How to build a better “altar worker” prayer team (Updated and expanded)

A pastor friend asked me how I would improve a prayer team during his services. Here are some thoughts to get you thinking and praying about this team. Pray about what God wants in your culture. Even if you already have a prayer team maybe one of these questions will help you think of areas for improvement.

  1. Why have a prayer team for your services?

Prayer teams can be a powerful point of contact for people with needs. If presented as such, they can also be models of praying for each others to inspire others to pray for each other. Importantly miracles can happen with these teams. Think about the culture God is having you build and how this team would fit with the overall vision. One piece of warning is to be careful on the language you use when introduce this group because you don’t want to create the impression that only certain people can pray. Instead this is a group that have been trained for this setting.

2. Who should be on this prayer team?

This is one of the most important questions when putting together a team like this. Some ideas would be:

  1. Specifically pick a group to be on the team.
  2. You could say that the deacons or elders are automatically the team. This can be great to “call for the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil” (James 5)
  3. You could use your small group leaders or whatever structure you use like that in your church.

Clarifying that the team has been designated for this assignment will help build confidence in the congregation that they can feel safe coming to this group.

3. When in the service should they be used?

If you already have a team simply changing when they are available could bring new life. Two main places I have seen a team like this used is: During the response time at the end of a message and during the singing. Before the singing simply say something like, “Our prayer team will be available during this time if you have a need.”

4. Where should they be?

Most people use the front of the sanctuary for this, but there is no hard rule. Think about your room. Maybe you have space at the back. Even if you use the front you might want to choose one side in case people want to use the other side for personal prayer.

5. What will they pray for?

You may simply have them available for whatever needs people have. You may use them for specific response to your message or be for a specific theme each week like healing or salvation.

6. How will they pray?

I did a specific video teaching on How to Pray for Someone that you could use to train your team in praying with people. A couple of specific thoughts for a service setting: prepare your team for very heavy needs and I have found discernment is key in praying in these situations. Also you will want to give some instruction on how long they should be praying. Again this is something that you can determine in advance or when you call them to their spot say something like, “Our prayer team will be available and we expect a lot of people coming for prayer today so they may be praying shorter prayers.”

So hopefully this will give you some thoughts to get started. What could you do to improve or start and altar worker prayer team?

A Gentle Reminder This Political Season

(Note: This post was originally written 10/16/2012 but we lost it with a website crash. I found the original word document and thought it would be appropriate to bring back in a 2016 United Stated political season-Kevin)

This post may get me in trouble with some of you, but read on anyway. This is high political season in the United States. Let me tell you a story. One of my favorite books of the Bible is Philippians. And I love the back story on the location. You may not know that Philippi was one of the places that had great battles with famous Romans like Brutus and Anthony. After one of these might battles, as a reward for being a place of victory, the whole city of Philippi is granted Roman citizenship. Now this was a big deal. Along with all of the other perks of citizenship the people of Philippi enjoyed the fact that they did not have to pay taxes. Yes, even back then it was about taxes. So this was a group of people that were very proud of their citizenship. So it was probably a little jarring when Paul writes them these words:

But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, (Philippians 3:20)

He was reminding them where their allegiance was to be first. And that is a good reminder for us as well.

What I am not saying

I am not saying that you should not be involved in the political process. Paul even in this book talks about those serving God in “Caesars household.” If God calls you to a political career do it as if you were working for the Lord not men. I am not saying not to vote. In the United States it would be interesting to see what would happen if every Christian actually voted.

What I am saying

Our hope does not come from politics

No matter what political party you support our true hope comes from the Lord the maker of heaven and earth. Certain things in this world will never be right until our Savior comes that we are “eagerly” waiting for from heaven. And this is good news because the Bible reminds us that He is coming.

[tweetthis]Our true hope comes from the Lord the maker of heaven and earth[/tweetthis]

Our loyalty is first with our citizenship in heaven.

As Christians we are dual citizens. But we must remember that our first responsibility is to “seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness” (Matthew 6). No matter the political season we must live a life of love and kindness. We must maintain control of our tongues and lay down our lives for others. For we serve a King who gave up heaven to lay down His life for us.

[tweetthis]No matter the political season we must live a life of love and kindness.[/tweetthis]

So before you go on with your day why don’t you take a moment and pretend to take out your passport for heaven. Take a look at it and commit to living today with the interests of heaven in mind, even in a political season.

How you personally could be the spark for the next great awakening

As a guy who has embraced the nerd within I sometimes enjoy my numbers. As I write this in 2016 I am entering a year of significant numbers. At the beginning of February I will celebrate 20 years since I was pastor of my first church. On Valentine’s Day it will be 20 years since I asked Jennie to marry me. A week later I will celebrate my 40th birthday.

But the number for this post that I want you to think about that has a powerful impact on your life is 40,000. I love the stories of the great awakenings that have happened in history. Even more interesting would be to be a part of the next great move of God. 40,000

One of fun stories of God’s activity in the last couple hundred years was something known as the Welsh Revival. God’s activity that started in this movement is still having ripple effects around the world. Wouldn’t it be fun to be a part of something that God starts which impacts the world 100 years from now? A number for you to think about is 40,000.

What is the significance of that number and what does that have to do with your ability to personally be the spark for that next great move of God? Well hang with this nerd for a moment and you will see. I asked one of my professors from college, who has studied the history of revival, about the numbers of the Welsh Revival. She told me that the numbers are all over the place. Some say 30,000 conversions in a couple months and others say 100,000 in 6 months. But for our purposes I want us to think about the number 40,000.

40,000 is a number that is important for a much more modern reason. Even a simple search will tell you that most people on Twitter have about 200 followers. Most people on Facebook have about 200 friends. If we use that as a baseline number math becomes our friend. If you share a post with your 200 friends and they share it with their 200 friends it could impact 40,000 people. Your tweet that is retweeted with their followers could impact 40,000 people. In the math of a revival that is enough people to start something that could have the impact on the world.

[tweetthis]We may be one prayer and tweet away from the next great awakening.[/tweetthis]

Imagine trying to touch 40,000 people in other time periods. It would be near impossible. We live in an time in history where a person with an internet connection can make a difference.

The key to this working is the activity of God in your own heart. Start by saying, “God start something in my heart that is worth sharing.” Then tweet by tweet and post by post share the goodness of God. Over time I think we will be surprised by our impact.

Your impact maybe won’t be seen till heaven. Or maybe someone will light a spark, one tweet/post/video/hashtag at a time, that will start the greatest move of God this world has ever seen. Will you be that person?

[tweetthis]Will you light a spark to start the greatest revival this world has ever seen?[/tweetthis]