February 27, 2026

Discussion: Who Do You Pray For?

Matthew 5:43-48 The Living Bible

“There is a saying “Love your friends and hate your enemies.’ But I say: Love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you! In that way you will be acting as true sons and daughters of your Father in Heaven. For he gives His sunlight to both the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and unjust too. If you love only those who love you, what good is that? Even scoundrels do that much. If you are friendly only to your friends, how are you different from anyone else? Even the heathen do that. But you are to be perfect, even as your Father in Heaven is perfect.”

We are all called to pray for others, that is a commandment. This includes strangers that you may never meet or see again. Sometimes it is a a quick prayer. Sometimes it lasts for months or even years. Sometimes you don’t know the answer in your own lifetime.

I do and have done intercessory prayer, mostly for strangers that I see on the street or somebody I meet by chance.

Two years ago I was traveling by Amtrak up to Oregon to visit my sister. She had just moved there and was getting settled in. It is a beautiful ride with an observation roof on top. Beautiful scenery but after a day and a half of traveling it is tiring. I was traveling with my friend who wanted to see her son. I tried to get comfortable in the seat, and she was on the aisle with stuff spread out all over the place. I decided to get up and go to the deck and try to rest. It was nice and quiet, so I checked my email, etc while sitting there.

I got up a little later to get something to drink and as I was walking back, I noticed a young woman, around 30 or so, sitting and talking to herself quietly. I immediately felt Jesus saying, “Go and talk to her.”

I asked if I could sit with her and she said yes. She had some questions about the 10 commandments, especially about love and honoring your parents. She was confused about it and couldn’t understand why she had to honor her parents. It turns out that she had a fairly rough childhood. It seems that her birth parents gave her up when she was little and she was adopted. They treated her badly and then her birth parents decided to take her back and she was abused. I believe the court intervened, they sent her to a psychiatrist and they doped her up on antidepressants, etc. She was confused, tired and on her way to another court appointment.

We talked for a while about honor and love and how the 10 commandments worked. She had confused love with honor and she thought that she had to honor them no matter what. I sat and explained that even though your parents were not good people, you should still love them. BUT, you don’t have to honor their actions. I said that you don’t love a person who shoots someone and you don’t need to do honor them. But I also told her that she should still love them anyway but she doesn’t have to like them.

I actually ministered to her, that loving them is good and it gives you peace and closure with it and with comes forgiveness and then compassion. She already was a believer but very torn up inside and confused. We prayed about it, talked a little more. She understood and felt a lot better and less confused after that. She called me her Angel. I didn’t see her again after that.

This was one that was that had an immediate response.

Please share some of your prayers if you want here. We would love to hear them and be encouraged by them.