Monday, March 17, 2008

Instructions for our 40 hours of prayer

Thank you for joining our 40 Hours of Prayer effort. I'm excited to see how God will move this Easter in response to your prayers.

I encourage you to look through this entire page. Here's what you'll see on this page: the other people signed up to pray, other ideas for prayer and Dan Arnold's teaching on prayer from March 9th.

I encourage you to write out your prayers in the comments section. Simply post a comment on the blog entry for your day. This will do 2 things: 1) keep you awake (if you're praying late at night) and 2) Allow others to read your prayers, which will inspire and encourage them in their prayers.

Remember, Almighty God is listening! How awesome is that?

- Pastor Donnie

Dan Arnold's Teachings on Prayer

There are 5 modes of prayer that are most commonly practiced:
I. Praise - Praise is complementing God for who he is.
A. God is worthy of all praise.
B. Through loving God, We experience his love for us.
C. Through praise we begin to place focus on God, and not ourselves.

II. Thanksgiving - Giving thanks to God.
A. Giving thanks to God for what he has done, is doing, and will do.
B. Thanking God for the gifts he has provided. (Family, Friends, Wisdom, etc.

III. Petition - Just ask, while focusing on God’s Character.
A. Request, and believe in God’s power to do what is best in an eternal context.
B. Pray for peace. (Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.)
C. Pray your heart out until you have peace that it is in God’s hands.
Further Notes on Petition:
There is power in joining together in petition, but this does not mean God keeps a score, or weighs a scale with numbers of prayers.
God works out what is needed from an eternal perspective, not a temporal perspective.
We need to be sensitive both to the urgency of the other’s request, and to God’s timing.

IV. Intercession - Intercession is praying on behalf of someone; but more specifically that their relationship with God would be made right.
A. Through intercessory prayer God works on our heart, as much as the other persons.

V. Confession - Can be admitting personal sin, but also a chance for humility before God.
A. "God, I don’t know what to do."
B. Just talk, don’t perform.
C. You can’t pray wrong, if you pray honest.

Monday, March 3, 2008

Things to be praying for

Here's a list of things we can be praying for over these 40 hours:

Your Fave Five
Our Love Wins ministry
Pastor Andy
Pastor Donnie
Small Group leaders
Our new Christ-followers
Our children, children's ministry and children's ministry volunteers
Easter Sunday's service
Those who have been invited to Easter Sunday
Our Good Friday Easter Egg Hunt

Other requests?

40 Hours of Continuous Prayer

From 4 PM on Good Friday until 8 AM on Resurrection Sunday, our church is going to be praying for 40 continuous hours.

If you haven't signed up yet, you can send me an email to pick one of the slots or you can sign up on Sunday morning at the welcome table.

Comments are enabled on this blog. It would be great to write your prayers in the comments section during your time of prayer. You could also post requests in the comments section. We could also post a new entry with a list of requests.

God bless,
Pastor Donnie

Good Friday

4-5 PM Erin Miller
5-6 PM Ashley Vance
6-7 PM
7-8 PM
8-9 PM Scott Sidusky
9-10 PM Karen Willey
10-11 PM Zach Pogemiller
11 PM - Midnight Matt Pearson/Ashtyn Florez

Saturday

Midnight - 1 AM Troy Strahan
2-3 AM Joshua Vance
3-4 AM Aaron Holmes
4-5 AM
5-6 AM
6-7 AM Donnie Miller
7-8 AM Brian Roberts
8-9 AM Melissa Billings
9-10 AM Philip Wheeler
10-11 AM
11 AM - Noon Caleb Wood
Noon - 1 PM
1-2 PM
2-3 PM
3-4 PM
4-5 PM
5-6 PM
6-7 PM Debbie Sidusky
7-8 PM
8-9 PM Andy McGee
9-10 PM Sarah Holmes
10-11 PM Michael Palmer
11 PM - Midnight Andrew Phelps

Easter Sunday

Midnight - 1 AM David Brush
2-3 AM
3-4 AM
4-5 AM Alicia Brush
5-6 AM Nate Warren
6-7 AM
7-8 AM