 |
| |  |
| |  |
| |  |
| |  |
| |  |
| |  |
| |  |
| |  |
||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Editorial:
Nurturing spirituality From
the[acting] director: New Shoes Wholeness,
Holiness & Wholegrain Spirituality Comment:
Racehorses and Turtles A
Spirituality of Communion: The Benedictine Monks, Rostrevor Interview
with John Dickinson & Paul Symonds: The Shape of Spirituality Prayer
24-7 In
quest of living theology: A conversation piece on theological education
and Christian formation A
Spirituality of Welcome Bible
Study: Christian Spirituality Review:
How (Not) to Speak of God Review:
Spirituality and Transformation Difficult
Conversations |
|
|
|
|
|||
|
|||
|
THERE IS SOMETHING VERY SPECIAL about the middle of the night hours, it is dark and still and there is a sense that it is an intimate time with God. Time, while others sleep unaware, to pray over family, communities and nations. Looking around the room, there are artistic expressions of people’s desires, pain, praise and wonder, scribbled prayer requests that are heartbreaking and heart-warming, Scripture that has been highlighted by those here before you, dreams and visions for the church, for Ireland, that people have cried out to God and written down for others to add their “Amen” to. Empty coffee cups represent people you may never meet but who have been part of a very special community of praying people, people who you pray with and for as you spend time in this place. I met one girl, in the prayer room at the end of a five-day period of non-stop prayer, she said she had lost count after her 17th hour that week and that she had been “Walking out into answered prayers.” Another commented that, “There is something addictive about being in the presence of God. I don’t ever want to leave. An hour in this room is just too short to hear all the things God has to say.” And that is one of the things about spending time in a prayer room, it is not just that time we set aside to present all our requests to God – and let’s face it a lot of us, whether we intend to or not, spend a lot of our time in prayer telling God stuff – it’s about giving God space to speak – through the stimuli for prayer, other people’s prayers and thoughts, planting dreams and desires – sending us out to serve our communities and world. 24-7 Prayer is a movement that began by accident in 1999. It all began when a group of young people decided to set aside a room and pray for a month non-stop. They couldn’t stop and prayed till Christmas and, from there, prayer rooms started popping up all over the UK, then the world and a movement was born. The story can be read in a book called Red Moon Rising, written by founder of 24-7 Prayer, Pete Grieg. It wasn’t a new idea, as the book describes, it was inspired by a visit Pete and Samie Grieg made to Hernhut in Germany – where Moravian Christians had prayed non-stop for 100 years – and by other prayer movements. It just has 21st Century clothes, drawing on the experience and tradition of years of prayer-ers and reaching out to a 21st Century world. When asked, “Who will you find in a prayer room?”, Phil Togwell of 24-7 UK said, “Young people and older people, children and adults and students. Prisoners and police-people, the armed forces and gypsies, skaters and punks and politicians, Catholics and Protestants, black and white, in over 65 nations.” In different cultures and settings it has very different expressions – from a prayer room in the west end of San Antonio, Ibiza, with prayer requests from clubbers and holidaymakers, to a prayer room in the Houses of Parliament, to our room in an unused office space in a building in the middle of student land in Belfast – each focussing on the needs of the surrounding community and a wider world, drawing people of faith and no faith, all denominations, ages and nationalities. The heart of 24-7 Prayer is that as we seek God through prayer he would prepare us and send us out to impact and change a society that has need of social reform, its own 21st Century slaveries and many, many people who need to know the love of Jesus. There are three strands: prayer, mission and justice. And so mobile 24-7 prayer rooms where triggered and mission teams sent out to places such as Belgrade, Serbia, Ibiza and more intensive, focussed places of prayer, mission and justice – called “modern-day monasteries” or Boiler Rooms – came into being. Our story began at Autumn Soul (the Methodist Church’s national youth weekend). Out of a 24-hour prayer room, which had been running at the event for the second time, came the challenge to youth groups to dare to get praying and challenge their churches to pray in this way in their own areas. And so, the Methodist Church in Ireland is challenging its churches across Ireland in 2007 to a whole year of non-stop prayer! A few days later, at a 24-7 gathering, some of us felt challenged about the empty space at the back of our offices and a passage from Isaiah 56 about becoming “a house of prayer for all nations” and God’s promise of “gathering others besides those already gathered,” became a motivation to pray and ask God for this space. So, in January of 2006, we opened our first prayer room, with a student-focussed week in February, a four-week period at Lent and 10 days in the lead-up to Pentecost. People signed up for an hour or more and came to this space to pray and listen as individuals or in groups. We were overwhelmed by the diversity of people who chose to come, both Protestant and Catholic, from the very young, who came with parents – the creative element allowing them to interact and get their hands dirty – to youth groups staying over and praying all night, to a group of pensioners. Things to read, write, feel, smell, do and a comfy space to sit, lie or kneel – prayer for those who struggle with prayer, an hour with God for those who couldn’t have imagined being able to spend more than 10 minutes without distraction. One woman wrote, “This has been a landmark experience in my walk with God! I never knew that an hour in his presence could pass so quickly. The whole experience has challenged my prayer life.” So the desire is that as we write, paint, model with clay, make cards, read a book, have a coffee, be in silence, put on some music, confess, praise, petition, dream, commit – we meet with the living God, who loves us and has a plan for us, as individuals and as a community of believers in this land, if we are willing to ask, hear and follow… I have loved being part of this worldwide network of pray-ers who, having prayed, are continually being sent out to be the answers to their prayers in their local communities and the world. GILLIAN BEST works as Youth Ministry Co-ordinator for the Department of Youth and Children's Work of the Methodist Church in Ireland. Developing leaders and running Autumn Soul (national weekend) are her favourite bits. She discovered 24-7 Prayer on a plane coming home from Nicaragua, reading the whole book in 8 hours. Further
reading: Books: |
|||
 |
|
