Pray Network Forum

A couple of weeks ago I attended a board retreat for Keep Believing Ministries headed up by Dr. Ray Pritchard. It was a weekend packed with overviews of the ministry, games, good food, great conversation and prayer.

          During our last night together, Peter Faulkner, the Foundation Relations Manager at the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and board member of KBM, was tasked with leading the evening prayer meeting. The room was filled with a variety of church and business leaders, lawyers, artists, and moms.

          Peter began the meeting by relaying a conversation he had with a friend who asked him if God couldn’t hear our prayers if our eyes were open. He said that it really struck him as a truth that he hadn’t spent much time considering. Peter said that just because we have always done something one way … doesn’t mean that it is how it has to be done.

          Typically in a prayer meeting, we go around the room and list our prayer requests, we close our eyes … then try to remember everything that everyone asked us to pray about … then wonder if it is our turn yet … and wonder if our prayers are too long … or too short …

          Peter asked us if God missed what we said the first time. Wasn’t He with us all along? He suggested that we try something new and then he challenged us to go around the room and as we shared our prayer requests, to actually pray those requests … out loud … to God … with our eyes open.

          One by one we offered up our own prayer requests to our heavenly Father who knows our hearts and delights in the time we spend with Him. It was beautiful, and intimate, and no prayers were missed or forgotten. Some of the most seasoned among us let their tears flow while laying out their petitions before the Lord and before all of us.

          I don’t think that I want to go back to the old way of group prayer and I don’t think it matters much to God if our eyes are open or closed. I think He hears us just fine.

Kathryn McBride

www.KathrynMcBride.com

It turned out that Jimmy was suicidal.

Our youth staff team met with him after he had attended an outreach event we hosted at his high school. He later came to Christ, but his emotional, mental, and spiritual challenges were frankly, overwhelming to us at times.

I remember that on one occasion we all entered into a time of focused prayer for Jimmy. We listened to each other pray for him and in that concentrated time we also listened to what the Holy Spirit was saying to us individually and as a team.

In the months after that concentrated prayer time for Jimmy, we were able to involve him in a Friday night Bible study at the home of a dedicated Christian family. They took him under their wing, in addition to the time investment our team was giving to him.

In the years that followed, he became established in his faith and identity; even his outward appearance and expressions became more positive. He finished college, met a wonderful Christian girl, and now is married and is a new father. Of course, he was prayed for many times throughout the years. But looking back, the deep, concentrated time of group prayer we had for him turned out to be powerful!

We all know how effective prayer is, and we have often seen the miracles of prayer expressed in various ways and forms. As E.M. Bounds wrote, “Prayer is of transcendent importance, for it is the mightiest agent to advance God’s work…only praying hearts and hands do God’s work…prayer succeeds when all else fails. Prayer has won great victories and has rescued, with notable triumph God’s saints when every other hope was gone.”

Prayer in your network

Most youth worker meetings include a time of prayer. More than likely, these occur at the end of a meeting and include quick prayer requests and quick prayers. Although this is often the norm, what I am excited about is the effectiveness and power that happens when we enter into deep and concentrated group prayer.

This form of praying is actually linked to having a deep and personal conversation with God. As in a conversation with friends and family, it includes listening and expressing and sometimes exhausting a topic before moving on to another.

As we enter into focused, concentrated group prayer it is good to quiet our hearts with a time of silence and confession. We are then much more sensitive to pray under the direction and in alignment with the Holy Spirit.

I love the passage in Romans 8:26-27, “The Holy Spirit helps us in our distress. For we don’t even know what we should pray for, nor how we should pray. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that can not be expressed in words. And the Father who knows all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit pleads for us believers in harmony with God’s own will.”

Not surprisingly, the Holy Spirit gives us impressions, thoughts, and specific verses about how to pray for someone or something specifically.

I remember one time praying with a mother about her daughter’s lack of Christian friends. Her daughter often felt alone and alienated at her high school. During our concentrated time of prayer together, I felt the Holy Spirit impressing me to pray that her daughter, Lisa would want to go on an overseas project that we were leading that year. After the prayer time with my friend, I invited Lisa to go with us. Through the project training times and the actual overseas experience Lisa made lasting friends with several other students on the project. They are still friends 10 years later!

Listening carefully to what others say in prayer along with the impressions of the Holy Spirit makes us much more sensitive in expressing our own thoughts and prayers. We can agree with others about what they pray, or share a pertinent Scripture, because we are involved in a conversation.

Making it work in your schedule

The main hindrance to this very effective way of praying is time. As a society and as youth workers, we often are pressured by time constraints. One suggestion is to divide the group up into smaller groups, with each group taking just one or two requests. That way, you can pray more effectively and all concerns can be covered. Sometimes, the request is so important or life-threatening that the entire prayer time needs to be devoted to it.

I think the early apostles might have used this focused, concentrated style of prayer. In Acts 4 it says “After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.”

How I would love to see our prayer times become truly revolutionary- then we couldn’t wait to pray and trust God to work. Shake us up Lord!

I have a secret to confess. It's been over 30 years, and I have to come out of the closet – or at least out from behind the couch. I was 6 years old, and one night after my mom herded me off to bed, I crept back down the stairs, and hid behind the couch in our family room. Just out of her line of site, like a moth to a flame I was pulled into one of 1966's most innovative TV programs. I watched with wide eyes as Gene Roddenberry's “Wagon train to the stars” told the story of the Enterprise and its five year mission to go where no man has gone before. Yes – I have to come clean – I am a closet Trekkie.

This is no surprise to my wife or kids. When the Next Generation, Deep Space Nine and Voyager spinoffs hit the airwaves, I remember pulling my kids onto my lap, and along with a bowl of popcorn, we watched Captain Picard continue the mission that my childhood heroes Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock began. The names had changed but the story was the same. Men, women and aliens banded together to face the unknown, out-gun old enemies and out-smart new ones. For those who are wondering . . . yes . . . we even attended a Star Trek convention or two.

One of my favorite episodes in that original series featured displaced society adrift in a hollow, round spaceship. War had left their planet uninhabitable, so their society's leaders built a 'world' inside a space-going ball. The catch was that the citizens believed that they were on a planet. an artificial 'sun' rose and set, and the entire world was designed to replicate home. After three generations drifting through space, their outside-in spaceship was the only world they'd ever known.

The episode's conflict because the spaceship was off course, and drifted toward an inhabited planet where it would crash and create galactic destruction. As the story raced toward it's climax, Kirk and his cohorts faced the challenge of convincing the inhabitants that they were on a space ship, not a planet. The Federation heroes had to help the helpless, and convince the society that what they believed was wrong, and what they experienced on a daily basis isn't real. There was a larger world outside of themselves. They had to change their reference point, and accept a new reality based on truth which resided outside of their experience, or face certain doom.

A minor character from this show intrigues me yet today. An old man, an outcast that most of the characters considered crazy was written into a brief scene. As Kirk, Spock and the boys tried to convince the society of their need to shed their wrong beliefs, this old man crept out of the shadows and spoke forbidden words.

“I believe you. I know we're not on a real planet. . . For the world is hollow, and I have touched the sky.”

A prayer ministry is built from the same conviction. This world is hollow, and we can touch the sky. We can touch Heaven with our prayers and connect with a new Reality which resides outside ourselves. When we do, we discover God's perspective. When I am affected by His point of view, my world can . . . and must change, and I can no longer stay the same.

The world is hollow, and we can touch the Sky. We don't have to settle for the world as it is, and Jesus calls us to go out into the world and work to bring about change. We are to make disciples, feed and clothe the poor, heal the sick, and see God change lives one at a time. It starts with prayer, because God's power must first work in my life, before I will grow to a place where He can work through me.

If your small group would like to learn more about prayer, and making deep, life changing prayer a part of the culture, contact Tim Burns and the Outlet Prayer Ministry at Kentwood Community Church, Grand Rapids, MI (http://www.kentwoodcommunitychurch.com/opmblog) We can help you with resources and ideas on how to encourage your congregation or small group to set an intentional time to pray together for your church, neighborhood, church, and state. As a group you will grow closer together, and individually God will work in your heart and life as He draws you closer to Himself.

For the world is hollow - join me - let's touch the Sky.

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10-3 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Tragedy – Don Jacobson

For Don Jacobson a tragic gun accident altered his walk with God …as well as his goals in life. He shares his story on today’s Lighthouse Report. (Don shown with wife Brenda)

10-4 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Life-Change – Nicole Bromley

Seeing people respond to the gospel really is exciting … and as Nicole Bromley explains … she’s seen lives transformed, firsthand.

10-5 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Loss– Abby Rike

For Biggest Loser contestant Abby Rike losing her entire family in a car accident was absolutely devastating. But …her whole outlook changed when she realized God could use her tragic story to bring healing to others. Listen as she tells us how on today’s Lighthouse Report.

10-6 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Prayers Answered– Lee Strobel

How have you seen prayers answered in your life? Lee Strobel joins Steve Douglass on today’s Lighthouse Report to share a story about prayer.

10-7 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Fathers – Kenny Luck

Fatherhood … it’s an important role that God (as our heavenly father) models for us. On today’s Lighthouse Report, Kenny Luck, of Saddleback Church discusses what he’s seen.

10-10 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Remain Active – Art Rorheim

No matter where we are in life … “being active” for the Lord should be our main goal. AWANA Founder Art Rorheim joins us today on the Lighthouse Report to give us some encouragement.

10-11 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Life’s Obstacles– Wendy Blight

You know, it seems we’re all too busy. But what about the mission field all around us -right in our own neighborhood? Wendy Blight has some thoughts about that on today’s Lighthouse Report.

10-12 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Adversity – Chris Fabry

Imagine leaving your home … and all your possessions behind due to illness. Well, that’s exactly what happened to Chris Fabry and his family. Hear their amazing story … and how God carried them through it on today’s Lighthouse Report.

10-13 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Conversation – Charles Stanley

Maintaining conversation with God is crucial to our spiritual growth. On today’s Lighthouse Report, Charles Stanley describes the correlation between prayer and our relationship with Christ.

10-14 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Life Lessons – Ryan Rush

Ryan Rush experienced a number of life lessons resulting from his daughter's many illnesses. He shares his personal journey on today’s Lighthouse Report.

10-17 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Purpose, Passion, Service – John Tesh

Are you passionate about making a difference for Christ in the world? Or apathetic? John Tesh challenges us on today's Lighthouse Report to find our personal ministry.

10-18 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Struggles – Terri Blackstock

Sometimes, as parents, we go through some pretty dark times. But through Christ, there's light at the end of the tunnel. Today on the Lighthouse Report, Terri Blackstock talks about her daughter's struggle with drugs.

10-19 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Bad Stuff – Steve Douglass

What do you say if someone doesn’t know if they’re going to heaven? Host Steve Douglass has some timely advice on that subject on today’s Lighthouse Report.

10-20 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Music and Lyrics – John Waller

For musician John Waller writing songs about his struggles helps him move past them. Today on the Lighthouse Report, he gives an example.

10-21 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Hardships – Stacy Delisle

Imagine … knowing you are going to lose your child. What would you do? Well, today on the Lighthouse Report, Stacy Delisle, who experienced that very scenario, shares her story.

10-24 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Following God – Jeremy Riddle

So, what desires has God placed in your heart? Today on the Lighthouse Report, musician Jeremy Riddle talks about following after God.

10-25 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Junk in Life – Regi Campbell

Isn’t it great how God loves us and cares for us despite all the junk we have in our lives? On today’s Lighthouse Report, Regi Campbell explains.

10-26 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Insecurities – Dave Fitzgerald

Do you ever struggle with insecurities in your life? Well, music artist Dave Fitzgerald does sometimes. On today’s Lighthouse Report, he discusses what he’s learned regarding that.

10-27 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Buying Their Coffee – Steve Sjogren

Sometimes it's very simple to *stir up* a godly conversation with others in a very nonthreatening way. It may begin by buying them a cup of coffee. Listen for more details from Steve Sjogren on today's Lighthouse Report.

10-28 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * God’s Presence – Clayton King

So, how can you experience God’s presence in your life? Well, on today’s Lighthouse Report, Clayton King discusses what he’s learned.

10-31 * MP3 1-MIN 2-MIN * Protective Power of Prayer – Steve Douglass

Too often we neglect to pray and simply forget the power of God behind prayer. And praying for someone's protection is one of the greatest privileges we can have in the life of a loved one. Steve Douglas tells a woman's story on today's Lighthouse Report.

Hello and Welcome to My Page!

I just joined this wonderful site and I'm already liking it alot. How are you enjoying it here? Can you tell me whats new and exciting here since you've been around? I ended up here because I am one who love to PRAY which of course I have much to PRAY for.

Well I hope we can connect to PRAY soon as I BELIEVE that when we PRAY the answer is on it's way. Have a wonderful day and thank you for stoppin by. Leave me a quick note if you like and let's link up.

Many Blessings,

Star!