Pray for me, please remember me in your prayers
For as long as I can remember I have heard people request others to pray for them. Coming from a Christian background, I often heard my relatives say, ‘pray for me, remember me in your prayers’. Some of my relatives got more such requests, as I overheard others say that the prayers made by these select relatives were very powerful. Whatever they would pray for, they would get. Over the course of time I learned it was not just a Christian custom but that people from various religions and cultures requested others to intercede with God on their behalf.
Even when I was child, the practice of ‘praying for others’ did not resonate with me, but I did not understand why. However, I could not help wondering why some people’s prayers were more powerful than others. What special status did they have with the Divine so that their prayers would be answered? When things get really tough, if I get more people to pray for me, like 50 or 100 – will it help? Why did some people not get helped by God in spite of being remembered in other’s prayers?
Things became much clearer after coming in touch with SSRF and the teachings of His Holiness Dr Athavale. While we have a whole article demystifying the concept of prayer, here are a few things I now keep in mind in relation to someone asking me to pray from them.
- Major life events happen to us because of the destiny we are born with. The negative events in life usually prompt us to pray for a certain outcome, however the final outcome is usually fixed as per our destiny. For over 90% of the world’s population, prayers do not affect the outcome. The outcome of major events in life is mostly fixed as per one’s destiny.
- If an average person prays and his wish is granted, it mostly means that it was in his destiny to get that result in the first place.
- The efficacy of prayer increases with spiritual level. The paradox is that at a lower spiritual level, people pray for things to happen even though their prayers are not spiritually powerful enough to manipulate the outcome. At a higher spiritual level (beyond the spiritual level of 60%), one’s prayers can affect an outcome. However, seekers at this spiritual level do not feel like asking God for something worldly. Also there is increased acceptance of life situations as one’s destiny and God’s will. Hence one refrains from praying to manipulate the outcome of situations.
- At a lower spiritual level, one asks for worldly and emotional things, thus reinforcing the belief that Maya (or the Great illusion) is reality. By praying for things in Maya, one continues to be stuck in Maya. At a higher spiritual level, one prays only for spiritual growth or reducing obstacles in spiritual practice so that one can progress closer to God and come out of Maya and the cycle of birth and death.
- Prayers with expectation for some material gain or emotional outcome have no value for spiritual progress. However, they may help to create faith in a person which is important for spiritual growth. On the other hand, if it does not get answered people may feel disappointed and give up on prayer or on any form of spiritual practice. Some people even get angry with God incorrectly holding Him responsible for their woes.
- The only thing that can erase negative destined events or minimise their impact in our lives is spiritual practice. SSRF has clearly enunciated 8 steps in spiritual practice that can provide seekers with faster spiritual growth.
While the above is okay in theory, it can be difficult to remember during tough times and even more difficult to put into practice, even for a seasoned seeker. When the status quo of things that we hold dear are changed, the urge to pray to God and ask others to join us in prayers for a specific outcome is tempting. When people are desperate, they pull out all the stops. Apart from traditional problem solving methods made available by modern science, they resort to not so traditional methods. From consulting astrologers to psychics, performing some rituals through priests or tantriks, indulging in black magic, and asking people “pray for me”, they will try anything to influence the outcome of a situation according to their desire.
However, falling back on my own experience and listening to the experiences of hundreds of co-seekers, the faith that God knows what is best for me and my spiritual progress has become firmer in my mind. Accordingly, my need to accept life situations as my spiritual practice has gained importance. Finally, as per the Path of devotion everything happens as per God’s wish; I can only do my best in a situation and leave the result up to God.
Having understood the points mentioned above at an intellectual level and having experienced them through various incidents in my life, I would often find myself in a predicament as to how to respond when others asked me to pray for them, especially when those prayer requests asked for a material outcome. So I decided to bite the bullet and tell my relatives and friends how my view of the world has changed after listening to a Spiritual Authority and Guide and experiencing the science behind prayer. Sometimes I would get a blank look or hear silence at the other end of the line and sometimes there would be genuine interest as to how prayer can or cannot influence destiny. Word got around about my views and slowly the prayer requests reduced. Yet for the odd few requests which still come my way, I say to them that they alone are their best help. By chanting the Name of God they could protect themselves from adverse destiny. When we start spiritual practice, God takes care of our needs to grow spiritually.
Learn more about Prayer with and Without Expectation
Please pray for my deliverance from powers of witchcraft and generational curses and stand with me in prayer as i petition the heavenly Father to
fulfill His promise to me 12 years ago.
Yours in Christ,
Nicholas Ng’ang’a
GlobalNet Prayer International
P.O Box 3305
Nakuru
Kenya
Email:
Dear Nicholas,
WE understand your struggle.
As it is shared in the blog, we do not do prayers for others. For spiritual problems, only spiritual solution is applicable, but person needs to do it alone.
We would suggest you to start spiritual practice like it is shared in the blog itself.
Sincerely,
SSRF team
Prayer for me to grow spiritual in God and to do his will day & night
help me with everything u can do for to remind in God forever. …
Dear Poster,
THe best would be if you can start spiritual practice. We suggest you to start from what is shared in the article ‘Start your spiritual journey’ by clicking here.
When we implement chanting the name of God shared there, our spiritual development can start more and with chanting we are reminded of God all the time 🙂
Sincerely,
SSRF team
Please pray that my family be reunited. Please mend ks and EF broken relationship and bring them back as one.make peace and happiness between. I pray ks is healed mentally and I pray he can forgive.draw him closer to our lord and I pray he stop living a life of sin.return him to EF on Jesus name amen
Dear Elysia,
Sometimes others need to go through their destiny and when this happens mostly we cannot do anything about it. If we can accept situation with stable mind (peacefully) it would be most beneficial and this happens naturally with spiritual growth.
The best help we can give others is to share with them that they start to pray and do spiritual practice, then they will experience benefit themselves.
Sincerely,
SSRF team
please bless me god. Someone torturing me he is so strong he made my life miserable please god please help me i want to get rid of that enemy in my life. Please bless me and punish him. He always look at me with evil eyes please bless me.
Dear Reddy,
Welcome to SSRF.
To overcome any problems caused by negative energies, including evil eye, it is necessary to do regular spiritual practice. Please see some inspiring suggestions on how to start spiritual practice in this article.
We would warmly suggest you to please write us via our login facility, our seekers will gladly give you more suggestions and help you overcome your difficulties.
Warm regards,
SSRF team
please pray for me to be able to become financially independent , so I can move from homelessness to a home roof water and electricity I am not looking for a mansion just were I can lay my head in a safe place, and a healing as I have AVN of the hips and use a crutches to walk
I thank you all .
Dear Louis, we are sorry to hear about your troubles and hopefully, we can be of assistance. During these current times, many people are facing various problems, difficult life situation. We can help ourselves with a regular spiritual practice that will protect us and make spiritual progress. Please see this article that shows how to begin.
https://www.spiritualresearchfoundation.org/spiritual-practice/steps-of-spiritual-practice/spiritual-journey/
Feel free to send us any questions on log in section and let us know your experience after chanting for few days.
Warm Regards
SSRF Team
Remember me your duas reply in english
Dear Nasreen, AS you may have read in the blog, what helps most is our personal, individual prayers. You will find more information about prayers here,https://www.spiritualresearchfoundation.org/spiritual-practice/prayer/pray-with-expectation/
Warm Regards
SSRF Team
Thank you for this insight.it is better to pray for oneself as you do spiritual practice…these days there are so many imposters who cheat you about your situation and they manipulate you seriously….so its better to study and pray for yourself
Dear Kariuki, We are grateful that you find this information useful. The article on Prayer on SSRF website shares more about this, you will find it useful,
https://www.spiritualresearchfoundation.org/spiritual-practice/prayer/
Warm regards
SSRF Team