Over the next 2 months the men I am leading on Team Covenant have been presented with the opportunity to go into the Buddhist pagodas (temples) here in Battambang and bring the Kingdom, specially to the monks. When our host first told us about this ministry, my heart just about jumped out of my chest. I was so excited, but nervous. I spent some time prayer walking through pagodas last time I was here, and I just remembered the heaviness and darkness that sit over them. After spending time in prayer about what this ministry was going to look like, the Lord reminded me not to forget the power of prayer.
“Lord, we pray for revival in Buddhist pagodas. We pray that so many monks come to know you that the pagodas close down. We want to see your Kingdom come and your will be done.” -part of a prayer I wrote in my journal on 10/16/2018.
Revival: “a restoration to life or consciousness”
If we take a look back in Scripture and in world history, any time there has been a huge movement of God or revival, it has been preceded by hours upon hours upon hours of prayer and intercession. Throughout the history of the early church in Acts, we see the disciples meeting together to pray before they did anything. The prayers of the followers of Christ not only prepared their hearts to boldly proclaim the Good News, but also invited the work of the Holy Spirit into everything they did. Without the work of the Holy Spirit, they couldn’t accomplish what the Lord had called them to do.
Acts 4:31 “After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filed with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.”
If prayer is something that the early church took seriously, it’s something we should take seriously as well. So we spent the first week of ministry doing simply that. We have spent hours in prayer and Scripture, asking the Lord to prepare our hearts to proclaim His word boldly and to prepare the hearts of all of the men and women we will come in contact with to hear His word. We have prayed for protection from spiritual attack in these dark places. Most of all, we have asked the Holy Spirit to work through us, because we can’t accomplish what the Lord has called us to do without Him.
So what’s my point in telling you all of this? I absolutely want you to know what our ministry has looked liked, but that’s not why I’m writing this blog. Prayer isn’t something that’s a one and done. It’s a daily choice and conversation with the Lord. Heck, it’s a choice that we can make every single hour, minute, even second of every day. It’s something that we will continue to do as we spend time in these pagodas bringing the Good News of Jesus. AND it’s something that I want to invite each of you into. We need your prayers. I want to ask you all to pray for a few things specifically:
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Pray that the Holy Spirit would direct our steps and use us for what He wants to do, not what we want to do.
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Pray for protection from spiritual attack. The enemy in not happy about us bringing light into a place where his darkness reigns. But the name of Jesus is so much greater than any attack we could come under.
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Pray for the hearts of the monks that we have met and will meet to be open and receptive to the Gospel.
Thank you for your prayers. I would also love to be praying for y’all! The Lord has been reminding me of the power of prayer and the fact that it’s powerful even from the other side of the world. So please send me any prayer requests you have to [email protected]
