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Any plea directed to Jesus for anyone else is intercession (not intervention). So Martha and Mary did intecede, same as Jairus interceded for his daughter. I know that in the raising of Lazarus Jesus deliberately tarried, for the purpose plainly explained in John 11:15. The point remains, however, that in most if not all miracle episodes, including this one, an expression of faith often involving a physical effort on the part of someone pleading to Jesus, is made. That illustrates that God allows people to act on their free will even though He surely does not lack power to override it.

no evidence Lazarus "earned somehow Jesus' friendship"

He was a friend (John 11:11) without doing anything?

You have again wandered far afield from the original issue on the table. Does a man possess the “unaided self-will to decide what moral choices he makes, uninfluenced and unguided?”

We contend that any decision which is foreknown is fixed in history to have a specific outcome. Since God’s knowledge is “pre” that decision, all decisions are fixed even if you “feel” free to make them. Your perception is not at issue. What a human feels is not what is necessarily the real situation.

In Peter’s case, he did not feel any “hand” guiding him to deny Christ, yet, right on cue, he did the deed. It felt like this was all his own will, his own choice. But, Jesus was clear, He knew what Peter was going to “choose” because being God, He knew all things, past and present. You argue that this gave Peter utter freedom to deny or not deny. We argue that Peter was not free to not deny. By extension this is the situation of every man.

Just as Paul lamented that he was not free to choose that which was good over that which he hated. You mangle this into, “Well, then Paul could have had a chance to think about choosing what he might have had to choose if he really thought about what he might want to think about.” Huh? Speak english, Annalex.

So Martha and Mary did intecede

The facts presented in John 11 do not support your contention that Jesus acted because Mary and Martha asked Him to. Lazarus was Jesus' friend. One way or another, He would go to him.

The point of the event was how and why Jesus went to him. Jesus waited purposely until Lazarus was dead. If Jesus wanted to simply acquiesce to the requests of Martha and Mary, He would have left right away and not tarried so long that Lazarus died. The verse you quickly glossed over tells us why...

"And I am glad for your sakes that I was not there, to the intent ye may believe; nevertheless let us go unto him." -- John 11:15

Jesus had healed the sick and fed the multitude. He now would raise a dead man back to life in order that His friends would believe He was God. You miss the heart of the Gospel if you think this episode occurred in order to show us the result of "a physical effort of the part of someone pleading to Jesus."

Lazarus is raised from the dead not because of an "expression of faith" by any believer, but because a man's rebirth is the predetermined intent and purpose of God alone who breathes life into dead and fallen sinners.