Possible to help someone who doesn't want help?

Typically it seems that you can't help someone who isn't looking for help, such as an addict who doesn't believe they have a problem, why would they want help? I don't think that means we shouldn't try though. Just be realistic and patient.

The sad reality is that unless a person is asking for help, rarely will they accept help.

Typically speaking, you can't help someone that doesn't need help.
Like Jesus said, he didn't come to help God's people, he's here for the sinners.

The person needs to understand they have issues, otherwise, you are just spinning your tires.

It gets more difficult by the day as well because people assume they have all the answers.
Tell them anything other than what they know will simply result in them rejecting you further.

Possible to help someone who doesn't want help?

Jesus is also limited to those who ask him, that is why he stands at the "door" and knocks.

Our ability to be interested in Jesus is a result of God working in us.

John 6:44 No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.

However, it is our thirst for truth that brings us to seek Jesus.

John 18:37 Pilate therefore said unto him, Art thou a king then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice.

We are all too often motivated to to do and say things in order make someone change. This is manipulation even if the motives are sincere.

We can and should pray. Even though logic and reason can seldom broach the human heart, the power of God can overcome any obstacle.

Peter in writing to those who were about to undergo great persecution told people to "be ready".

1 Peter 3:15 But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:

Our job is to be ready and be in prayer. God will draw those he chooses to those who are ready.

Lightsped said:

Besides praying, is it possible to help someone who doesn't want to be helped? Possible problems include negative peer pressure, finanicial, trying to fit in, non-believers, etc.... Can these people be helped if they are not interested?

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Short answer, no.
They're living in a situation that an outsider see's as something they need to be saved from. But if that one living it doesn't see it we can't open their eyes to it.
They're living their life. Live yours.

Are you truly helping someone that doesn't want it? If they don't want it they won't take it. And what is it that makes us think they need help in the first place? Our perception of their living their reality. Through their emotions and understanding of how it goes.
When they don't want our help how can we help them out of their choice to stay where they're at?

How can we help them out when they want to stay in?

Would they accept prayer if they don't accept help?

Yes. jesus said if you not welcome in a house to shake the dust off your feet. Someone else could need help and be better off rather than you wasting time helping someone who doesnt even want help.

Not sure what you mean by 'helping' i would think you mean helping them hear the gospel so that they can have God help them 24/7.

Lightsped said:

Besides praying, is it possible to help someone who doesn't want to be helped? Possible problems include negative peer pressure, finanicial, trying to fit in, non-believers, etc.... Can these people be helped if they are not interested?

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No.
Dynamics of discussions on CF will prove this.

none of us responded to the first offer of spiritual help we received from God through a Christian; there were many people in each of our lives that we refused help from. each one however brought us a little closer to Truth; it's likely that most of the people that you feel led to minister to will reject you on some level, but then none of us is the Savior; none of us have complete understanding of God, so that's understandable. God may want to say something to this person that He knows you can say clearly (and it may be something that you yourself don't know 'intellectually'; He always teaches the minister, as He teaches the one ministered to); and if you give up and resist His leading to continue to spend time with this person, it may delay the time in their life that they come to know God, and delay the time in your life that you receive that truth yourself.

but there's something you haven't shared; what help are they refusing? i was raised in a traditional church and learned some things about God that i later found out weren't true because they conflicted with scripture; i was outright unsuccessful trying to help someone else understand the error i had been taught; so maybe your efforts are not producing fruit because the help you want them to receive is somehow based in error.

and of course there's the faith question: how do you know that you aren't helping them? are you judging by what you can 'see' with your 5 senses? if God led you to try and help them, then trust Him to know when to lead you to stop.

Can you convince someone where they are is not where they need to be?

I knew a woman that was in a really bad marriage. Really bad. One day she called seeking council and when she was finished telling me all her troubles, the plight she was in, what he was doing to her, I took each part of her quandary and offered a solution for it.
With each solution I offered, she retorted with why she wasn't able to go there. Each and every time.

She was seeking advice and then giving details about why she couldn't see herself taking the steps to remove herself from the dire situation that caused her to ask for it. Because to change her life in steps was too much for her to do. She was comfortable where she was. She was calling so as to hear someone tell her there was something better out there that was possible.
But at that moment she wasn't ready to work toward it. She instead gave reasons why she should stay where she was.

You can't bring someone out of that mind space. They're living it personally.
In her case her husband was threatening her physically. Not hitting her but threatening to harm her. Verbally abusing her. Cutting her self esteem down. She was experiencing his words and all those emotions that they conjured inside her. And yet when there was a way out she was using her own words to tell herself why she had to stay and endure.

When we give someone advice like that we're telling them what we'd do in their situation.
We're coming from a place where we respond to what they tell us they're suffering. And when that is repellent to us we express what we'd do to get out of it. But that's not who they are. They are the one's living what they're experiencing and enduring with the emotional tools they have at their personal disposal. They can't relate to our sense of self preservation because it is ours not theirs.

Maybe picture it like this. Someone comes to you and starts speaking in a language you don't understand. You reply in your native tongue which is something they don't understand.
And then you expect them to do what you said.

It is possible that your help will not be appreciated and considered as a help, when you are giving it to somebody, who does not ask for it, or who does not want it. It is like sending a spam email to a person, who has not asked for it. Help is precious, so do not give it to someone, who does not appreciate it.

Lightsped said:

Besides praying, is it possible to help someone who doesn't want to be helped? Possible problems include negative peer pressure, finanicial, trying to fit in, non-believers, etc.... Can these people be helped if they are not interested?

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Without knowing more detail it is hard to say if or how you can help this person.

If they have been offered and refused a particular type of help recently then this door is closed for now.

As someone mentioned above though, you may have helped already and not know it. I think it is often the simplest of things remembered later which can be of help to someone when they need it most.

It s possible your way of helping is not working so you should stop doing it and let someone else help if they need it. Dont be a [bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse].

Well my name says it all.... nothing is impossible with God... however with that said some people as they get older are to set in their ways. Thats why when you marry don't expect to change the person (not that you should want to anyways). Helping someone is all dependent on them actually wanting the help. God can open their hearts to it. But if they refuse even Him then not much you can do besides pray for them.