We talk about camp being relational, but you don’t have to wait until camp starts to begin to experience oneness with someone and unity in Christ. Invite a trusted individual to pray with you about your camp ministry mission.
Chris sat up in bed. It was 3:00 AM in New York State. She woke her husband and they began to pray for their friends in Mexico. It was a time of violence, killing and kidnapping. God answered those prayers. No harm befell their friends. Prayer changes things.
Invite. Share. Contend for the Impossible.
Invite: => Select and invite someone to pray for you during your ministry endeavor.
Share: => Openly describe the mission, your role and expectations.
Contend for the impossible: => Wonder what God could do.
Don’t walk the pathway of ministry alone.
Heaven is more parade, procession and gathering than closed doors, secret counsel and special missions.
— DGC
-- Stating the obvious: Pray about who to ask to uphold you in prayer. It is to your best interests that the whole process of finding a prayer partner be bathed in prayer. Ask God to help you know who He wants you to ask.
-- Follow the leading of God’s direction: Select a person to pray for you and for your work in ministry.
-- Take action: Invite them to pray for you and the work you are attempting.
Assuming a positive response, affirm your new prayer partner when they accept the responsibility to walk with you in your Christian camp endeavor.
Below are a few specific examples of thing you could ask your paryer partner.
- Preparations-a prayer request example: I will be studying and practicing to become a camp guide. Pray that I am diligent in preparations.
-- As the camp event date comes closer: Provide your partner-in-prayer with your purposes, a likely scenario of circumstances, and a time table of your ministry endeavor. What will you be taking in? (Education, practice, experience?) What will you be giving out? (Care, direction, evangelism?)
- My responsibilities-a prayer request example: I will be working with a co-guide named, John. Pray that I will communicate expectations clearly. I have responsibility to be a guide for five explorers. Pray that God would prepare their hearts for the gospel message they will hear at camp. The three day/night camp starts on the second Monday in July. Pray that in that short time God would bring us all closer to him through his Word.
-- Just before camp: Announce your intentions of what success will look like. Share what may be difficult. Confess fears. Communicate your greater ambitions for kingdom work.
- My needs-a prayer request example: I will be stretched in this process of working with explorers. I have never done anything like this before. Please pray that God will use me. Pray that I really understand and believe what I tell the explorers. Pray that the Holy Spirit will open minds to God’s majesty, to have reverent fear of and for him. Please pray that sin would be reviled and confessed; that repentance would lead to salvation and new birth and changed lives would follow.
-- Pray for humility. Transparently, ask for God to use you after he changes you.
Pray for two things:
2) Ask for God to use you,
1) after you ask for Him to change you.
-- As you would call your mother, give your partner-in-prayer occasional updates during, and for sure, after your ministry experience.
-- After camp: Let your partner-in-prayer in on a few stories of what happened at camp. Make a plan with your partner how to continue and for how long.
- Follow-up plans-a prayer request example: I will be seeking to meet with my co-guide and a few of the explorers next week. Pray that the relationships we built at camp can grow. I will be continuing my daily Bible reading in Proverbs. Pray that my example will be an encouragement to the explorers. Pray that when I see the others in my adventure team at church I can be transparent and honest with them.
Summery: Set a time frame -- a limited number of days for your prayer partner to pray for you. Maybe provide a calendar or itinerary. Keep them informed as you progress through each phase of pre-camp, the event and discipleship follow-up. Pray for your prayer partner.
Possible Profile
What might some characteristics be for a prayer person? You may or may not know the person well but at least you should know of them and their interest in spiritual things. Some guidelines for selecting a partner-in-prayer:
- Older in the faith.
- Older in age (5-10 years older than you).
- Same sex as you.
- Shares an interest in your type of ministry endeavor.
- Accessible in one or more of the following ways: in person, goes to your church, or allows you the privilege to connect via phone or internet.
Partners-In-Prayer
Reciprocal
Bless your partner-in-prayer by praying for them.
Mighty
When you and your co-guide have done everything right yet trouble or crises come to your adventure team, what power, other than God, is there? When plans crash, when piercing pain afflicts, when you get to the end of you, is there anything else? Is someone back home “holding the rope” for you and your team? (Rope holding: Joshua 2:15, Jeremiah 38:10-12, Acts 9:25) Ultimately, God rescues us. But your partner-in-prayer will be integral in the process.
Intentional
Asking is a big deal. It puts you in a humble stance with both God and man. God and man may say no to your request. But too, they might say yes! Asking God in prayer is respectful and reverent. Asking shows thoughtfulness and demonstrates trust. Asking someone to ask God on your behalf is asking them to come along with you in the adventure. Camp, ministry and life are all, at some point, beyond our control. So be it. Let God do the impossible through you and through your partner-in-prayer.
Question:
If prayer makes a difference, why don’t more people actually pray?
1) Many people have not seen God answer prayer, (maybe because they haven’t taken the time to pray) so they really don’t believe in prayer.
2) Prayer is a spritiual consideration: For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world’s rulers of the darkness of this age, and against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Ephesians 6:12-13 WEB
3) Prayer takes time, diligence, thought, a right-relationship with God and other not-always-abundant resources.
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Answer: Regardless of what other people think, feel, believe… you can pray.
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