What about the other side of the issue: the fact that the drug companies give doctor's bonuses for prescribing their medications and, as a result, physicians lie or coerce their patients into taking a pill when there ARE natural remedies that have been proven to work?

I think it is foolish to not get your child help when they are sick, but when it comes to cancer, a lot of kids die from the treatments alone. And, did you know, that the side-effects of chemotherapy are the exact same as those that occurred when doctors used to give people mercury as a medicine? Mercury has, of course, been proven to be a poison. Are we going to see the same conclusion drawn from studies on chemotherapy?

So I conclude that to just sit back and wait for God to heal, which does happen, can be a foolish decision to make but, simultaneously, it is just as dangerous to just take the doctor at their word and ignore any alternatives to conventional medicine that may be present.

I wonder what the parents would do if their kids were being attacked by a dog, or being abducted by a stranger. Would they simply pray that God would intervene or would they take action to ensure their child's safety. For some reason some people think that when the attacker is a germ or a virus or a defective organ the only proper way to respond is to "have faith". Utilizing doctors and technology doesn't mean we don't have faith in God. Wasn't Luke, the faithful companion of Paul a doctor?

The creation and fall account indicate that death is a bad thing - not part of God's perfect will. So any (moral) means to sustain life is good. While death is inevitable, I think life is always better than death. I also think God gave us our minds to be creative in the pursuit and sustaining of life. So while the end of life is always in God's hands, I see no Biblical reason to think that we cannot intervene to continue life. If we are given the skills and the creative power to do so, there is no reason why we shouldn't use them.

There's this bad idea that says that by doing nothing we are showing our faith and dependence on God. But that is simply not true. While God is certainly free to intervene and work miracles, we are not called to sit around expecting Him to make His will happen. We are created in His image, with skills, with a mind, and a command to work (even before the curse of the fall). So whatever He has revealed to us so far, even if its just enough to get us through the day, act on it! We are given a privilege and responsibility to see His will carried on earth.

To deny medical treatment because "God told me not to" is very dangerous and should not be practiced by Christians.

I would like to hear the arguments in favor of "natural healing" that are so compelling that you conclude "there's no clear cut answer". That's not as much a challenge as an expression of my incredulity that such an argument exists.

It's parental negligence. Second degree murder is the appropriate charge. And I would be willing to hear arguments where churches that teach that nonsense have their tax-exempt status pulled and leaders that push those ideas on the parishioners face prosecution for child endangerment. Heck, prosecute them under the assisted suicide laws in states where those apply.

This is not just a cultural separatist thing where a group of people don't use electricity or cars. This is a problem where children who cannot determine the best course of action for themselves are having dangerous choices made on their behalf. And they're dying because of it.

I actually spent a short time working for the Wisconsin family that this post refers to. I knew the daughter that died, and the other three children. I find it disturbing to justify her death in such a way. God of course has a plan and a will for our lives, but in this case especially the illness that caused death was so easily treatable! These treatments would not be possible if not for God's will, which I take to mean that God would like us to use them. Prayer is an amazingly powerful tool and should be an important aspect of any type of healing, but the Bible does not tell us to ignore medicine as another aspect of healing.

I tend to think that God has built into most people the desire to live as long as possible. That seems to be a common theme in the bible as well. Medical treatment is a way to prolong a person's life as well as improve their living standard. I have to wonder why someone would deny their children medical treatment if it is available.

"using modern medicine is ignoring God’s will for our lives" and "if God wanted us to fly, He would have given us wings"...Roughly the same logic here.

Unless you are foresaking other modern technology (which affects every aspect of our lives, including lifespan) this argument is simply poor and inconsistent with the way we live rest of our lives. I'd like to see the Biblical basis for the argument...

Lately I have really been convicted that you can't say for sure what God is doing in the lives of others. On the other hand, these choices sure don't sound like something the God I know would ever say. I think, legally, these parents should be prosecuted, because they broke US law. In terms of their spiritual lives, I guess that's God's business.
Jeremy, I think you are posing an extreme position that I would soften considerably. There are some cases where refusing treatment is a reasonable choice based on the risks at hand. There are other cases where no natural cure exists, and assuming the medical cure is harmful is foolish. From everything I can tell, refusing vaccinations is an example of this kind of foolishness, though it's rarely linked to religion.

Often, healing is done THROUGH the Doctors and Nurses and medication- other times He heals IN SPITE OF the Doctors and Nurses and medication. The prayers of the faithful are heard loudest through their acts of obedience, faith and trust. It most certainly an act of faith and trust when we turn our loved ones over to strangers for care but it is also an act of obedience. We are supposed to take full advantage of God ordained institutions like hospitals to make sure our loved ones are cared for and have a better opportunity for healing when we can't do it ourselves.

Now this is where prayer comes in. We pray for wisdom and discernment for the Doctors and Nurses. We pray for the effectiveness and proper administration of helpful drugs. And when all medical help is exhausted and the Doctors and Nurses are beyond their abilities, we pray for God to take over to miraculously heal or mercifully welcome our loved one into His Home.

I have heard of and witnessed so many miracles having to do with terminal illness that I couldn't go through a them all, but what strikes me as significant is the fact that they were all taking advantage of medical treatment before the healing took place. It is after hope was gone or in spite of medical treatment and through the prayers of the faithful that the healing took place.

So we the faithful followers of Christ and believers in His complete love, power and mercy should also trust that He had a hand in forming medicine, medical treatment, hospitals and the majority of those who practice it. We do not see so we might have faith, we have faith so we might see God's hand in all things.

Getting there together,
rob

If you deny your child medical treatment that may save their lives I think you are allowing other factors to cloud your judgement. God gave us doctors and those in the medical field to help us. Some treatments hurt and are confusing, but without them we may suffer even more. I don't deny that drug companies make a profit on drugs, but have you ever received a discount or even free medications from your doctor who received them from the drug company and he just passed them on. God gave us a brain to use, so use it and seek out those who can and want to help. In God's Grace John