Let's clarify this.
1. A surgery is scheduled for 5:30 AM, and at 11:00 AM you are praying for 5:30AM surgery to go well.... AFTER the surgery is over.
For clarity, you are not praying for the RESULTS of the surgery to be good, or the for patient to RECOVER well... you are actually praying for the doctors to do a good job DURING the 5:30AM surgery, which is already over, and in the PAST by 5.5 hours.
2. I am not about to tell you what to do in your prayer life... you can certainly do whatever you like.
3. I can however point out biblical doctrine, and logic, for the other readers here.
4. There is NO biblical support that we can pray for PAST EVENTS.
5. Praying for PAST EVENTS, in order to CHANGE THEM, is NOT IN THE BIBLE.
6. If we were to get into the biblical doctrine, or the philosophy, which regards this kind of thing, it is all about God INTENTIONALLY CREATING and INTENTIONALLY PLACING US into LINEAR TIME.
The creation of linear time, and the act of placing us into linear time, were INTENTIONAL ACTS OF GOD.
7. In the same way God did not place you into a different model of space (like living in 12 spatial dimensions) God also did not place you into a different model of time.
God placed you into THIS model of space, and THIS model of time.
He placed you into a linear, temporal time for his reasons, and his purposes.
8. Nowhere in the Bible does God say you can BREAK OUT OF this model of TIME.
According to scripture, you are STUCK in this model of time, and there is no way to break out of it.
There is not even a way for your PRAYERS to break out of it.
You, your prayers, and everything you do, and everyone you know... are all STUCK in this model of linear time.
God made it this way.
He made it this way for his purposes.
9. Nowhere does God say you can pray for past events, and your prayer will effect them.
That's not in the bible.
It doesn't matter what TERMS you use, or what PHILOSOPHICAL EXPLANATION you use... it simply IS NOT IN THE BIBLE.
It's not in there.
YOU have no effect over the past.
That is contrary to EVERY SINGLE THING IN SCRIPTURE.
10. If you COULD pray for past events, and that would effect them, then almost nothing in life would be either REAL, or FINAL.... you could even pray people BACK OUT OF HELL... if retroactive prayer were possible.
The bible says man dies once, and then the judgment.
But if your version of retroactive prayer were possible in God's eyes... then we could very justly expect to pray people back out of hell after they've died.
Philosophically... if you could change the past, that would be to UNDO CAUSALITY.
This would undermine, and undo, the very fabric of existence.
If praying for past events could effect them, because God looks into the future, from the past, and sees our future prayers, and answers our future prayers back in the past... we'd have to apply this logic to EVERYTHING... and we'd quickly see it undoes all of scripture. It simply breaks everything in scripture.
- You could pray people back out of hell after they'd died.
- You could pray for that accident you had 20 years ago... that God would go back and undo it.
- We could all pray for our past relationships... that God would go back and keep our spouses from divorcing us, or boyfriends and girlfriends from breaking up.
- You could even go back and pray for your college transcripts... that God would make us study harder for that test 20 years ago, and change our grades.
IT'S ALL ABSURD!
* YOU certainly have the freedom to do whatever you like in your own prayer life.
* But if you're going to propose it here publicly, and it's something unbiblical, then I also have the freedom to examine it, and show how it doesn't fit with the bible.