How to Pray- Our Week of Prayer starts 6.10.23
As we begin tomorrow night to lay aside our normal rhythms and give God our best in prayer- how are you feeling? Maybe expectant? Maybe guilty about not being great at prayer? Maybe stressed about ‘adding another thing’ into your svhedule? Maybe you have never tried to pray consistently and you don’t know how to start?
However you come to this week of prayer …..COME!
Join us on Friday from 7pm …
Our theme is 'Your Kingdom Come', each hour taking a separate topic (see below) , so come along for just one hour or join us for the whole night!
7-8pm PAUSE + REJOICE - Worship and opening intercession
8-9pm ASK - Our Church - Building Fund / Sundays/ Small Groups and Ministries.
9-10pm ASK Under 18s and their teams - Kids/Youth/TLG/ Kids + /Sparklers
10-11pm ASK OUR Community - Bracknell Town schools, local government, health, Isaiah61
11-12pm YIELD Kingdom Come - In our personal lives + ministry time
Parking in the Kerith Centre and K2. Entrance via the office side door to the left of the building after 7:30pm
Praying through the week…
Preceding each day from Saturday morning there will be a blog post with some suggested daily structure of prayer. Using headings and some guidelines, each day of the week takes a different focus of prayer to aid you - BE CREATIVE about when in the day you pray. You don’t need to be on your knees at 3 in the morning- but see if you can take some time each day so you are consistent. I’m not great at concentrating so I’m best praying as I jog… what works for you?
For families- On each day we have included ideas for those with children, have a go at finding a time to pray together if you can- why don’t you ask the children to lead the time together, you might be surprised! Many of the ideas have an element of kinaesthetic learning.
All these themes have been taken from the Kingdom Come Prayer Guide we made available when as a church we had a year of prayer ( remember 2020!!) . You can download the whole Kingdom Come Prayer Guide if you’d like more each day than our blog provides.
How to pray…
Build a daily habit. 24/7 prayer have written a great blog on how to get started Take a look HERE
What Structure to use? At Kerith we have been following a really helpful acronym for P.R.A.Y.
PAUSE - and spend time in quietness
REJOICE - Start by thanking God for all his blessings
ASK - As child to a loving Father we come to God with our requests
YIELD- pray ‘ Not my will but yours…’ and ask God to change your heart to align with His plan.
You or a group of friends can also book one of the remaining hourly slots in our 24-7 Prayer Room. Why don’t you try this for the first time this week!
Fasting….?
Fasting shows us how quickly we rely on things, rather than God. In Matthew 6: 17 Jesus says “When you fast..” not if. So there’s something in abstaining from food that is helpful enough that Jesus saw it as a given.
Fasting shows us how quickly we rely on things, rather than God. While fasting implies abstaining from food, it more importantly means a feasting on God - an utter dependence upon the presence of God beyond the sustenance of food. In doing so we prove the words Jesus quoted during His own fast: “…man does not live by bread alone but by every word that precedes from the mouth of God...”
For a HOW TO GUIDE head to page 14 of our Prayer PDF
Visit the 24/7 Prayer website for a beginner’s guide to fasting and guidelines to help you grow in prayer through fasting.
Come along for the journey this week as we pray together as a community! lets see what God will do in and through us.