Praying for Persecutors
Praying for Persecutors
You may wish to include the following prayer in praying for those persecuting you or persecuting others you're interceding for.
Our heavenly Father, I present to you, in the name of Jesus, the people who are persecuting me. Lord the condition these individuals have yoked themselves in through the schemes of Satan is something I cannot ignore. The yoke is in many dimensions:
1) their salvation is at stake,
2) they stand to reap in multiples the negative seeds they are nursing in their hearts,
3) Their behavior separates them from your hearing as 1 Peter 3:12 says, “the face of the Lord is against those who do evil,”
4) their problems that they desire you to solve will therefore continue as Isaiah 57:21 says, “There is no peace for the wicked,” irrespective of the size of wickedness,
5) they risk not being forgiven by you as our Lord Jesus said in Matthew 6:15: “If you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins,”
6) they risk procuring a curse from you as your word says in Proverbs 3:33 “The Lord's curse is on the house of the wicked, but he blesses the home of the righteous,”
7) They are away from your refuge and therefore can easily be opposed by Satan to whatever degree their sins give him the legal grounds to interfere with their lives,
8) Their sins will harm their children in one way or another as Isaiah 14:20-21 and Leviticus 26:39 say
All this is working to the advantage of the devil whose ministry is to destroy people's lives. It profits you nothing for them to remain in such a hopeless state. Your word says in 2 Peter 3:9 that you do not want “anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” Neither does it profit me anything to see them sawing seeds of bondage against themselves unknowingly. This leads me to my second petition.
Therefore my second petition, in the name of Jesus, is that you answer my petition to pardon their sin and therefore free them from paying their sins in the multiple ways mentioned above and any other ways. I forgive them for their sinful attitude towards me and I hold nothing in my heart against them. The Lord Jesus said to us his disciples: “if you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven,” John 20:23.
Thank you that the enemy has been robbed of what he had wanted to destroy on my side and the side of those persecuting me. ( If prayed among two or more) : Thank you that you have considered my petition as binding just as Jesus said in Matthew 16:19 “whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven.” Thank you that the enemy cannot unbind it since you who is mightier than him have bound it in heaven.)
Thirdly, I ask in the name of Jesus, that you cause these individuals to repent. Lord of the great harvest, open their mental and spiritual eyes so that they see their sins. Satan who is the god of this age has blinded their minds from knowing your truth.
Your word says “The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God,” 2 Corinthians 4:4.
Verse 6 says it is you who healed the blindness of the minds and hearts of those of us who now can see: “For God, who said let light shine out of darkness, made his light shine on our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.”
Heavenly Father, I ask you to let your Holy Spirit to heal the hearts of these individuals. May your Spirit open their eyes and shine his light in their hearts to give them the light of the knowledge of your ways. Some of these individuals are believers who already have the seal of your Holy Spirit in them.
However, they're grieving your Spirit by their sinful behavior and thereby hindering or limiting what you've purposed to fulfill in through them. Please allow your Spirit to convict both the believers and the unbelievers of their sins so that they can live lives worthy of your callings. In Jesus' name I pray, Amen.