speak to his supervisor. When I talked to her, she said she would meet me in the lobby to discuss things in person (most call centers are off campus and somewhere is LA). She wouldn’t budge until I have her a packet of info on me I had prepared. She said she would take it back to the nurses’ center and look at it. In 15 minutes, she came back and said that they only had 2 doctors who treated my need, one of them was there (these guys usually go twice a week to different UCI centers around LA), miraculously, at that moment he actually had a meeting slot open, and he would see me right then. Long story short—he took me on as a patient and I am now 1/4^th of the way through my 2-a-day treatments!! Incredible. Guidance and provision. (Two other UCI doctors in other departments confirmed that radiation was the way to go.)

Keytruda A year ago I went in for immunotherapy infusions once every three weeks for six months at a non-UCI infusion center under the recommendation of my oncologist for 10 years. It did not work. However, Dr. Charu (without me knowing it) scheduled me to do 17 infusions (one every three weeks) with a drug (Keytruda) she thought might be better for me.  Well, guess what. It treats 10 different cancers and is the best treatment for cheek cancer that cannot be surgically addressed! But there is more. It is also the second line of defense after BCG treatments (which I get every 3-6 months) for bladder cancer!! And you can be on both at the same time. Unknown to Dr. Charu, Keytruda was exactly the infusion drug I needed to address both cancers!!

The following are 4 answers to prayer that happened in my hospitalization at UCI Friday-Monday morning (June 28-July 1).

Private Room

I checked into the hospital Friday morning and got in quickly (after me, a hoard of people came to the hospital, and they announced that it would take 2 hours or so to check people in!). They literally took me to a room in the basement that looked like a second world hospital (It was horrible). It was so small, that my bed barely fit inside and there was room for only 2 people to be in the room working on me (establishing an IV line, etc.) After 2 hours I was taken to floor 2. I had to share a room with an older couple. There was little privacy, we shared a bathroom, and they had their TV on late into the night (making going to sleep hard). And the bed was an older one I could barely get out of (I had 4 lines coming into me with bags of solution on a pole) to attempt a bowel movement (I was constipated until Monday). It was not a good situation. Unknown to me, Hope and my daughters prayed that God would move me into a private room with a better bed. Mid-morning the next day (Saturday) a nurse came in and announced I was being moved to a private room on the 6^th floor. It was so, so nice and the atmosphere was completely different and uplifting. And get this: They had just received some new beds a few days ago and I got one that was so comfortable that I slept well and could get in and out of bed easily!

Surgery at 1pm

Surgery was scheduled for Sunday, and my surgeon assumed that since it was Sunday, there would be no problem with the OR being available. A fairly early surgery might allow me to be released early Monday and also go to my radiation appointment (which I could not miss) at 9am Monday. Early Sunday morning, one of the doctors visited me and said that unfortunately, they had underestimated the demand for the OR and my surgery was scheduled for 6pm. I was heartbroken and Hope and I prayed that God would open up an earlier time so I could be released Monday morning and go to my radiation appointment. At 1:15pm, a nurse entered my room and said “Get yourself ready. All the surgical team in in the OR and you are going in for surgery right now!” I was whisked into the OR and had surgery immediately!

Miracle in Surgery

On Friday night, a urologist visited my room and told me they knew what was causing the bleeding: In 2017, I had radiation on my prostate area that also hit my bladder and (he used a technical name) I had such and such. The radiation had affected my bladder and now (probably due to earlier bladder treatments) it was causing the bleeding. He said he had to be honest: This syndrome cannot be solved by surgery since my bleeding was highly likely to be from the entire inner wall of my bladder. He said that we might get lucky and find a few lesions that are the source of the bleeding, they could cauterize them, and solve the problem, But I needed to prepare myself for them not being able to stop the bleeding (they could try strong anti-clot meds with side effects), and I would likely go home and wear the catheter (I had already worn it with bright and dark red blood in my urine for 3 weeks) for maybe another month.  In the recovery room after I awakened, the doctor said, “Well, we got lucky. There were 3 lesions causing all the bleeding, they were cauterized, and the problem was solved. No more blood and only clear, normal urine!!

Monday morning radiation appointment

There was still the Monday 9am radiation appointment I needed. At 6:30am, the nurse told me I was being released sometime that morning but I most likely would miss my appointment. The weekend administration and nursing staff were being replaced by the weekly folks, they would need to be briefed on all the patients, and a urologist would need to be contacted to approve my release (and the urologists were all most likely in surgery until mid-morning). I cried out to God to somehow override all of this and get me to that appointment. About a hour later, a nurse came in and told me I was being released immediately and they had an ambulance ready to put me on a gurney and take me to my appointment across the hospital campus and back to the hospital!! So, I needed to quickly pack my things (it took 5 minutes). I actually got in to have my radiation treatment at 8:15am instead of 9am!! It was incredible.

Catheter Removal

I was released from the hospital Monday morning July 1. On Wednesday, I had an appointment at the urology department to remove my catheter (PTL!). But things were not that simple. Before the procedure, the nurse told me that after the catheter was removed, I would need to urinate. If I couldn’t, the catheter would be put back in (ugh!). My bladder was empty due to the catheter. So, using a syringe, she filled my bladder with 110 ml of solution. She had me hold a urine bottle to catch anything that came out, removed the catheter and, sure enough, fluid did come out. But it could have simply been the solution she had put into my bladder. I was instructed to stand for 10 minutes, try to urinate in the bottle, she would leave the room, and return in 10 minutes.  I tried several different approaches—relaxing, straining, etc.—but at the 6-minute mark, nothing had come out. I cried out to God, “Where are you? Why are you doing this to me!” But is suddenly caught myself panicking, and centered myself in Jesus. I said, “I know you are here, if I must leave with the catheter, I’ll be okay, I trust your goodness regardless of what happens. Stay with me.” I went into perfect calm even though I never urinated. The nurse came in, assessed the situation, and said that she was going to reinsert the catheter.  Then she paused and said to wait a few minutes. She wanted to talk to 2 or 3 more experienced nurses and she would return. After 5 minutes, she entered the room and announced, “OK, you are clear.  The others said that this happens often, and I was cleared. I was able to go home catheter-free and have urinated ever since (though it will take time to work through incontinence). You have no idea how great it is not to be catheterized!!

I’ll be honest. I have had hard times when God has not answered my cries. These are frustrating, confusing, and disappointing. But I bear testimony that I have, in fact, seen God do these things. And to top it off, I have never felt closer to Jesus and to Hope in all of this. I hope this has helped you know me better and that you find some encouragement in what I have said.