Questions

No, it's God good pleasure for you to pray for people who are presently lost. We can't know who God has decided he won't save, so we can hardly pray that he save someone that we know he has decided not to save, because we don't know who they are.

That would be praying against God's will only if God had revealed what his will is in regards to that particular person. I don't know who is elect and who is not, do I? Why wouldn't I pray in exactly the same way I pray for every other thing I pray for: "I ask this of you, but nevertheless, not my will, but yours."

As much as we can, yes, but unless we're on God's privy counsel, there's a whole lot about the way God wills to work in history that we don't know. That's why we couch all of our requests with "not my will, but thine."

I think that's covered with "not my will, but thine" isn't it?

 

The way I see it is this: It isn't if they are elect or not but what we think that persons standing is. If we have reason to think the person might be a stray sheep then we should pray for them even if we are wrong. Praying for God's enemies is wrong. We must discern as far as possible who to pray for and who not to from the persons concerned.

No, but He does work His works through us. He involves us. We should be led by the Spirit in prayer or we should be general in praying for the things we know He wants us to have such as knowledge and Wisdom and so on. If you find yourself praying for more love more hospitality and so on then you can be sure you will get it because it was God that put the prayer into your mind so that He could bless you and get closer to you.

We should be led by the Spirit in prayer. God does tell us who to pray for but being told by God does not mean that we can know we are praying for the elect. I can think of reasons why God gets us to pray for reprobates, it could be God wants them shamed on Judgment Day for their thoughts of us.

RO 8:26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. 27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will.

We don't need to get it right the Holy Spirit prays on our behalf and gets it right. We should use our prayers for selfish reasons. Ask for more and more of Him so that we become the people our Father will be proud of like He was of Job.

It makes us feel better. How do you know, wife, whether you will save your husband? Or, how do you know, husband, whether you will save your wife? 1 Cor 7:16.

Praying or not doesn't change God's plan. The plan is being worked out. Unbelieving wifes and husbands are made holy and are in a priveledged position to hear and see the word of God in action. Since the non-Christian is loved then that love will express itself in pleas of mercy for the husband or wife of the Christian with a half promise, how do you know?. Love demands our prayers. Love is kind and wants the best for the objects of our love.

I will be interested in the response.

We do not need to give Him options, Jesus said, "Your will be done."

I think that's covered with "not my will, but thine" isn't it? Absolutely.

john.

 

Does the nonsense floating around this board know no end?
Most every thread I read has these insipid statements that make the poster look quite silly.
As Russell55 neatly pointed out:
Christians pray for non-Christians because we don't know who God will save.
We pray that it is His will to save those who we ask for.
We never ask Him to send anyone to hell anymore then we ask Him to send ourselves to hell.
Please stop with the irrational statements
It's horribly frustrating to have to read this stuff and then summon a response that will actually penetrate the nonsense.

 

Johnp

Matthew 5
44 But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, 45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward have you?


Again, it just makes no sense to pray for the salvation of one who has been condemned from eternity past. The decision has been made. It's a done deal. Your prayers are useless. Do you pray for the Lord to return someday? If so, is it because you're not sure if it's God's will or not for Him to come back? I don't pray for the Lord to return, because I already know He will. It's a done deal. So, why would you pray for the salvation of anyone (whether you know they're the elect or not) because it's already a done deal. The only thing you could possibly hope to accomplish is to change God's mind and save some that He did not choose to be the elect.

 

:wavey: <--------------this is me

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:BangHead: <--------------this is me on calvinism

 

So you really do think you're making a valid point, don't you?
Obviously you don't see the Biblical teaching that God uses the prayers of His people to accomplish events.

Your dismissal of the effectiveness of prayer is flippant and unsound.
The Bible is filled with God responding to His people as they cry out to Him.
Where's your verse encouraging you not to pray for some things?

A perfect pattern to follow.

 

DA 9:1 In the first year of Darius son of Xerxes (a Mede by descent), who was made ruler over the Babylonian kingdom-- 2 in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, understood from the Scriptures, according to the word of the LORD given to Jeremiah the prophet, that the desolation of Jerusalem would last seventy years. 3 So I turned to the Lord God and pleaded with him in prayer and petition, in fasting, and in sackcloth and ashes.



john.

 

Actually you missed the point. I certainly do not dismiss the effectiveness of prayer. My point was that calvinists say that a person's salvation has been determined before the earth was formed, so by that logic, it does no good to pray for something that God has already determined. Calvinists claim they pray for other's salvation. My point is this........they don't make sense!

 

It seems he was hoping to change God's mind. Is that what you are trying to do when you pray for another's salvation?

 

You've got a lot of room to talk. THAT is twisting the text. The text does NOT say that. Try again...

You can't be serious! Does that end there? I can't believe the way you butcher a text and slice it up to make it say what you want it to say. This is eisegesis at it's worst!

Who? The man who comes to Chrsit!

Let's use your logic with another verse... "the fool says in his heart 'there is no God'"
You have a fool saying something in his heart. Face value: you have a person thinking foolish things in their heart to themselves. Now let's look at the rest. 'There is no God'. Face value: this means there is no God. Therefore, what the verse must be saying is that a man has foolish thoughts in his heart that there really is a God, when the Bible tells us plainly there is no God, making the person thinking there is a God out to be a fool.

You see how you can make any text say what you want it to say? Please do not butcher Scripture the way you have been doing.

 

And your point is based on a wrong premise, which is that God does not use prayer as a means of accomplishing His purposes!

And as you so stated the above, it shows that you misunderstand the meaning and use of prayer.
Calvinists pray because we believe that God answers prayers, just like the Bible teaches us.
Moses intereceded for the nation of Israel and God heard and answered his prayer.
Moses' prayer of intercession was the means by which God desired to show mercy on the Israelites.

 

Of course it makes no sense to pray for the salvation of someone who has been condemned from eternity past, if we knew who was condemned from eternity past. That would be praying against what we knew to be God's will. But we don't know who God will save and who he won't. Given that, it's your objection that makes no sense.

Absolutely. Just like John did at the end of Revelation: "Amen. Come, Lord Jesus! "

Or Paul in 1 Corinthians: "Our Lord, come!"

No, I pray for it because I know it's God will. That's called aligning my prayers with the will of God, or praying "according to God's will."

Then you are not following the examples given to us by John and Paul. Praying for what we know God will do is part of aligning our will with his, BTW.

Because one of the means God has ordained to use to accomplish his will is the prayers of his saints. Because expressing my desires to God is one way of aligning my will with his. Why do you think Paul and John prayed "Come, Lord Jesus!" when it was already a done deal that Christ would return?

I'm not hoping to change God's mind. I'm not hoping to accomplish anything with my prayers, as if my prayers themselves work something. It's not as if God is my cosmic bell hop, there to do my bidding.

What am I hoping? I'm hoping that God will use my prayers as part of the means by which he brings someone to himself. That I can be one of the instruments God uses in the salvation of someone. It's the very same motivation for spreading the gospel—the desire to be one of the instruments by which God brings someone to himself.

 

I don't know what you were reading Amy.G but Daniel read in scripture that the curse was for seventy years and Daniel, realising that the seventy years were up, prayed and pleaded with God for the very thing God had promised. What a waste of time a?

DA 9:1 In the first year of Darius son of Xerxes (a Mede by descent), who was made ruler over the Babylonian kingdom-- 2 in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, understood from the Scriptures, according to the word of the LORD given to Jeremiah the prophet, that the desolation of Jerusalem would last seventy years. 3 So I turned to the Lord God and pleaded with him in prayer and petition, in fasting, and in sackcloth and ashes.

How you can turn that into saying Daniel was trying to change God's mind?

No it isn't. I just want to receive some of the blessings involed in the gospel.


john.

 

I think some AW Pink quotes are in order here, but I recommend reading the whole chapter:

http://www.reformed.org/books/pink/index.html?mainframe=/books/pink/pink_sov_09.html

But did not the Lord Jesus tell His disciples, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in My name, He will give it you" (John 16:23)? He did; but this promise does not give praying souls carte blanche. These words of our Lord are in perfect accord with those of the Apostle John: "If ye ask anything according to His will He heareth us." What is it to ask "in the name of Christ"? Surely it is very much more than a prayer formula, the mere concluding of our supplications with the words "in the name of Christ." To apply to God for anything in the name of Christ, it must needs be in keeping with what Christ is! To ask God in the name of Christ is as though Christ Himself were the suppliant. We can only ask God for what Christ would ask. To ask in the name of Christ is therefore to set aside our own wills, accepting God's!

Let us now amplify our definition of prayer. What is prayer? Prayer is not so much an act as it is an attitude-an attitude of dependency, dependency upon God. Prayer is a confession of creature weakness, yea, of helplessness. Prayer is the acknowledgment of our need and the spreading of it before God. We do not say that this is all there is in prayer, it is not: but it is the essential, the primary element in prayer. We freely admit that we are quite unable to give a complete definition of prayer within the compass of a brief sentence, or in any number of words. Prayer is both an attitude and an act, an human act, and yet there is the Divine element in it too, and it is this which makes an exhaustive analysis impossible as well as impious to attempt. But admitting this, we do insist again that prayer is fundamentally an attitude of dependency upon God. Therefore, prayer is the very opposite of dictating to God. Because prayer is an attitude of dependency, the one who really prays is submissive, submissive to the Divine will; and submission to the Divine will means that we are content for the Lord to supply our need according to the dictates of His own Sovereign pleasure. And hence it is that we say every prayer that is offered to God in this spirit is sure of meeting with an answer or response from Him.

Here then is the reply to our opening question, and the scriptural solution to the seeming difficulty. Prayer is not the requesting of God to alter His purpose or for Him to form a new one. Prayer is the taking of an attitude of dependency upon God, the spreading of our need before Him, the asking for those things which are in accordance with His will, and therefore there is nothing whatever inconsistent between Divine Sovereignty and Christian prayer.

 

Oh! Daniel is such a good example.

 

I think most of the people in this thread are careful about this, but I want to add a word of caution not to think or talk about prayer has having some innate mystical power.

The God to whom we pray has all power. If prayer is "effectual, effective, powerful," it is God who gives it effectiveness.

russell55 has it right, I think:

When we pray, we are asking God to use his power, not the power of our words. To imbue prayer with a mystical potency comes pretty close to the error of the Postive Confession movement, which holds that "you can have what you say."

 

JM, don't apologize. The OP asked legitimate questions, and we've strayed from it. And I was an accomplice.

This happens on occasion. Sometimes we'll extract a comment and challenge it, and the hijacking is off and running. Not your fault.

 

It's hard to state your intentions aren't argumentative...and then start an open theism Lord's prayer thread exactly one minute after you post this. What's the point of that?...