This guest post by Steven Knight (you can read more about him at the end of this post) represents a new phase in my blog (and my life!). I’m starting a new job this week and my thesis due date is coming fast, so I thought it would be great to hear from some other people. So here’s Steven’s post on buiding a prayer team, I think he’s got some great ideas.
Do you have a prayer team in your children’s ministry? How many times does your prayer team bring your ministry and its leaders, the children and the parents in your ministry before the Lord every week? One of the most powerful tools believers have in ministry is prayer. After describing the armour of God in Ephesians 6, Paul immediately begins to emphasise the importance of prayer! In Luke 18, Jesus stresses the importance of bringing your requests before God because He will give justice to His people. Prayer is powerful and should be used in every ministry in the church. Here are ten ways on how you can build a prayer team for your children’s ministry:
- Set up a time once a week for your children’s ministry staff or pastoral staff to meet and pray for the children’s ministry.
- Recruit parents from your children’s ministry to pray throughout the week for specific prayer requests. Don’t forget to give them a list every week!
- Send out an email newsletter to the church with prayer requests. Make sure you include which prayers have been answered recently as well.
- During a weekly Sunday or Wednesday children’s ministry program, have the children gather in groups and pray for one another. Give them several prayer requests about the ministry that they can pray for too!
- Find the prayer warriors in your church, and ask them to start praying! Again, making and updating a list of prayer requests will be very helpful for them.
- Have your volunteers gather together before a program or meeting to pray for the children’s ministry.
- Ask some of your fellow children’s ministry colleagues to start a prayer team with you that would meet and pray weekly for your ministries.
- Meet with your church’s youth pastor and ask them to recruit students to form a prayer group that could pray for different ministries in the church, including the children’s ministry.
- Form a children’s leadership team consisting of some of the children in your ministry and ask them to pray for the ministry.
- Last, but certainly not least, spend time daily with your family, praying for the children’s ministry.
Take a few of these ideas and incorporate them in your ministry and personal life! Don’t forget the power of prayer and its importance in God’s eyes.
What things do you do to make sure there is lots of prayer happening in your ministry?
Steven Knight is a children’s ministry leader, writer and speaker with over 10 years of children’s ministry experience. He is currently active in the children’s ministry community through his writing on www.kidmintools.com, serving in the local church, and speaking at training workshops. His passion is to evangelise and disciple children, encourage parents to be spiritual leaders in their home, and help train and equip children’s ministry leaders. You can connect with him on Twitter at @StevenKnight09.
Great article by a great guy!
Yes, it is. So good to have Steven writing a guest post for me.