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This article addresses cases of remarkable recoveries related to healing after prayer. We sought to investigate how people who experienced remarkable recoveries re-construct and give meaning to these experiences, and examine the role that epistemic frameworks available to them, play in this process. Basing ourselves on horizontal epistemology and using grounded theory, we conducted this qualitative empirical research in the Netherlands in 2016–2021. It draws on 14 in-depth interviews. These 14 cases were selected from a group of 27 cases, which were evaluated by a medical assessment team at the Amsterdam University Medical Centre. Each of the participants had experienced a remarkable recovery during or after prayer. The analysis of the interviews, which is based on the grounded theory approach, resulted in three overarching themes, placing possible explanations of the recoveries within (1) the medical discourse, (2) biographical discourse, and (3) a discourse of spiritual and religious transformation. Juxtaposition of these explanatory frameworks provides a way to understand better the transformative experience that underlies remarkable recoveries. Uncertainty regarding an explanation is a component of knowing and can facilitate a dialogue between various domains of knowledge.

The setting: between 2015 and 2020 a medical assessment team evaluated 27 reports of prayer healing in the Netherlands. Objectives: Three research questions were formulated. What are the medical and experiential findings? Are there medically remarkable and/or unexplained healings? Which explanatory frameworks can help us understand the findings? Methods: The reported healings were analyzed using both medical files and patient narratives, as part of a case study research design compiled by a multidisciplinary research team. An independent team of five medical consultants, representing different fields of expertise, evaluated the 27 case files. According to criteria these were selected from a larger group of 83 received reports. Experiential data was obtained by in-depth interviews and analyzed. Instances of healing could be classified as ‘medically remarkable’ or ‘medically unexplained’. Subsequent analysis was transdisciplinary. Results: Eleven of the 27 healings assessed were evaluated as ‘medically remarkable’, none were labelled as ‘medically unexplained’. Recurring characteristics were common to some degree in all healings, whether ‘medically remarkable’ or not: a temporal connection with prayer, instantaneity and unexpectedness of healing, strong emotional and physical manifestations, and a sense of ‘being overwhelmed’ and transformed. The healings were invariably interpreted as acts of God. Positive effects have persisted for 5 to 33 years, with 2 relapses. Conclusions: Our findings on remarkable healings do not fit well in the traditional biomedical conceptual framework. All healings exhibited important non-medical aspects, whether or not they were assessed as medically remarkable. We need a broader multi-perspective approach in which all relevant data is considered to be valuable, both experiential and objective. This so-called horizontal epistemology may be helpful when trying to understand the findings, and it may bring about mutual understanding between patients, health practitioners and relevant disciplines.

Summary Neo-Calvinism is increasingly popular in the United States, but far less so in the Netherlands where it originated. Written from the context of the Free University (Vrije Universiteit) founded by Abraham Kuyper, this article presents six elements of Neo-Calvinism which together establish it as an important and relevant worldview for our time. The first is that it attempts to create a ‘priestly’ connection between gospel and culture. Next there are Neo-Calvinism’s notion of the sovereignty of God, its conviction that humans are elected to something, and its belief that this world – even in its fallen state – is and remains God’s world. The last two elements are the trinitarian spread of its theology and the fact that it exercises the Christian virtues of faith, hope and love.

The purpose of this article is to enhance our understanding of prayer healing by studying a case which was described as a 'remarkable healing' by a medical assessment team at the Amsterdam University Medical Centre (UMC) in the Netherlands.This retrospective, case-based study of prayer healing investigated numerous reported healings using both medical files and patient narratives. A medical assessment team evaluated the associated medical files, as well as any experiential data. The instances of healing could be classified as 'remarkable' or 'unexplained.' Experiential data were obtained by qualitative, in-depth interviews. The study was transdisciplinary in nature, involving medical, psychological, theological, and philosophical perspectives. The object was to understand such healings within the broader framework of the science-religion debate.We present the case of a female patient, born in 1959, with Parkinson disease who experienced instantaneous, nearly complete healing in 2012 after intercessory prayer. At that point the disease was at an advanced stage, rapidly progressive, with major debilitating symptoms. High doses of oral medication were required. Following this healing there was no recurrence of her former symptoms, while the remaining symptoms continued to improve. She regained all of her capacities at work, as well as in daily life. The medical assessment team described her recovery as 'remarkable.' The patient reported that she had always 'lived with God,' and that at a point when she had given up hope, 'life was given back to her.' This recovery did not make her immune to other illnesses and suffering, but it did strengthen her belief that God cares about human beings.This remarkable healing and its context astonished the patient, her family, and her doctors. The clinical course was extraordinary, contradicting data from imaging studies, as well as the common understanding of this disease. This case also raised questions about medical assumptions. Any attempt to investigate such healings requires the involvement of other disciplines. A transdisciplinary approach that includes experiential knowledge would be helpful. Against the background of the science-religion debate, we feel that the most helpful approach would be one of complementarity and dialogue, rather than stoking controversy.

Aim to enhance the understanding of documented mismatches between ‘subjective’ experiences and ‘objective’ data in three cases of self-reported instantaneous healing of hearing impairment upon prayer. Method description of three cases taken out of a larger retrospective case-based study of prayer healing in the Netherlands. In this larger study multiple reported healings were investigated using both medical files and patients’ narratives through in-depth interviews. A subset of three cases with dramatic subjective reduction of hearing impairment upon prayer was studied. These patients underwent extensive additional investigations at the audiology center of the Amsterdam University Medical Centre. All data was evaluated by an interdisciplinary medical assessment team, subsequent analysis was transdisciplinary. Results the three case histories with self-reported healing after prayer demonstrated a clear mismatch between subjective experiences and objective findings. No measurable improvements were found in four different audiological testing methods. However, in-depth interviews, hetero-anamnesis and a validated questionnaire all confirmed the healings. The medical assessment team could not label these healings as ‘medically remarkable’ because of absence of measurable ‘objective’ changes, but they did consider them as ‘remarkable in a broader sense’. On expert consultation no equivalents of mismatches to this extent could be found. The healing experiences of our participants involved their entire being with profound positive effects in different domains of their lives, and a perception of a benevolent God who acted upon them. There was a distinctive pattern, labelled by the participants as a healing of mind, soul and body. Conclusions The subjective-objective incongruities that were found were not well understood. We noticed a paradox: the ‘objective’ measurements did not reflect hearing abilities in daily life where-as ‘subjective experiential’ data did. The latter could be ‘objectified’ and validated in various ways. In fact, a rigid distinction between ‘objective’ and ‘subjective’ was not relevant here, nor a hierarchy among them. A model leaving room for different causations (horizontal epistemology) complied best with the multi dimensionality we came across.

Reformed thought on creation is throughout its history deeply influenced by the knowledge that this world comes from the triune God, who we know as Father, Son, and Spirit. The world is approached with the expectation that it somehow bears the traces of the Father, Christ, and the Spirit. God remains actively involved in the continuation of his creation. Already in Calvin’s work this aspect is very clear in his rejection of the Epicurean idea of distant divinity who does not interact with the world. The continued reality of God’s rule as sovereign over all that exists is one of the basic elements of the Reformed theological tradition. At the same time it has been and still is one of the most contested doctrines.

This article explores to what extent God and his works can be understood in terms of entrepreneurship. We give several theological reasons for using this lens, and we survey briefly the use of the word ‘oikonomia’ in the New Testament, the early church, and Reformed theology. Thereafter, we investigate how the entrepreneurship metaphor fits the narrative of the Bible. We argue that by looking at how features of entrepreneurship can be found in the way in which the triune God acts, we obtain a more comprehensive view on our history as a risky drama between God and humanity. The metaphor also highlights the important role played by humans in letting creation flourish.

The appropriation of Barth’s theology in contemporary Protestant theology is related to the culture and conditions of its reception. While the direct influence of Barth may broadly have decreased in recent years, some of his major insights and decisions have found wide acceptance in Protestant theology. The importance of Christology for the doctrine of God is recognizable in many strands of contemporary Protestant thought; equally, the ethical dimensions of Barth’s theology have drawn much attention to this domain of the theological enterprise. Barth’s emphasis on God’s action in favour of God’s creatures and of the human being—the creature called to creative and free response to God—also features heavily in current Protestant reception of his work.

This article examines the moral status of wealth creation, particularly within its theological and religious contexts, across Reformed confessions from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. These confessional standards are a key source for the moral teaching of Reformed churches, and their treatments of the eighth commandment demonstrate a relatively nuanced and sophisticated view of wealth. Rather than simply denouncing wealth itself as intrinsically evil, these confessional standards, from a variety of national and ecclesial contexts, both on the European continent and Britain, provide a basis for viewing wealth creation as a moral good, even while warning against excess, temptation, and vices such as avarice and envy. This survey of the treatments of wealth from a diverse set of Reformed confessional standards provides a foundation for understanding a critical element in the formation of Reformed, and more broadly Protestant, economic ethics in the early-modern period.

This article describes some of the basic elements of John Calvin's theology of creation and providence by situating them within a trinitarian framework. By using metaphors such as mirror, theatre and garment, Calvin pictured the earth as a generous gift of the Creator within which God shows his goodness, power and fatherly care. Calvin understands God not to be far away, but rather to be near and to sustain all life on earth by the power of the Holy Spirit. The visibility and tangibility of God's care as shown in the order of the universe and the reality of the world as a habitable place is of particular significance for Calvin. I argue that although contemporary science has changed our ideas regarding the universe in significant ways, there is an important aspect of Calvin's thinking that may be recognizable for the modern mind: the fragility of life on earth.

Context • Prayer healing is a common practice in many religious communities around the world. Even in the highly secularized Dutch society, cases of prayer healing are occasionally reported in the media, often generating public attention. There is an ongoing debate regarding whether such miraculous cures do actually occur and how to interpret them. Objective • The aim of the article was to present a research protocol for the investigation of reported cases of remarkable and/or unexplained healing after prayer. Design • The research team developed a method to perform a retrospective, case-based study of prayer healing. Reported prayer healings can be investigated systematically in accordance with a step-by-step methodology. The focus is on understanding the healing by studying it from multiple perspectives, using both medical judgment and patients' narratives collected by qualitative methods Setting • The study occurred at Vrije Universiteit (VU) and VU Medical Center (Amsterdam, Netherlands) as well as the general medical practice of the first author. Participants • Potential participants could be any individuals in the Netherlands or neighboring countries who claim to have been healed through prayer. The reports of healing came from multiple sources, including the research team's medical practices and their direct vicinities, newspaper articles, prayer healers, and medical colleagues. Outcome Measures • Medical data were obtained before and after prayer. Subsequently, a member of a research team and of a medical assessment committee made a standardized judgment that evaluated whether a cure was clinically remarkable or scientifically unexplained. The participants' experiences and insider perspectives were studied, using in-depth interviews in accordance with a qualitative research methodology, to gain insight into the perceptions and explanations of the cures that were offered by participants and by the members of the medical assessment committee. The medical findings and participants' experiences were weighed and interpreted based on a transdisciplinary framework, including biopsychosocial and theological perspectives, with reference to a conceptual framework derived from Ian Barbour's typology of positions in the science-religion debate. Conclusion • A case-based, research study protocol that compares medical and experiential findings and that interprets and structures those findings with reference to Ian Barbour's conceptual model is an innovative way of gaining deeper insight into the nature of remarkable and/or unexplained cures.

Abstract Theology of creation has liberated itself from the shadows of the debate on natural theology. After Moltmann’s explorations on the theme of pneumatology and ecology others have moved towards more reality and experience-oriented conceptions. In this contribution some of these proposals are discussed and recommendations are made in order to develop a pneumatology that is informed by trinitarian-theological insights as well as empirical ecologically informed research.

In this response to Robert Menzies article “Luke’s Understanding of Baptism in the Holy Spirit. A Pentecostal Perspective” (PentecoStudies 2007/2) it is argued that that the distinction between a soteriological and a charismatic understanding of the work of the Spirit should be integrated in Reformed theology. At the same the claim is criticized that the prophetic gifts are available for every member of the new community. In opposition to this view it is emphasized that it is more biblically founded to defend and to teach a theology that begins with the sovereignty and freedom of God.

Eschatology discusses what believers are hoping for - for them personally and for the world- and what carries them through life. This chapter begins with a discussion on the essential for Calvin's theology that is the distinction between heaven and earth, the fundamental otherness of this world and the coming world. In Calvin's view the civil authorities have a fundamental task for the earthly pilgrim on the way to his eternal destiny. Calvin describes life as one long battle from which one should not want to flee. The eschatological direction of Calvin's thought is determined by two tracks, first, for Calvin a correct distinction between the "already" and the "not yet" is of the greatest significance and the second is that, spiritually viewed, the center of gravity is found in the "already" of the blessings of God received in Christ. Keywords:Christ; eschatology; John Calvin