3 Ways to Pray for
Those Who Persecute Us
1. Pray with
Forgiveness
“For if you forgive others
their offenses, your heavenly Father will forgive you as well. But if you don’t
forgive others, your Father will not forgive your offenses.” (Matthew 6:14-15)
Forgiving others allows
God to forgive us. Not doing so, means God won’t forgive us. When we pray with
forgiveness on our hearts, we beseech God to bless those who have offended us
instead of cursing them. When we forgive, we replace the malice in our hearts
with care with the person instead. While forgiveness is easy to discuss, the
feelings held after an offense has been made can be difficult to release. The
solution then is to ask God to support us in forgiving the person. The more we
can pray with forgiveness in our hearts, the more we can operate in the way
Jesus taught.
2. Pray with Love
“By this everyone will
know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” (John 13:35)
“If your enemy is hungry,
give him food to eat, and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink, for you
will heap burning coals on his head, and the Lord will reward you.” (Proverbs
25:21-22)
The worldly response to
persecution whether by means of violence or slander is to retaliate. Jesus
showed us on the cross how we can respond to our persecutors. When we pray for
our oppressors from a place of love, we seek their wellbeing, not their harm.
We can ask God to mold and shift their hearts instead of us trying to force
change.
3. Pray with Humility
“With all humility and
gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love” (Ephesiasn 4:2)
When we achieve
forgiveness and love in our prayers, we are putting on full display our
humility. This means we do not act or pray in a way that indicates God values
us any more or any less than the other person. Instead, we see the persecutor
as a child of God and ask God to bless them just as he blesses us.
The more we can see
everyone as being made in God’s image, the less we will see them as an enemy
(Genesis 1:26). Praying for others will be easier, and in turn, there may be
less persecution, at the very least from Christians.
A Prayer for Those Who
Persecute You
Lord Jesus, following Your
example and command, we pray for our enemies today. We ask first that You would
saturate our lives with the Holy Spirit’s power and might. Send Your love
flowing through us, and forgive us for holding on to anything that could hinder
our prayers. We release any unforgiveness, thoughts of revenge, or hateful
emotions that can quench Your Spirit in our hearts. Then give us wisdom as we
seek how to bless, to love, and to pray for our enemies.
We pray for you to bless
our enemies and to orchestrate events in their lives that will leave their
hearts exposed before you. As You characterized blessing in the Beatitudes, we
pray that You would give them a poverty of spirit that recognizes their deep
need for You. We pray they will discover Your comfort in times of mourning, and
they would be humbled before You—in Your way and Your time. We pray You would
show them mercy before it is too late—knowing we were all God’s enemies before
You extended mercy to us—and that they would, in turn, be merciful to others.
Knowing how you sometimes
use pain and difficulty to bring blessing to our lives, we pray the same for
our enemies. Use whatever means You need to soften stony hearts, open blind
eyes, and to help them realize their ultimate neediness for You. If necessary,
allow persecution in their own lives so they can experience Your blessing.
Speak to them in miraculous, supernatural ways if necessary, through a dream, a
movie, another believer, Your Word—or even through our own lives if we are ever
confronted. In some way, let them witness Your power and recognize that You are
the source. We pray for conviction, for an honest evaluation of their own
destiny, and for a sense of desperation if that’s what it takes for them to
consider Your claims and to discover Who You really are. Pursue them, even
allowing goodness to lead them to repentance. And give us patience and a deep
trust in You, Lord, even when we can’t see any change in our enemies. When we
waver, not wanting to pray for our enemies, help us to remember Your grace in
our own lives, and what we would be without You. Amen. (prayer by Rebecca
Barlow Jordan)
A Powerful Prayer for
Your Enemies
"Pray for those who
persecute you." Perhaps one of the hardest commands Jesus gives to us as
His disciples is to bless, love, and pray for our enemies. But how can you pray
for someone who wants to harm you? In ourselves, we can’t. But through the
power of God’s Spirit working through us, all things are possible. Through
Jesus, we can pray for our enemies. Here’s one way you might pray:
What Does the Bible Say
about 'Pray for Those Who Persecute You'
In the Old Testament, even
righteous people prayed for God to destroy their enemies in cruel ways. Their
prayers were not prayers of blessing. Proverbs and other passages talk about
how to treat our enemies in positive ways. But Jesus turned life upside down
with His command to bless, to love, and to pray for our enemies. While not
defining who our enemies were, in the Beatitudes Jesus described enemies as
those who mock us, persecute us, lie about us, or despitefully use us. And that
we were blessed if we experienced those things. He added that those who were not
for Him were against Him. Jesus taught a new way to live life: with love, not
hate. He encouraged us to recognize that the true enemy behind all wrongs is
Satan—and how to resist him. But regarding our earthly enemies, when we don’t
know how or what to pray for them, we can trust the Holy Spirit to pray through
us.
A Prayer for Your
Enemies
Lord Jesus, following Your
example and command, we pray for our enemies today. We ask first that You would
saturate our lives with the Holy Spirit’s power and might. Send Your love
flowing through us, and forgive us for holding on to anything that could hinder
our prayers. We release any unforgiveness, thoughts of revenge, or hateful
emotions that can quench Your Spirit in our hearts. Then give us wisdom as we
seek how to bless, to love, and to pray for our enemies.
We pray for you to bless
our enemies and to orchestrate events in their lives that will leave their
hearts exposed before you. As You characterized blessing in the Beatitudes, we
pray that You would give them a poverty of spirit that recognizes their deep
need for You. We pray they will discover Your comfort in times of mourning, and
they would be humbled before You—in Your way and Your time. We pray You would
show them mercy before it is too late—knowing we were all God’s enemies before
You extended mercy to us—and that they would, in turn, be merciful to others.
Lord, we pray that instead
of lusting for pure evil, they would hunger and thirst for Your purity and
righteousness, become advocates of Your justice and that their warring spirits
would be changed into peacemaking. Remove the façade of well-being; tear down
the lies that have deceived them; and hedge their ways until they can see no
way out but up. We pray You would show them the futility of what they are doing
because in opposing God’s kingdom and in their darkness, they are often
oblivious about the true reasons for their behavior and resulting consequences.
Reveal to them any deep hurts or traumas in their own lives that may be
contributing to their destructive actions.
Knowing how you sometimes
use pain and difficulty to bring blessing to our lives, we pray the same for
our enemies. Use whatever means You need to soften stony hearts, open blind
eyes, and to help them realize their ultimate neediness for You. If necessary,
allow persecution in their own lives so they can experience Your blessing.
Speak to them in miraculous, supernatural ways if necessary, through a dream, a
movie, another believer, Your Word—or even through our own lives if we are ever
confronted. In some way, let them witness Your power and recognize that You are
the source. We pray for conviction, for an honest evaluation of their own
destiny, and for a sense of desperation if that’s what it takes for them to
consider Your claims and to discover Who You really are. Pursue them, even
allowing goodness to lead them to repentance. And give us patience and a deep
trust in You, Lord, even when we can’t see any change in our enemies. When we
waver, not wanting to pray for our enemies, help us to remember Your grace in
our own lives, and what we would be without You.
Why Should We 'Pray for
Those Who Persecute You'
Why should we pray for our
enemies? Because Jesus did. He prayed for those who opposed Him, for those who
devised evil against Him, and ultimately as He hung on the Cross, Jesus prayed
for His Father to forgive all those who had a part in His death—because they
didn’t know what they were doing. Jesus modeled unconditional love and how we
should pray for our enemies, then commanded us to do the same.
Prayer is an amazing
discipline and privilege. What usually happens when we pray for anyone, is that
the prayer acts as a boomerang. God may or may not answer in the way we prayed,
but God often chooses to bless and change us as a result of our obedience to
pray. It’s hard to stay angry at someone for whom you earnestly pray. Prayer
also leaves the consequences, revenge, and complete justice to God. It’s a
transference of our will into God’s hands. By praying for our enemies, God’s
Spirit can supernaturally show love and kindness through us or another that may
ultimately change them. That process can also eradicate our fear of our enemies
because perfect love casts out fear. Jesus said not to be afraid of those who
could destroy us physically. Instead, we are to fear—a reverent attitude—the
One Who determines and fulfills our soul’s destiny.
7 Bible Verses that
Give Us Perspective about Praying for Our Enemies:
Proverbs 16:7 NASB, When a
man’s ways are pleasing to the Lord, He makes even his enemies to be at peace
with him.
Matthew 5:44 KJV, But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless
them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which
despitefully use you, and persecute you.
Luke 23:34 NIV, Jesus
said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”
Mark 11:25 NIV, “And when
you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive them, so that
your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.”
Romans 12:20-21 MSG, Our
Scriptures tell us that if you see your enemy hungry, go buy that person lunch,
or if he’s thirsty, get him a drink. Your generosity will surprise him with
goodness. Don’t let evil get the best of you; get the best of evil by doing
good.
1 Peter 3:9 TLB, Don’t
repay evil for evil. Don’t snap back at those who say unkind things about you.
Instead, pray for God’s help for them, for we are to be kind to others, and God
will bless us for it.
Proverbs 20:22 NLT, Don’t
say, “I will get even for this wrong.” Wait for the Lord to handle the matter.
To Jesus, every person
mattered. He came to show us the Father’s complete love, even while we were still
His “enemies.” And when He called us as His followers, He didn’t leave us
without a model. Knowing we would be mistreated and even persecuted for
belonging to and believing in Him, He commanded us to pray for our enemies.
When we do, God’s power is unleashed in them—and in us.
How Do We Pray for
Those Who Hurt Us?
When we can’t find the
words, we can lean on His. When we find them hard to get out because the pain
in our hearts clogs us, we can tell Him with authenticity that we want to love
people as He does.
How Do We Pray for
Those Who Hurt Us?
“But I say to you who hear,
love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you,
pray for those who persecute you" (Luke 6:27-28).
Jesus’ instruction to pray
for those who mistreat us can feel like an impossible task!
I knew a woman once who had
a very unfortunate interpretation of the task. She said, “Oh! I’ll pray for
them alright! I’ll pray that God will get ‘em! That He’ll make ‘em pay and make
them regret how they treated me!”
She missed the spirit of
the words a bit!
In Greek, the word used to
describe how we ought to pray is proseuchomai, which is a compound word coming
from two words meaning to ask/wish/pray and advantage/blessing/beside.
When we are told to “bless
those who curse us,” the word for bless is eulogeō (where we get our English
word eulogy) and means to speak well of.
So, Jesus tells us to do
good, speak good about, and pray good things for those who have hurt us
emotionally (hate), relationally (they cursed or spoke badly of us), and
physically/literally (mistreat).
In Greek, the word for good
is kalōs and is usually translated as good, but can also be translated as:
Beautifully, commendably, correctly.
What Does it Mean to 'Pray
for Those Who Persecute You'?
While it is good to unpack
these instructions from Jesus, sometimes we just hurt so much we can’t even
find the words to pray or speak well of someone, let alone find a way to do
good to them.
This is where we find a
treasure already prepared for us in God’s Word, by praying His own words back
to Him.
The practice of rephrasing
Scripture into our own prayers, or letting it guide our hearts in prayer, is
very powerful in every aspect of our lives.
Praying blessings over
people can be especially hard and the Lord’s word will carry us in this task.
For example, this is the
Aaronic blessing from Numbers:
The Lord bless you, and
keep you; The Lord make His face shine on you, And be gracious to you; The Lord
lift up His countenance on you, And give you peace (Numbers 6:24-26)
Those words of blessing can
be fashioned into a prayer where we ask God to bless the person who hurt us, to
keep them, to be gracious to them, and give them peace.
Scripture is full of
blessings, and we can use God’s own words to shape our prayer to Him. When we
can’t find the words, we can lean on His.
And when we find them hard
to choke out because the pain in our hearts clogs us, we can tell Him with
authenticity that we want to do His will and we want to love people as He does.
We can confess that we know
He loves them in this way (the blessing in His Word) but that our heart is full
of hurt and we are struggling to agree with Him over it.
We can admit that we need
to grow in His sacrificial love and ask Him to carry us until our hearts
reflect just Him and His perfect love, instead of our pain and shortcomings.
Jesus tells us this is a
form of sacrificial love for our enemies. He goes on to say:
But love your enemies, and
do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great,
and you will be sons of the Most High; for He Himself is kind to ungrateful and
evil men. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful (Luke 6:35-36).
As we follow Jesus’ words,
we “will be sons of the Most High.” There is a promise that as we seek to love
people unconditionally and to do good to them even when they wrong us, it is
like wearing our crowns out loud!
It reveals whose kid we are
— the King’s child! No wrong done to us can take that from us and the more pure
and true we live out that love, the more we reflect our Father.
Paul continues to urge
believers in a similar call, again with the promise that this is how we show
that we are God’s children:
Do all things without
grumbling or disputing; so that you will prove yourselves to be blameless and
innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse
generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world… (Philippians 2:14-15).
How to be Imitators of
Christ: Pray for Those Who Persecute You
If we are living without
grumbling against one another, but seeking to be lights, it isn’t a leap of
faith in what Paul refers to the kind of relationship or interactions Jesus was
speaking about.
Those moments when the
frustration or hurt just bubbles inside us so strong it’s hard to keep it from
pouring out our mouths too! Yet it is in those very moments that we prove
whether we are just like the world or whether we are like God.
Paul adds in his letter to
the Ephesians:
Therefore be imitators of
God, as beloved children; and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and
gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma
(Ephesians 5:1-2).
Christ gave Himself up so
that people, broken by sin, could come to God in freedom and forgiveness. We
are called to this same sacrifice and purpose. Thankfully, Christ has done the
work for all of us, you and the person who hurt you.
What Should We Learn from
Jesus' Call to Love Our Enemies?
It is now our privilege to
walk in His finished work. And one of the sweetest ways we can do that is
through praying for those who have hurt us.
One of the most powerful
things I have personally found about praying for those who have hurt me is that
it is just between me and God.
Sometimes, a relationship
is so toxic that trying to do something good for them or even interacting with
them at all gets twisted beyond our ability to act “beautifully, commendably,
or correctly” but we can always pray for them.
God doesn’t usually ask us
to revisit physically dangerous people or situations (however there are
powerful testimonies of people who have been called to that, so we don’t want
to put God in any kind of box and miss out on following Him where He would call
us), but there is never a time we can’t ask God’s blessing on them. It might
not be easy. But it promises the great reward of showing us to be God’s
children!
