“I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life. And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him. If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask, and God will give him life—to those who commit sins that do not lead to death. There is sin that leads to death; I do not say that one should pray for that. All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin that does not lead to death.”
(1 John 5:13-17)
The phrase, “according to the will of God” is open to various interpretations. But in the text above, there is a particular focus on John’s mind. He is describing one way we express our love for the children of God, who we must love if we love the Father. Therefore, we will want to do something for them, such as praying for them and having the confidence of receiving an answer because we will be asking according to God’s will.
But where does this confidence come from? As stated above; we who believe in the name of the Son of God, knowing that we have eternal life through the Son, and knowing that, we can have confidence before God concerning prayer (1 John 3:21-22). But John takes this idea even further and declares it as God’s will that we pray for the spiritual needs of others, especially the children of God.
John’s focus is on our spiritual health, which does not take away from the fact that God also meets our physical needs. Jesus said the Father knows we require food, drink, and clothes. But we are to seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness first, and all those things will be provided to us. (Matthew 6:31-34) This means we are to be more concerned with the spiritual welfare of our brothers and sisters in Christ, than their physical needs.
The two sins that John speaks of here are listed in Numbers 15:27-31; the intentional sin and the unintentional sin. John is simply saying that we are to pray concerning the mistakes that our brothers and sisters make in their lives. Of course, this means that we are to come alongside them, praying for and with them, knowing the Lord will forgive them.