Here's the video:
Anecdote time: I attended a small group session in high school. It was about twenty teenage boys and a leader. During prayer time we went around and offered our requests,which the leader concisely wrote down. He then assigned each person a prayer request and literally told us to keep it short and to the point.
He, after all, had an agenda to get to.
And to turn it around on myself: I often pray in quick lists. It's a great way to order my thoughts. I also recognize how stifling it is to spiritual growth, but seriously, it's a lot easier coming to God with a list of "fix this, fix that" things than to sit and listen.
And to play dissenting voice for a bit: is praying in such a way necessarily a bad thing?
Other thoughts?
HT: Scotteriology.
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Comments (10)
Both types--and everything in between on the continuum--are good and necessary, but they require their own time. One must not be substituted for the other.
It seems like you've thought about this a lot, do you have any particular experiences that stand out to you as being foundational to your understanding of prayer?
This type of gathering (I think it works best with around 50 or 60 people) really give people a chance to build community, getting past some of the hindrances to prayer and seek out direction. I have most often done them with Pastors and Para-church leaders in Chicago. But many groups of business leaders or intercessors or single church prayer summits can be done well. Certainly not the only format for "real prayer" but one that I have found especially helpful.
Terrific youtube find.
i was just convicted of this during my morning and I was thinking about how long it had been since I had a "conversation" with God.
1. It limits the temptation to have "the best prayer."
2. It opens up the doors for people who otherwise wouldn't open their mouths for fear of sounding inelegant.
3. I keeps people focused.
4. The prayer time usually lasts longer than with, "eh, pray as long as you want" prayers because people are happy to contribute multiple times to the prayer.
One word prayers are interesting - I highly recommend them, especially for novice prayers.
His agenda is another issue, but we've probably all been guilty of that at some point in our lives, yes?
It's a great way to get youth started. Praying through the Psalms is wonderful, but sometimes even adults can't grasp that, so doing that type of intercessory prayer can be a good thing.