"I urge you, first of all, to pray for all people. Ask God to help them; intercede on their behalf, and give thanks for them." (1 Tim 2:1, NLT) Prayer is not just a weapon of warfare, it is also an instrument of peace. With prayer, we can bring peace among warring nations, establish common ground where disparity abound. We can bring down the power of God to protect, secure and safeguard. We can enthrone morality in a society ridden with evil and decay. With prayer we can become harbingers of positive change, turn the heart of a wicked government, restore peace in the Middle East, bring aboout global harmony... We can do that much good by simply praying. The problem we are having as Christian is we are not truly tapping into the power of praying. We usually use our prayer as a weapon of destruction: fighting our "supposed" enemies, raining fire and brimstone on all people opposing our progress and welfare. But the scriptures seem to have a completely different view about prayer. First Jesus says "Bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you" (Luke 6:28). And again Paul tells Timothy: "... to pray FOR all people". This is not a suggestion, it is a commandment. We are to pray for everyone. We are to pray for the Muslim, the Buddhist, the Witch, the Satanist, the evil tyrant... we are to pray for everyone. We do not get to choose who we may pray or not pray for. The divine injunction for prayer is to do it for everyone. .
God is wiser than all. And the foolishness of God is wiser than our highest wisdom. It may seem foolish and naive to pray for people who are obviously against us, but we achieve more and frustrate the devil when we realize that those people are God's lovely creation under the manipulation of satan. We are to pray and frustrate the work of the devil, and be able to save the sinner whom the devil is using. Unless, we can use our power as Christian to change lives and bring about good, we are no better than the witch, the Islamic Jihadist or the vindictive criminal. We have to be better! We have to pray for everyone.