Should You Pray For Someone's Salvation?

CONTENDING FOR THE FAITH

In this regular feature Dave and Tom respond to questions from listeners and readers of The Berean Call, here is this week’s question:“Dear Dave and TA, is it biblical to pray for someone’s salvation, and if you do what are you asking God to do?”

Tom:

Dave, that’s depending on, I guess, what your perspective is.If you’re a Calvinist you’ve got one view, if you take the Bible literally, I mean, time and time again we know it’s God’s desire that all should be saved, and we’re praying something according to God’s will.But there is an issue here of the will, and I think that’s what makes this a tough question.What do you think?

Dave:

Well, I suppose I’ve prayed that prayer for many people, but mostly what I pray is, Lord, will you please do everything that you can to bring this person to an understanding of the issues, what they are facing, eternal damnation, eternal separation from God, and let them, at least understand that Jesus died for their sins.Of course a Calvinist wouldn’t pray that, and that you want them, and Christ is holding out His arms, pleading, Come unto Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, I will give you rest.So, that’s all I can really ask.Now on the other hand, the Lord—you could ask your question, Tom, about anything.Why pray?Because we end our prayer with, “Thy will be done.”Well, if it’s God’s will why doesn’t He just do it?

Tom:

That would leave us out of the mix, we wouldn’t learn anything, we wouldn’t understand anything, so we know that that’s for our sake, obviously it’s not for God’s sake.But Dave, what about a mother’s prayer for her children, I mean, just continually going before God?At least wouldn’t that bring the Holy Spirit in more conviction, more—as opposed to somebody who’s not even bringing them before the Lord, I don’t know.

Dave:

Tom, It’s a very complicated question because the we could say, But if God brings more conviction, then their judgment is going to be greater.

Tom:

I think that may be the case.When they stand before Him, if they refuse to accept the Lord and stand before Him at the great white throne judgment, they are going to have to live with that.

Dave:

That’s why God said at the time of the flood, “My Spirit shall not always strive with man.”In other words, there comes a point where God says, You would just be heaping more judgment upon yourself.The more I plead with you, the more you say No, the worse it gets, I’m going to just drop it.You can have what you want, this is what you want.And Tom, you know I often say that young people especially—look, if Satan has a better deal than God, follow Satan, that’s simple, that’s reasonable.If Satan really has a better deal than God, follow Satan.God is not trying to trick you, He’s not trying to sell you a bill of goods, He’s not trying to get you to take the worst side just to build Him up.No, who has the best deal, look at it carefully, and no one can blame God when they are in the lake of fire, because He has done everything that He could.Now, is that biblical?Well, if you read Isaiah 5, God asks the question in Isaiah chapter 5.Israel is His vine and His vineyard, the Bible says that, Israel is the vineyard of the Lord.And He says, I looked for good grapes and they are wild grapes, sour grapes.And then God asks the question:What more could I have done?I’d like to know what a Calvinist says about this scripture, as well as a few others.God said, What more could I have done to my vineyard that I haven’t done?Then why does it bring forth wild grapes?Now you can’t say—well, I could respond for the Calvinist, well, He could have given them irresistible grace, He could have predestined them to bear proper grapes.He could have done all kinds of things the Calvinists say He does for the elect, He could have elected them.No, that doesn’t enter into it, this is a question between man and God.God wants man to be saved, He’s not willing that any should perish.In fact, you remember, Tom, when I wrote, What Love Is This? there was a lot of criticism from Calvinists that, “Well, you’re misquoting Spurgeon and you are misquoting Arminius, and so forth.”Okay, so we redid the book, and I just put in more quotes.I have a quote in there, 1 Timothy chapter 2 verse 4, where it says, “He would have all mento come to the knowledge of truth to be saved.”And then I quote Spurgeon, Spurgeon says:“Just as you would want all people to be saved, and I would want all people to be saved, so God wants all people to be saved.”This is what Spurgeon said, you can’t read the Bible without coming to that conclusion, so now why are we praying for somebody to be saved if it’s already God’s will, we know God wants them to be saved, as you said Tom, very well, it exercises our heart.I think of a writer over 200—300 years ago, almost 300 years ago, well, he used various fictitious characters and one of them was a pastor who said, I have learned the infinite value of souls by appearing so often in God’s presence on their behalf.I think that was pretty well said.So, Lord, I’m showing you that I want this person to be saved, I know you want them to be saved, I’m just joining with You, do everything you can.Well, He did everything He could for Israel, and they still rebelled.But at least, their blood will be upon their own handsnot on God’s, they can’t blame Him.

Tom:

They will be without excuse, Dave.

Dave:

Right, and that’s a tragedy.Specifically responding to this question, which I think we did, but anyway, is it biblical?I couldn’t find a biblical example where someone prayed for someone’s salvation, but still, God wants everyone saved.I think it would still be biblical in a general way for me to say, Lord, do everything you can to bring this person to Christ.

Tom:

Dave, Paul prayed that an effective door would be opened.What for?Just so he could be more prosperous or this or that? So that the gospel would go forth so people would receive it.

Dave:

But that’s not the question.

Tom:

Is it biblical to pray for someone’s salvation?

Dave:

See, he’s talking about some specific individual.I can pray, Lord, help me to be more effective in my work and to see souls saved, but I’m not taking an individual and saying, Lord, I want you to save that person.