Congregational Prayer Meeting

The prayer meeting is an intimidating place full of people who know the bible back to front, and who pray out loud for twenty minutes each whilst demonstrating their excellent vocabulary in an attempt to show how clever they are and to thank God for all the good things that they’ve got.

The above paragraph is the exact opposite of what a prayer meeting is, but it’s probably what a few people have in their mind when they think about it.  So here are a few home truths about the prayer meeting. 
Have a look at them and then decide if it’s for you...

• You don’t have to pray out loud at the meeting (many people don’t)
• Your vocabulary doesn’t have to be greater than a one year old! (you could grunt your prayer and God would still know what you were saying)
• You can be honest with God and openly question why something has happened – he knows how you’re feeling anyway!
• You can repeat what other people have prayed for – you don’t need to have a unique thing to pray for.
• You don’t have to know much about the bible – just that you believe that Jesus is the Son of God, and he’s alive, so that you can speak to him
• All prayer is answered (sometimes ‘yes’, sometimes ‘no’, sometimes ‘not yet’)
• You don’t have to have your eyes closed, you don’t have to put your hands together, you don’t have to speak out loud, you don’t have to be doing nothing else at the time.
• The word ‘prayer’ comes from a French word meaning ‘to request’, so there’s nothing fancy in that, so feel free to ask away!

The meetings can be varied, with different people leading sometimes, it leads to differing ways of leading prayers.  One person got us to write our prayers on a piece of paper, fold it into a paper aeroplane and then launch it across the room.  On another occasion, the person leading the session had printed information on various countries around the world and the issues they faced and the group read these, learned more about what issues other people are facing and then prayed about these.

The meetings are at on Thursdays at 7.30 in the Crèche room and last just over an hour.  If you want any more information about the prayer meeting, either come along and find out, or contact Elwyn Batt at prayermeeting@brightonschurch.org.uk.

"NO ONE IS A FIRMER BELIEVER IN THE POWER OF PRAYER THAN THE DEVIL;
NOT THAT HE PRACTICES IT - BUT HE SUFFERS FROM IT."