Is It OK to Pray This?

“When the question rises, ‘Is it okay to pray this prayer?’ let the answer be once and forever settled: Yes, it’s okay. How? Just ask!

“We worry about knowing exactly what to pray in some cases because we think we know what to pray in all others. We may, at times. But aren’t there many times that we have asked imperfectly? God was not befuddled. Our ignorance did not clog the wheels of the universe.

“When we are uncertain as to how boldly we may ask, we are saying, ‘I’m afraid to ask for this because I might confused the Almighty. I may just force His hand to violate His own eternal purposes, and suddenly bring our world to a screeching halt when my mightiness of faith has secured an answer on earth which God didn’t really want to give.’ It is as though we sometimes think that a cosmic accident might occur if we invade heaven with a request that would somehow slip through the machinery of providence without being checked out carefully. Somehow God would find himself awkwardly glancing toward earth wondering, ‘How did I ever let that happen? I must be more careful about my answers to prayer.’

“‘But,’ you will ask, what if my request isn’t appropriate to God’s will? What if I am asking for something that I shouldn’t?

“The discovery of God’s perfect will won’t happen by excursions of human reason, assertions of man-made theology or personal opinions about ‘how I think God does or ought to do things.’ To the contrary, the Bible tells us how to discover His will through praying, not how to find His will and then pray.

“‘I implore you, brothers and sisters: present yourselves before God in a posture of worship, the kind that God accepts. It’s the only truly intelligent thing you can do. Therein you will find a transforming of your mentality from the world-way of thinking of God’s new way for you, and therein you will discover the whole counsel of His perfect will’ (Romans 12: 1-2, paraphrase.)”   -- Jack Hayford

Arizona Prays

I went to Arizona at the end of September. After dragging my feet to book a room for the conference I was to attend, I learned there was no room at the inn. At the last minute I contacted a local acquaintance and asked if I could stay with her. Barbara was delighted to take me in.

She also told me great stories about the things the Lord is doing among believers in Arizona, some of them part of a national initiative to raise up 10,000 intercessors in every state. Want to know more? Maybe you could use some of these ideas in your own context!

1. God Bless Arizona Prayer Walk: Leading up to the state’s centennial (February 14, 2012) Christians are walking the streets of every city and town praising God and inviting his blessings on their state. Can you think of a better way to acknowledge God's goodness and welcome his work in the years to come?

2. Border Initiative: Christians in Arizona, California, and Texas are also prayerwalking along our country’s Southern borders, seeking God for transformation in the border towns and among the peoples of both the US and Mexico. Learn more from BridgeBuilders.

3. Prayer in the Public Schools: Recognizing the importance and influence of the education system in their communities, Christian leaders in Arizona organized 11 all-night prayer gatherings in different schools, set to culminate 11-11-11 (tomorrow!) What a way to bring prayer back into the schools! Learn more at eleven11.

4. Prayer Torches: Several prayer “torches” are touring the area, inspired by the Olympic torch it seems. Everywhere they go people are gathering to pray 24/7. Indian reservations have been participating as well. Learn more from Lite The Fire.

Nobody Has to Live Like That

Indian Peaks Wilderness Area, Colorado Rocky Mountains

"Prayerless people cut themselves off from God's prevailing power, and the frequent result is the familiar feeling of being overwhelmed, over-run, beaten down, pushed around, defeated. Surprising numbers of people are willing to settle for lives like that. Don't be one of them. Nobody has to live like that. Prayer is the key to unlocking God's power in your life."

 Bill Hybels, in Too Busy Not to Pray

Some Prayers

Ever read the book of Tobit? As I prepare for the Bible survey classes that will start me off on the seminary road I suppose I should be glad that the Bibles most evangelicals read have a mere 66 books (and not more), but I'm rather fond of some of the works that got left out. Ah, well, maybe ol' Tobit doesn't belong in the "canon." That didn't stop Fredrick Buechner from producing his short novel On the Road with the Archangel, a creative re-imagining of the tale told from the point of view of the angel who accompanies Tobit's son Tobias and his dog on his epic journey. I commend it to you. Here, as a taste, are the words that open the story:

"I am Raphael, one of the seven archangels who pass in and out of the presence of the Holy One, blessed be he. I bring him the prayers of all who pray and those who don't even know that they're praying.

"Some prayers I hold out as far from me as my arm will reach, the way a woman holds a dead mouse by the tail when she removes it from the kitchen. Some, like flowers, are almost too beautiful to touch, and others so aflame that I'd be afraid of their setting me on fire if I weren't already more like fire than I am like anything else. There are prayers of such power that you might almost say they carry me rather than the other way round—the way a bird with outstretched wings is carried higher and higher on the back of the wind. There are prayers so apologetic and shamefaced and halfhearted that they all but melt away in my grasp like sad little flakes of snow. Some prayers are very boring."

Spirituality for Extroverts

My friend Lisa is an off-the-charts extrovert. I'm just a mild one, and more bent towards introversion in a couple of key ways. But when I heard Lisa was doing research and writing a dissertation on spiritual practices for extroverts, I asked to tell me more. Maybe I could buy her a cup of coffee?

We got together last week. In typical extrovert fashion, we both talked a mile a minute and covered many other topics as well. As I left I realized that without taking notes or seeing something on paper I might have a hard time summing up her research with any accuracy. However, she's promised to let me read the thing at some point. I will probably have to reciprocate by following through on my promise to send her the rather pathetic little paper I wrote in hopes of laying the foundation for a book (on listening).  

While in many ways the culture we live in and the American church punish introversion and reward  extroversion, the opposite is true when in comes to spirituality. Want to hear from God? You have to go to the mountains, by yourself, with your journal. Want to grow in your faith? The "daily quiet time" is essential - American Christians think it's a sacrament. And we're not a sacramental people.

While not knocking those things - which are great, but no more mandatory than daily mass - what can we do to offer authentic, helpful models for spiritual discipline to the extroverts? I am assuming it's not impossible to have a vibrant spiritual life if you are a more extroverted, community-oriented person, not a private, keep-it-to-yourself monk in the desert. Most of us would fall somewhere in the middle of the spectrum, right?

This is an important question to raise not just for American Christians, but people of a variety of backgrounds. I've been in quite a few cultures where people are never alone - never. Sometimes this has to do with fear; I think of the Malay guy I met, a college professor and head of household, who said he hadn't been alone in his home in years - he's that afraid of the djinn. Even without that fear I think the idea of finding and treasuring time alone would seem pretty weird and foreign to someone like him. I know it would to many of the people I've met in Central Asia or North Africa. And "How can I know God?" would be less the question, than "How can we know God?"

I think it was an Albanian girl who told one of our research teams, "We never drink tea alone." So many of the world's cultures value "togetherness" much more than "individuality." The balance of those two things has a huge effect on what discipleship looks like. If we're going to fulfill the call to disciple nations, we have to navigate these questions more thoughtfully.  

In researching spiritual discipline for extroverts, Lisa pulled together two groups of extroverted women, all mature Christians. They shared their experiences and attitudes, and tried out some variations on classic spiritual disciplines chosen and adapted for extroverts. For example, they did "lectio divina" - reading and reflecting on spiritual texts - reading and talking it all out together, in a group. They practiced confession, also together. After a discussion of traditional liturgical observances (something all of them tended to feel awkward with) they "practiced" liturgy through memorizing scriptures together. They did some silence and sabbath too - but it didn't have to be a weekend alone in the woods, and their sabbath included the "celebration" element that often gets left out.

I encouraged Lisa to take some of the best stuff out of her dissertation and write it up in an article or two, say, for Discipleship Journal. She agreed that this would be a good idea, but she doesn't want to do it, at least not now - not after so many months in the basement trying to crank out the dissertation. Writing is hard work. Maybe harder for someone who plans to reward herself, when she finishes, by hitting the road and visiting good friends and far-flung family. Yes, an extrovert's solution! I believe she'll find a way to pass on what she's learned one way or another, but more writing might be tough.

No, I didn't offer to interview her and write her article, though that would be fun. I thought about it. But these days I'm trying to do a better job at distinguishing - both to myself and to others - between recognizing a great idea and making a commitment. I hope someone does write it. Maybe the "funnest" way to get the article might be to give Lisa a chance to prepare and teach a lesson for a big group, then record and transcribe it?  

Question: Do you struggle with spiritual disciplines, and/or with expectations and models that don't fit your level of introversion or extroversion? How have you adapted? What's worked? What hasn't?

See also this previous post: Seeing God's Voice

Changing Channels (Cynthia Bezak)

"...in the wee hours last night when my Situation loomed large and kept me from sleep, I handed it over to Abba one last time, then switched channels.

"I decided to intercede through the alphabet, asking the Holy Spirit to give me someone or something to pray about for each letter. Sometimes He gave me more than one prayer for each letter. Usually I prayed for family and friends, but when I got to H, it was Haiti He led me to pray for, and when I got to O, He urged me to pray for our President. I dozed off a few times, but each time I awoke and my mind raced toward the Situation, I pulled it back to where I'd left off in the alphabet.

"When I finished that, I was still awake and tempted to go back to my Situation, so I started the alphabet over again, this time naming something about God that corresponded to each letter. I tried to use names and attributes that had personal meaning for me and rest in those qualities of who God is--for instance, my Deliverer, Glory, Healer, Lifter of my head, Protector, Provider, Shalom, and Vindicator.

"As before, I dozed on and off, but each time I awoke, I'd pull myself back to where I'd left off and continue centering on God and worshiping Him..."

>> Read the complete post.

Seeing God's Voice?

Another thing that stood out for me from this study on "hearing God's voice" (mentioned in Saturday's post) is the author's claim that more often than not, we don't hear God's voice, we see it.

What?

Since the study was actually written by my pastor, I considered the source... B. is a pretty visual guy. One for whom a picture is certainly worth a thousand words. He loves finding the right image, the word picture, the story that encapsulates his point. He loves fine arts and is a big movie buff. He's also a master of PowerPoint.

Yet as I read through the study I realized this was more than just a personality thing - that B. is probably right. Hearing from God takes not just the form of verbal, auditory transmission - words - but can come any number of other ways as well. The Scriptures DO talk about God speaking. (e.g., "This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased." Matthew 3:17, 17:5, 2 Peter 1:17.) But he also speaks through image after image, drama, music - each one of our senses, in fact - and all kinds of dreams and visions.

God speaks to us more often than not by stirring up a feeling and/or drawing or showing us a picture.

And so it is today. You may ask God a question, but more likely than not his answer comes through a vision, a picture, an emotion, or the persistent thought of a person, phrase, or concept that seems to be from God.

"In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams." Acts 2:17

In the Year King Uzziah Died...

I know spring is supposed to be the time of new beginnings, and the evidence is rather unmistakable - with all the green and new growth, flowers and sunlight, baby animals and whatnot. And for many, a new year begins January 1.

But like most of my readers I've lived a life shaped more by the academic calendar than the agricultural or fiscal one. So my new year really begins in late August or early September.

This last week I realized that this is a big part of why autumn is my favorite season.

Huh. What does that mean?

Oh, I like autumn leaves and crisp air and football and school supplies. But especially I like starting a new un-messed-up season. Each new "school year" comes rich with opportunity, possibility - and unmarked by failure, poor decisions, falling behind, shame, guilt, and the like.

Do you find yourself thinking this way? It sort of works for me, but I think there's a better way to respond to the challenges of life.

The problem is that I seem to be powerless to live up to my own standards. I need someone else to show me what's best, to rescue me from myself, to make things right, to heal and strengthen and sustain and lead. To provide the courage and creative energy for responding constructively to the messy parts of life.

Look at this amazing story from the book of Isaiah, this prophet transformed - in a moment! - from a "ruined man" into an ambassador:

¹ In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple. ² Above him were seraphs, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. ³ And they were calling to one another:
"Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty;
the whole earth is full of his glory."
⁴ At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.
⁵ "Woe to me!" I cried. "I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty."
⁶ Then one of the seraphs flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. ⁷ With it he touched my mouth and said, "See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for."
⁸ Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?"
And I said, "Here am I. Send me!"
Isaiah 6:1-8

Seems too easy, doesn't it? That must have been some coal. Or some seraph. Or some powerful King!

My new friend Wendy and I - along with about 70 pairs of people in our church - are going through a study on "hearing God's voice."

This last week the lesson asked us to jot down a few of the major concerns or issues on our minds at the moment. (My fears of messing things up and being rejected for it came rushing forward to volunteer!)

Then we were asked to picture Jesus standing in front of us, gently taking each one of those issues from us, putting them in a sack and tossing the sack over his shoulder. "Let me take care of these for you. Now, come for a walk with me. I would love to talk with you..."

After that we spent time meditating on the passage from Isaiah.

It was just what I needed.

Prayer as Hide and Seek

“I have always found prayer difficult. So often it seems like a fruitless game of hide and seek in which we seek and God hides. I know God is very patient with me. Without that patience I should be lost. But frankly I have to be very patient with him. With no other friend would I go on seeking with such scant, conscious response. Yet I cannot leave prayer alone for long. My need drives me to him. And I have a feeling that he has his own reasons for hiding himself, and that finally my seeking will prove infinitely worthwhile. … I long for more satisfaction, but I cannot cease from questing. Jesus sometimes found prayer difficult. Some of his most agonized prayers were not answered. But he did not give up his praying. I frankly have little to show for all my prayers, but I cannot give up, for ‘my soul longeth for God,’ and I know that outside God there is nothing at all but death.”

Leslie Weatherhead, A Private House of Prayer, p. 28, quoted in Prayer: Does It Make a Difference? By Philip Yancey, pp. 161-2

Yancey on Prayer: Why Is It So Difficult?

More from Prayer: Does It Make a Difference? By Philip Yancey:

“Some manuals on prayer imply that time spent with God will rank as the high point of the day and that prayer following spontaneously from anointed lips will usher in miraculous answers. Instead the prayer-er finds himself battling boredom, fatigue, and a nagging feeling that she’s wasting time. What went wrong? she wonders.”

And, as Yancey points out, modern life has provided more and more distractions that ever:

“Of course, all the electronic devices have an on/off switch, but somehow their offerings seem more productive or enticing than sitting quietly in conversation with God. Let’s be honest: by most standards they are more productive and enticing than prayer.” (p. 164)

Some of it has to do with expectations. Yancey cites the research of Daniel Yankovich, who identifies the cultural shift that occurred in America in the 1970s. It was right around the time that we traded in our values or self-denial and deferred gratification, and looked instead for self-fulfillment and emotional satisfaction, preferably without sacrifice or delay. But prayer doesn’t seem to work that way. It takes discipline and rarely yields measurable results or satisfies our emotional cravings right away.

Few people find prayer fulfilling, easy, or rewarding. One of Yancey’s friends wrote to him when he was doing research for this book and shared her theory that prayer is analogous to sex. “Sex and prayer and intimate are over-glamorized relationships. [This] sets up false expectations. And breaks down intimacy.”

Yancey agrees with her unlikely analogy. “Like sex, prayer centers in relationship, more than technique.” (p. 159)

And, as he suggests, reading a book about prayer, like reading a sex manual, is hardly as useful as knowing and building an intimate relationship with one’s partner.

See also: this article on "prayer and temperament"

Yancey on Prayer: Action and Contemplation

1. Desmond Tutu

After the change of power in South Africa, Bishop Desmond Tutu found that his work had just begun. … "Day after day he listened to stories of deeds from hell acted out in his own country," says Philip Yancey. "In the midst of that time a reporter asked him, ‘Why do you pray?’ [Tutu replied:]

“‘If your day starts off wrong, it stays skewed. What I’ve found is that getting up a little earlier and trying to have an hour of quiet in the presence of God, mulling over some Scripture, supports me. I try to have two, three hours of quiet per day and even when I exercise, when I go on the treadmill for thirty minutes, I use that time for intercession. I try to have a map in my mind of the world and I go around the world, continent by continent – only Africa I do in a little more detail – and offer all of that to God.’” (p. 123)

2. Dietrich Bonhoeffer

“…Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s secret, said one German theologian, was the creative way in which he combined prayer and earthiness, forging a spirituality that made room for piety as well as activism. While sequestered in a monastery and awaiting orders from the German resistance movement, Bonhoeffer wrote, ‘A day without morning and evening prayer and personal intercessions is actually a day without meaning or importance.’” (p. 124)

3. Prayer and Action

“…In my travels overseas I have seen the clear results of prayerful action. Christians have a strong belief in a powerful and good God and an equally strong calling to live out the qualities of that God on a damaged and rebellious planet. For this reason, wherever Christian missionaries have traveled they have left behind a trail of hospitals, clinics, orphanages, and schools. To preach God without the kingdom is no better than to preach the kingdom without God.

“We will not all find ourselves in the kind of dramatic circumstances that faced Bonhoeffer in Germany or Tutu in South Africa. But each of us in our own way will feel the tension between prayer and activism, between action and contemplation. I receive a newsletter from ‘The Center for Action and Contemplation’ and together those two words encompass most of what we are called to do in following Jesus. The founder of the center says, ‘I have often told folks that the most important word in our title is not ‘action’ nor even ‘contemplation,’ but ‘and.’” (p. 125)

Prayer: Does It Make a Difference? By Philip Yancey, p. 123-5.

Yancey's sources for this bit:

Bishop Desmond Tutu, quoted in Antjie Krog, Country of my Skull, 2000, p. 202.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, quoted in Geffrey B. Kelly and F. Burton Nelson, The Cost of Moral Leadership: The Spirituality of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, 2004, p. 228.

Richard Rohr, Everything Belongs, the Gift of Contemplative Prayer, 1999, p. 92.

Yancey on Prayer: Does Prayer Change Things?

“C.S. Lewis seemed fascinated by the questions posed by prayer, especially how a sovereign God might listen and respond to our prayers. As a young Christian in England, he had felt embarrassed about prayer for his brother Warren overseas when he heard of a Japanese attack on Shanghai. What difference might one puny prayer make against the inevitability of fate or providence?”

After all, doesn’t God know best? Does he need advice from us on how to run the world? Lewis says you could make the same argument against any activity, not just prayer:

“Why wash your hands? If God intends them to be clean, they’ll come clean without your washing them… Why ask for the salt? Why put on your boots? Why do anything?”

Yet God has chosen a style of governing that allows people to take part. We can cut down trees and dam rivers, cultivate the land, hurt or help each other, rebel against our creator, and kill the prophets.

“Prayer as a means of advancing God’s kingdom is no stranger than any other means. Go into all the nations and preach the gospel, Jesus told his disciples, thus launching the missionary movement with all its harrowing history. …Heal the sick, visit prisoners, feed the hungry, house strangers… Consistently, God chooses the course of actions in which human partners can contribute most.”

Prayer: Does It Make a Difference? By Philip Yancey, pp. 136-7. The Lewis quote is from God in the Dock, 1980, p. 104-5.

Yancey on Prayer: Just as I Am

I’ve been wanting to post some of my favorite bits from the Yancey book I’ve been enjoying over the last month or so. This is the week. Here’s part one, of five, all from Prayer: Does It Make a Difference? By Philip Yancey. I’ll queue them all up now so one will be published each morning.

“Norwegian theologian Ole Hallesby settled on the single word helplessness as the best summary of the heart attitude that God accepts as prayer. ‘Whether it take the form of words or not, does not mean anything to God, only to ourselves,’ he adds. ‘Only he who is helpless can truly pray.’

“What a stumbling block!” says Yancey. Isn’t it though?

“Almost from birth we aspire to self reliance… all the while we are systematically sealing off the heart attitude most desirable to God and most descriptive of our true state in the universe." (p. 33)

“Prayer makes room for the unspeakable, those secret compartments of shame and regret that we seal away from the outside world.” (p. 41)

And, in one of the many short testimonies scattered throughout the book, a woman simply identified as “Dee” describes her own experience with prayer:

“So many times when I pray I feel like I’m either shaking my fists in God’s face (defiance) or pounding them on his chest (grief). Would that I could just place them on his knees, and have him hold my hands in his.” (p. 77)

Notes: The Hallesby quote is from a 1975 book simply titled Prayer, pp. 16-17.

Miracles in the Land of St. Patrick

This just in from Joel News, one of my favorite subscriptions. Sadly, too late for us to republish in our ezine this week. Fair to republish excerpts here?

---------

As the Irish celebrated St. Patrick's Day on March 17, remembering the Irish apostle who helped turn a pagan nation into a hotbed of Christianity, a Vineyard church in Coleraine, Northern Ireland, is helping spread a new wave of spiritual renewal across the nation. "God is moving in our communities in Ireland," says Alan Scott, who with his wife Kathryn leads the 350-member Causeway Coast Vineyard.

Instead of following the traditional model of commissioning couples to plant churches, Vineyard has been sending teams into communities across Ireland, where they set up a banner in the street that says 'Healing', and place a few chairs where people can sit while receiving prayer.

"We go to an area, heal the sick, and see if ultimately a community forms around kingdom activity in that area," Scott says. It's messier, but the results have been dramatic. South of the border in the Republic of Ireland, the team encountered a Gypsy woman who was diabetic and blind in one eye. "The Lord sovereignly healed her," Scott recalls. "Her son was lame in his right leg and was also healed. They all just came from everywhere. It was book of Acts stuff."

The intercessors were invited to pray for others. A boy with scoliosis - a severe curvature of the spine - received prayer and "instantly straightened up." Similar experiences followed as the team visited other parts of the republic. "Every time we go, we see the sick healed," Scott says.

[The] Vineyard leader says the rich heritage of early Irish church leaders such as St. Patrick continues to influence him and his church.

"Part of our reason for existing is that we want to recapture some of that original mandate. There was a group of crazy monks who were so captured by the Spirit of God, they understood that community and mission are inseparable. They had something in their heart that wanted to care for the poor and change the community in which they functioned."

JOEL NEWS 678, 20 March 2009
(c) JOEL NEWS, 2009 | republication only with full creditline | www.joelnews.org

Abide - Love - Bear Fruit

I have not been spending much time in the Bible lately. ("[Marti, Marti], you are worried and upset about many things" comes to mind) but the "verse of the day" service to which I subscribe keeps reminding me that it is still there. Today's verse was John 15:16, which is an easy and comforting thing, by itself:

"You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you."

Enduring fruitfulness.... I like that! I want that! But how? I had to look and see more. The chapter leading up to it tells us how to actually get there, and it has a cost, and requires a commitment - to God and to people:

John 15 (TNIV - highlighting mine)

1 "I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. 3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4 Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

5 "I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6 If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. 7 If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 This is to my Father's glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

9 "As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one's life for one's friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you servants, because servants do not know their master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. 17 This is my command: Love each other."

David Watson on prayer

What do you think of this?

"In a recent meeting of the top 100 church planters in our ministry, we looked for common elements among these high-producing leaders. Each of these church planters, along with the teams they led, started more than 20 churches per year, each. One group started more than 500 churches in the previous year. The only common element we found in all these church planters was their commitment to prayer.... These leaders spent an average of three hours per day in personal prayer.

"I was humbled by this commitment to prayer. When I measured my own time in prayer, and my own commitment to prayer, I found myself lacking in devotion.
"Most church planters and missionaries spend their prayer time in trying to get others to pray for them. In the early days of my ministry I spent as much as 20% of my time in developing and maintaining my prayer network. This involved newsletters and personal contacts with prayer partners.

"After our survey of the top church planting performers on our team, I decided to change my strategy. Instead of developing prayer partners, I would pray. I began to call, text message, or e-mail people and praying for them, instead of asking them to pray for me. ...[Now] I have 30 people I pray for every month. When possible, I pray with them in person or by phone. If not possible, such as when I am traveling is blackout conditions, I send text messages or e-mail containing my prayers for each of them.
"The result of this process is that 30 people respond to my prayers by praying for me. As I talk to them about this process I encourage them to pray for 29 other people on the days they are not praying with me. So, in one generation the prayer network goes from 30 to 900 people praying. We pass prayer requests back and forth on this network. We encourage all participants to find 30 people to pray with every month. By three generations there are 27,000 people in the prayer network. That’s 30 X 30 = 900 and 900 X 30 = 27,000. This is exponential growth. If the process is only 10% effective there will be 2,700 people praying. If it is only 1% effective there will be 270 people praying."

Read the rest of this posting here: Thu, 12/27/2007 - 02:00 — David Watson

Prayer and Phillip Yancey

I went to hear Phillip Yancey speak on Sunday. Yancey has one of my dream jobs. He picks things he is interested in or struggling with, then takes his handy-dandy journalism skills, and goes out and learns about those things by interviewing people. Then he writes about it. His most recent book is "Prayer: Does It Make a Difference?" (click on the post title for a link to the Amazon description). I don't have it... I'm waiting for the paperback to come out. But he was speaking just up the road and I couldn't resist!

You can make prayer really complicated, Yancey says, but the real keys to prayer are being honest about who you are and aware of who God is.

One thing Yancey did while researching the book was to go to a lot of prayer meetings. People usually pray such nice and polite prayers in those settings. But he went to one where a woman prayed, 'God, I was really furious with you after the rape. And really mad at the people in this church, too... but you were there for me, and some of these people were too, and thank you for that. I know you can bring healing for these terrible scars I have." Now there is a real prayer!

At one point he referred to the tremendous turmoil in Psalm 46:

Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
he lifts his voice, the earth melts (46:6)

In the midst of this God says:

"Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth." (46:10)

Apparently the word for 'be still' in the Latin version is 'vacate,' from which we get our word 'vacation.' So maybe you could read this to say,

'When everything seems to be falling apart, a huge mess, you can take a vacation. You aren't in charge anyway, and God has got it under control. He will accomplish things way beyond what you are concerned about.'

Sound good?