If God can perform miracles, why doesn't He heal amputees?

I would imagine for the same reason he doesn't stop war, crime, famine, natural disasters, murder, genocide etc etc. Lets look at it theoretically. If the bible is to be believed, god created the world then the human race. In time he sent his son along to carry on his work ... and ... well he was crucified. To recap ... God gives world and life. That which he gave takes the life of his son. If the bible is not your flavour and you consider the big bang theory, then God doesn't really hold much weight and we have to look to the day when medicine can evolve to the point of an absolute heal. To be fair, the treatment for amputees has come a long way over the last decade. Hmm this has turned into a bit of a babbled response. I guess thats what happens late at night trawling the questions with no response. Now i'm in the mood to watch Life of Brian again ...

God made the world. God made man. God put man over the world, his primary duty and obligation to dress it and keep it. You following me here? The next part is important. Jesus came as Chief Ambassador and Son of the Most High God. When he people came to Him He did miracles of such a multitude that they are still talking about them today. Maybe the key is not that we wait for God to do, but that we find Him where He is and go to Him and ask for the healing until He gives it. Examine the Gospels and tell me what they say. I am curious too. ;-)

If He had wanted us to be lizards or worms, I guess He would have made us such. This is just another of the "If God is so all-powerful, why doesn't He ..." which assume that God is made in the image of Man and would see things the way we see them. The only real answer is that God is, well, God (or whatever you want to call Him/Her/It). We are told that we are 'made in His image', which doesn't mean that He also has two legs, two arms and so on! The 'image' that is meant (poetically) is that, like Him, we are spiritual beings and seem to be able to communicate with Him (if we get it right, which isn't all the time, and can seem incomprehensible to someone who hasn't yet met Him.) I hope I am preaching to the converted but, if you want to meet Him, then you only have to ask - in your heart. When you are ready (and have puzzled long enough over silly notions like growing new limbs and why there are such things as earthquakes and typhoons), He will be there like a shot.

It's amusing to me how many of the responses in this post don't answer your question as much as they avoid it by preaching about how great God is. The fact that there hasn't been a single amputee that's grown a new limb by God's Grace(tm) - among other things - is proof to me that he either doesn't exist, or is NOT the loving omnipotent deity that people like to think. Think about it. People have a disturbing habit of attributing all good things that happen to or around them to the works of God, and all bad things to the devil. If someone's cancer goes into recession, "God did it!" if they have a relapse... "They must have rejected God!". You can't have it both ways. You can't say that "God will heal you if you trust and believe in him (and don't forget to give money to the church while you're at it!", and then when faced with something that HAS NEVER been cured by 'God' say, "It's not in God's plan to heal". If god DOES exist, then there has to be a good reason why he doesn't heal his faithful amputee followers when he apparently helps people fight cancer, HIV, mono, etc. every day. Have you noticed that the amount of people being "healed by god" is almost directly proportional to the medical breakthroughs being made in the field of the afflictions that are healed? Have no doubt, when Science figures out how to grow and successfully attach new limbs to amputees, the blind and ignorant will attribute that success to God as well, and not the REAL PEOPLE who worked hard for many, many years.

I have some assuptions. I assume you believe in the power of prayer? - Yes? I assume you believe God can do anything? - Yes? I assume that whether you pray or not, God will do his will? - Yes? So, if everyone in the whole world prayed for all the amputees in the whole world to heal their absent limb, it wouldn't matter, God would if he wanted to. Therefore, amputees have not been healed, and so we can conclude that God doesn't want to heal them anyway. Has anyone prayed for someone with dowensyndrome? I'm guessing God who treat such a preson in the same manner as an amputee. That goes for burn victims, rape victims and if the wound is fatal, God won't heal them either, because they die. But it's his will, who are we to judge the actions of God? He heals cancer, because we didn't really see it anyway to begin with. God heals the unseen illnesses, not the seen ones. God seems a bit picky about who he heals don't you think? The whole situation makes more sense when you don't believe in a personal all powerful God. But I wouldn't want to say that, it is impossible for you chaps to consider such a notion isn't it? here's a better argument to help you guys. It was the Satan, in all his evil power, who stopped God from healing the suffering. It's a watertight argument for you and one which I can't refute. Because for me to refute it, I would need to believe in God and Satan. I write this post not to attack you personally, but to raise the greater issue at hand. You will think that my argument is flawed, but that is your right and I respect your feelings. I felt that way too once. I am no better than you. We are all in this thing called life together, let's try our best to make sense of it all, for everyones good. Please, there are other answers out there besides this Jesus character, if you are willing to look. And the answers you find are as satisfying. Take the leap of faith Christians are always demanding of Atheists. If you demand a leap from Atheists, have the balls to do the same for them, please. We need mutual respect in this regard.

Becuase it's God's will and His Diviness have his own reasons too holy for us human ears. (sarcasm) But really, I don't know.

i noticed a lot of "I don't knows" and a whole bunch of answers that don't make any sense. but the explanation is rather simple actually. The first human pair was given a commandment not to eat of a certain tree of the garden. the were essentially told by God "that mine, don't touch" they disobeyed and by doing so sin was introduced into the human family and they became imperfect. but the one that started the whole thing in the fist place, who later became called Satan the Devil, had also challenged God right and quality of rule. that being the case once Adam and Eve began having children that imperfection was passed to them genetically and eventually down to us. this is why we get sick, have things that happen to us that requires us to lose limbs and so forth. now the reason why we are still like this is due to that challenge that i mentioned before. thats recorded in Genesis 3:1-6. Time has been alloted to him to prove that under his direction human rule will benefit them more than God ruling them. Which is clearly a lost cause. 6000 years of human history and we still have problems with the governments cause they simply cant rule properly. but we were certainly not created to be like this. in fact scientists cant even explain why we grow old in the first place. according to their findings we shouldn't even be dieing. now he is going to do something about this. but that in of itself is a whole different discussion that I'm not going to tackle here. but thats the simplest explanation that can be given.