A Day to Pray and a Virtual Prayer Community, episode 65

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If you love a prodigal, you can discover help and hope for your wilderness journey right

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here at When You Love a Prodigal and also help and hope for your own life journey.

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In this episode, we are offering the best gift we can for you and your loved ones.

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We will pray for you.

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We will pray for anyone that you ask us to pray for.

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Be listening so you can know how to get engaged.

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It was June 2nd several years ago.

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18 of us made a large circle in our Florida room.

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We each shared why we had come, a brief overview of our journeys with a prodigal.

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Some were new to me people, and so they were new to me stories.

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Others were reminders of long waits to see challenges, of despair and hope intertwined.

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Some of them just hadn't happened yet, and some were in process.

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What did we have in common?

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We each loved a prodigal.

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Some were taking their first shaky steps in the wilderness and really appreciated hearing

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from people who had walked that path for a longer time.

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Others were feeling their way in a shadowy darkness, no light at the end yet.

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And a few had stories of light and new life and great hope.

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We had all come to the only place we thought offered any answers on our knees.

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We can do all sorts of things.

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We can even do rehabs and programs and information, and they can be helpful.

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But it is on our knees going to the Lord in prayer where we see the change that really

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happens.

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At first our prayers were tentative, were these people we were with safe, but then honesty

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and vulnerability and tears opened our hearts and we connected together at the throne of

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grace, petitioning our Father for each other, for the many who requested prayer, for our

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own loved ones and for ourselves.

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Our prayers became tender, desperate, impassioned.

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We confessed our unbelief and declared our belief.

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We extended arms of faith and love to each other.

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We beseeched and we begged and we hoped to see something happen.

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In the end, we recognized that our prayers were as much for ourselves as for our loved

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wanderers.

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And we acknowledged that loving a prodigal was indeed a wilderness journey, but that

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each beloved prodigal was a gift, a true treasure to make us more and more like Jesus, and gratitude

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filled us even as tears flowed.

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And now it is almost June 2nd again, time for the Worldwide Prodigal Prayer Day.

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Last week we talked about how the Worldwide Prodigal Prayer Day on June 2nd each year

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came to be.

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This week we will look at how it happens each year and how you can be a part of it as much

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or as little as you desire.

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And then I will tell you about our wonderful year-round virtual, safe, and private prayer

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community.

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So perhaps you submitted a name or several to be prayed for on June 2nd.

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Then what?

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You might be asking, how do I participate?

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Let me take a minute to answer the questions that we often get asked.

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First one is, who can pray for prodigals on June 2nd?

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One and everyone can pray from all over the world, because they are all over the world.

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Most often people who love and at risk or rebellious family member are eager to pray.

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Two, what is prayer for prodigals?

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Do I have to be a member to pray on Prodigal Prayer Day?

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Prayer for prodigals, or P for P, is a community of people who have joined on our password-protected

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website for resources, encouragement, and a safe place to request prayer and pray for

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others.

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It is free and all online.

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We sponsor the World Wiped Prodigal Prayer Day, but you don't have to be a member to

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pray with us on June 2nd.

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Information, resources, and personal requests are available to members only because it is

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a password-protected site, but you are welcome to join, and I will explain how at the end

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of this podcast.

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So how do we pray on June 2nd?

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You may pray in any way that works for you.

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You may pray as long or as little as you like.

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Most people try to join with others, friends, neighbors, church, or family.

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Join small groups or unzoom or Google Calls at some point in the day of June 2nd, and

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they may pray for just a short time or an hour or some pray for many hours.

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You can pray by yourself.

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You don't have to do it with someone else.

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Maybe you're not comfortable praying in a group, but God will welcome you to come on

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your knees figuratively, if not literally, to ask Him for your loved one.

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I pray personally, on and off throughout the day.

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There's other living I have to do, but I also have to manage all the requests that are still

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coming in, so I'm on and off getting the names and praying for them.

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But at the end of the day, I almost always have a group like the one I described at the

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beginning who come to my home and will spend a couple of hours together with each other,

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listening and caring, and then praying for each other as well as for our loved ones.

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Then people say, well, that's good, but what I really meant was how do we pray?

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I don't know how to pray like this.

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Again, anyway, you are comfortable.

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There's no prescription.

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There's no requirements.

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I have a booklet and the link will be in the show notes called Prayers for Your Wilderness

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Journey.

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If you don't have a clue how to start praying, this will give you a lot of places to start,

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a lot of ways to pray.

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You might want to click on that link and you can download it.

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It's free.

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It offers just variety of ways to pray and helpful scriptures.

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What is the list?

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The list is the centerpiece of the Prodigal Prayer Day.

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At this time, we have more than 6,000 names for whom prayer has been requested.

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It is only first names, but God knows every one of them.

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Some of us will pray through the entire list, lifting every name up to the Lord, asking

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for him to keep on loving and pursuing these ones who have turned away or been rebellious,

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drawing them back to those who love them and also back to God himself.

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Many will pray for a section.

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It's alphabetical.

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They'll say, well, my prodigal's name begins with C, so I'll pray for all the Cs or something

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like that.

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Whatever works for you.

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We ask that everyone who's participating, spend a little time at least praying for people

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on the list because we promise them if they put the name on the list, we're going to

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pray.

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If you are a member of Prayer for Prodigals, you can access the list there on the welcome

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page.

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If you're not a member, you are always welcome to join us. You can access the list in the

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show notes, probably on the day on June 2.

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I don't always get through the entire list on June 2, so I keep it and keep praying through

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the list because I want to make sure that I pray for every single one of those people.

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You can use it all year.

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It's available, and a group of us meet every couple of months online, and we pray through

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much of the list again and again because we want to be engaged in bringing about what

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God is going to do in each life.

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How do we put names on the list?

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You can look at the link in the show notes, which will tell you you can offer a name for

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the Prayer for Prodigals list, or you can write to prayerforprodigalsedgmail.com.

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You may continue to add names for prayer on June 2 all day, June 2, but it's nice if you

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do it before.

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Another question, is there anything else we need to know?

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If you've not had a chance to read the devotional, so I'll give thanks that I've been writing,

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to help prepare your heart and mind for intensive prayer and entering the battle with the evil

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one, there's a link you can check in the show notes.

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Anything else to bless and encourage you as you pray?

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You might enjoy the Prodigal playlist on Spotify, and there's a link for that as well.

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Then some of you might want to join our virtual community of Prayer for Prodigals.

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We have intentionally required a password, so you feel safe and comfortable to post specific

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requests for your loved one, and maybe other related challenges or the things that it's

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causing in your family.

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Others will also feel safe, so they can post requests.

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We do encourage you, if you join, to try to participate by praying for other requests.

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You can certainly be happy yours is there, but there are others who are asking for prayer,

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and you can do that on your own, or you can join in the highlight of the community and

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write out a prayer for some of those requests.

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It just blesses people so much when they see their request and they see five, eight, ten

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people who have responded with a prayer in response to their request.

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It just is such a blessing and an encouragement that God's listening because many people

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are praying for your request.

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They'll do the same for you.

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They'll come out if you've posted a request or asked us to post a request, which you can

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also do, and they'll come and they'll see your request, and they will pray for it and

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hopefully write out their prayers.

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It makes it a very beautiful community.

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Another thing we would request is that when something happens, either a little more often

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than we would like, it's more things that we need to pray about, but often we get the

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response that say, hear what God did, see what happened in our prodigal's life.

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We really appreciate when you update us because we all then get encouraged to see the answers.

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We love when your update is good news, but even if it's not good news, we'll keep praying.

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So I'm eager to get to pray for your loved ones.

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God bless you.