When do You Give Up?

Let's have your opinions on a religious issue.

Imagine you know someone whose behavior is truly vile. Let's say this is someone who has had ample--even exceptional--opportunity to turn to God. And you keep this person in your prayers for years. And it doesn't seem to help, probably because free will is a barrier even God will not breach.

The Apostle Paul referred to abandoning unrepentant people to Satan for the destruction of the flesh. It sounds like he meant he gave up praying for them, in order that they might suffer and be motivated to change. Does that make sense? Do you ever give up praying? Maybe it's okay to stop, because prayer takes time, and you can overload yourself, and time from which one person will not profit can be given to another person who will change. It just seems a little odd, refraining from praying for someone, in order to help them. And helping was part of Paul's motivation.

As a Christian, you want to see miserable, hate-filled people change. And Jesus encouraged people to be persistent in prayer. But eventually, you want to move on!

It seems to me that the danger of giving up on a hateful and unpleasant person is that you may be depriving that person of the help of the only human being who cares at all. People like that live in loneliness, darkness, complete cynicism, bitterness, spite, and envy. Other people can't stand them and feel contempt for them. They remove them from their lives. Seems to me that a person like that is better off being the subject of prayers uttered purely out of obligation than no prayers at all.

More

I guess I should have read up before asking. It looks like Paul was referring to driving people out of churches. One example was a Christian who had a sexual relationship with his father's wife. This person presumably had to be cut loose for the good of the church, where he had somehow managed to find approval and encouragement. And I think Paul was talking about an official act, performed by the assembled church.

Maybe an individual should never completely give up, although I can certainly understand expelling God-hating, continually offensive people from your life.