Dreaming of Prayer
Each week, at the end of service, we hear our ministers say, "To the right of the stage, there will be volunteers that would love to pray with you...", and if you’ve ever lingered in the sanctuary after service, you’ve seen our Prayer Team in action. These are volunteers who faithfully show up and step into the stories of our congregation, meeting them where they are, ready to intercede.
United Together in Prayer
Praying can seem so simple. It’s just talking to God after all, right? We can send off a fleeting, even nonsensical thought out into the ether in between sitting in traffic and glancing back down at our phones, or we can formally kneel, fold our hands, and speak aloud trying our best to sound “holy.” Scripture claims that through Christ’s work on the cross this ability to approach the throne of God anywhere, anytime is open to us all. One of the reasons he came down was to connect with his sons and daughters. It’s apparent—God longs to hear our prayers no matter how they come.
Grow Our Hearts: Prayers for the World
We are beginning a monthly element in our worship services that we are calling “prayers for the world.” This communal time of guided prayer during our worship services will be intentionally built to have us pray for the things that hit close to home for us as well as the things that hit close to the home of another—to pray for the daily bread of another even as I pray for my own.
Guided Prayer
Your prayers, and mine, mix together with all the prayers ever uttered from the lips of God’s people and waft up to him like a sweet aroma with incense. God hears us! What a miracle, we have the ear of the King of the universe. In this season, we are coming together as a church to pray from a place of pain, disappointment, and deep concern. We are taking the time to pray. We will pour out our hearts and pound our fists on the very throne of God, and he will hear us.
A Day of Prayer and Fasting
Whether it is longing to hear from God, mourning loss, needing protection, seeking guidance, or beginning a new journey, the common thread is when God’s people need him to show up, they fast and pray. There are times when forgoing something of comfort can help us look more clearly at our need for God. This is at the heart of fasting, which biblically refers to abstaining from food for spiritual purposes. On Wednesday, March 24th, from sunup to sundown, we invite the Summit family to fast and pray. For some, fasting from food for extended periods of time is unhealthy. If that is the case for you, please don’t put your health at risk through fasting, but please join us in prayer throughout the day.
Summer in Psalms Reading Plan
Along with preaching on various psalms this summer, we’ve come up with a 10-week reading plan in Psalms. Psalms is broken up into five books, and we will spend two weeks reading selected psalms from each book. Many biblical scholars find each book has a guiding theme. We’ll be reading one psalm a day for five days per week, and you can find the list here!
Twenty-One Days of Prayer and Scripture
In this time that is so different than we may want, or certainly different than we expected, let’s connect with God through prayer and Scripture. My invitation and challenge for us all is to commit to read Scripture and pray daily for the next 21 days.
Let's Pray
Although we aren’t meeting together right now as a church and you won’t find the prayer team waiting expectantly for your arrival at the end of a service, the team is more dedicated than ever to praying for you. Every request that is submitted to the church online or via social media is funneled to the prayer team and now, more than ever, our commitment to stand with you in prayer is unwavering.
What Do We Do With Our Fear?
The question we should be asking is not “Should we be feeling fear?” but rather “What do we do with our fear?” We all face fear, so what do we do with our fear? Fear is like a car—it moves us. It takes us somewhere. If our level of fear is mostly fueled by uncertainty, then where this fear moves us is toward what is certain.
Why Should We Care
Why do we care when someone is hurting? Why do we care when a child goes hungry or a single mom can’t make ends meet or when people are mistreated? Why do we care? The Bible has an answer for those questions and it comes in the first chapter of the first book. Genesis 1 says that people are unique in creation as being made in the image of God.
Pursuing Through Prayer
I am not very good at prayer, I think because I’m too busy doing stuff—stuff that I think is important and necessary and, well, I just don’t have time to stop and pray. How would I ever get things done?
God Has Something Better
The first time I prayed a desperate, cry-from-the-heart, kind of prayer was when I was about 8 years old and our cat went missing. I went into my bedroom, kneeled in front of a small statue of Jesus, and begged him to bring Smutty Nose back. While I was still on my knees, I heard my sister yell from the driveway, “Guys! Guys! Smutty Nose is back.”
IJM Orlando Prayer Gathering
At the IJM Orlando Prayer Gathering, we got to hear about the work that’s happening to end slavery and we had the opportunity to pray for some specific issues IJM is facing around the world. Whether or not you were able to make it, these are the things that were prayed for and we will continue to pray for.