The difference, and it is definitive, is that our friends are alive and benefit themselves from their prayers for us, whereas the various intermediaries and dead saints are all stone cold compost.
Deuteronomy 18:11, 1 Samuel 28:1-25, 1 Chronicles 10:13-14 and Isaiah 8:19 all speak against praying to the dead.
Repent of it.
For such an high priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens; Who needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for the people's: for this he did once, when he offered up himself." -- Hebrews 7:25-27"Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them.
"...whereas the various intermediaries and dead saints are all stone cold compost."
Its a shame you believe that. By the way, I thought you and I had agreed not to ping each other. Perhaps I was mistaken. Please in the future refrain from contacting me. You alone, of all the Calvinists here, I have nothing to say to nor do I care to hear from you.