Prayer Walking

patamoSermon Extras

SOME PEOPLE DO THEIR BEST PRAYING while they are moving. Prayer walking can be a wonderful gift for those who like to get up and move around. This type of intercession intentionally invites the person to go to the site of their concern: the office, the conference room, the dining room, the kitchen, the school, the hospital, the government buildings. The immediacy of the context can fuel prayer and offer a way for listening more deeply to God, to what his concerns for his place might be.

Prayer walking is a way of saturating a particular place and people with prayer. This discipline draws us out of prayers that are limited to our immediate concerns and into a larger circle of God’s loving attention. Sometimes prayer walking preceded a particular mission endeavor. A team of people go beforehand to walk through the neighborhood, country or project in order to pray. The actual mission team follows. Often this type of prayer is intentionally organized rather than happening spontaneously. It can be a one-time event or a part of an ongoing prayer ministry.

SPIRITUAL EXERCISES:

  1. Walk through your home or church in the company of Jesus. Pray for each room and what happens there. How would recognizing Jesus’ presence there reorient your interaction.
  2. Send tine walking with other believers through your workplace. Pray for you colleagues, the custodial help, the customers, the delivery people, the kitchen staff. Offer yourself to be Jesus’ hands and heart in this place.
  3. Visit the playground and school near you. Walk though it in the company of Jesus. Pray for those who work, play and study there. How do you see the heart of God for this place?
  4. When you are on vacation or in a natural setting, allow God to draw you into prayer for this particular place. Let your interaction with the created world lead you into prayer. Pray that the exquisite beauty of the world will not be snuffed out.
  5. Before a neighborhood picnic or school event, join other believers who will prayer walk for the crowds and people they know who will attend. Ask the Lord to give you his heart for them, Pray the Holy Spirit will work even in this event.