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The power of the Church truly to bless rests on intercession—asking and receiving heavenly gifts to carry to men.
“As prayer meetings fail in a congregation, so will the ministrations of the pastor become unfruitful, the preaching of the word fail to convert sinners and promote holiness in the professors of religion.”
The Prayer Meeting and Its History, J. B. Johnston
By the Prayer First team
Dana Olson, Jerry and Dee Sheveland, Bryan Moak, Tannie and Wally Eshenaur, Dennis and Barb Erickson, Carol Madison
As a Prayer First team, we are committed to our simple mission statement: Calling the church to the extraordinary importance of prayer.
We talk often of our desire for all Converge Worldwide churches to be “praying churches.” Although on the one hand that may be a given, the reality is that it takes great effort and intentionality to keep prayer at the forefront of all we do. We all agree on the necessity of prayer, but is there a benchmark to help determine if your church is hitting the mark of being identified as a “praying church”?
The Prayer First team has discussed the definition of a praying church, made lots of revisions, and finally landed on a description we believe is broad enough to be adaptable by any church. You might want to introduce this to your leadership and your prayer ministry as a encouragement to dream and envision a culture of prayer in your church.
A Praying Church
1) A praying church is humble, desperate, and hopeful in prayer – worshipping Jesus Christ and praying Kingdom-minded prayers.
2) A praying church establishes a rhythm of prayer first:
- First thing each day we seek God first.
- First day each week we model meaningful corporate prayer as churches.
- First week each month we set aside a day for prayer and fasting.
- First month each year we emphasize the priority of prevailing prayer.
3) A praying church is led by a praying pastor, who is supported by praying people.
4) A praying church encourages its members to establish personal and family prayer times.
5) A praying church teaches its members Scriptural prayer principles.
Room to Grow
Obviously within this definition there is opportunity for much creativity and direction to take your prayer ministry. This is a great place to put that prayer into practice by taking time to seek the Lord as to the specifics of how you can encourage your congregation to grow.
Prayer is so extraordinarily important, and our hope is for a movement of churches that practices the simple principle of prayer first.
“We should be merciful to one another in seeking never to look at the worst side of a brother’s character. Oh, how quick some are to spy out other people’s faults! They hear that Mr. So-and-so is very useful in the church, and they say, ‘Yes, he is, but he has a very curious way of going to work, has he not? And he is so eccentric.’ Well, did you ever know a good man who was very successful, who was not a little eccentric? . . .
Do you go out when the sun is shining brightly and say, ‘Yes, this sun is a very good illuminator, but I remark that it has spots’? If you do, you had better keep your remark to yourself, for it gives more light than you do, whatever spots you may have or may not have. And many excellent persons in the world have spots, but yet they do good service to God and to their age.
So let us not always be the spot-finders, but let us look at the bright side of the brother’s character rather than the dark one, and feel that we rise in repute when other Christians rise in repute, and that, as they have honor through their holiness, our Lord has the glory of it, and we share in some of the comfort of it.”
“The man who mobilizes the Christian church to pray will make the greatest contribution to world evangelization in history.”
Research Suggests Accurate Count of Christians Closer to 4% in US
August 30, 2011 By Nathan Creitz
Some troubling research according to Greg Laurie:
- Only 1 in 20 Christians has ever shared the Gospel.
Let’s combine that with some data from ARIS 2008:
- US Population = 307,006,550
- Self-proclaimed Christians in US = 233,324, 978 (or 76%)
- 1 in 20 US Christians who has ever shared the Gospel = 11,666,249 (or 4%)
What does Jesus have to say about this?
Therefore, everyone who will acknowledge Me before men, I will also acknowledge him before My Father in heaven. But whoever denies Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father in heaven. (Matthew 10:32-33).
Modern men and women are so desperately in need of the help (to learn how to pray) that we can provide that our best energies should be devoted to this task.
Prayerless pulpits will produce prayerless and powerless congregations.
~Mighty Prevailing Prayer, Wesley Duewel
If you want to see how popular the church is, attend Sunday morning worship. If you want to see how popular the pastor is, attend Sunday evening. if you want to see how popular God is, attend the prayer meeting.
Can we still have the supernatural in our churches? I think we can, for effectual, fervent prayer is capable of producing supernatural results!
bryanaloha
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