Unite Canada: 24-7-365-2010 up and running!

by Richard Long,

The National House of Prayer is very honoured to be partnering with other prayer ministries across Canada in 2010 to make it a year of unprecedented prayer.

The Unite Canada: 24-7-365-2010 website is now up and running.

Here’s the opening lines from the vision statement.

The Vision

After gathering with about twenty ministries as part of a national prayer network (Camp Stillwood, BC. Sept 2009) we all sensed the importance of uniting and working together to fuel and inspire more prayer in our nation. An idea birthed out of our meeting was to mobilize a year of non-stop prayer that travels through churches/communities in cities across Canada.

Our hope and dream is to unite Canada in prayer right across the nation, including all generations, denominations, cultures, cities and ministries. Different denominations have completed a year of prayer for their nation (Salvation Army in the UK) and Canadian cities have united in prayer (7 churches in Regina for 40 days)… But we want to go beyond and unite generations, denominations, people groups and ministries in every city to PRAY…. like never before, 24-7-365!

Read more …

Advent II Collect

by Richard Long,

   Well-crafted, written prayers can be powerful in priming the pump for more spontaneous prayers.  The 5o or more “Collects” that are used in the Anglican Tradition, are some of the best short written prayers you can find anywhere.

   If you attend a congregation that is part of that tradition then you will recall hearing the Collect below in today’s service.  It is a great prayer to pray anytime that you open the Word of God.

“BLESSED Lord, who hast caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning: Grant that we may in such wise hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that by patience and comfort of thy holy Word, we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life, which thou hast given us in our Saviour Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end. Amen.”

By the way, it is easy to learn how to write your own collect.  We had our Nazarite interns engage in this exercise in the past week and they came up with some awesome prayers!

There are 5 elements to a collect. 

1. The address to God

2. The attribute of God that you want to honour

3. The request

4. The outcome you hope to see

5. The gloria.  What you praise Him for at the end of your collect.

Prayer Central

by Richard Long,

   In our various trips around the World Wide Web we run across a myriad of interesting resources.  The Holy Spirit is inspiring many people to harness the power of the internet for the purposes of the Kingdom.

Prayer Central is a website hosted in India, that serves a global community.  You can pray for all kinds of targets, including the Mission in Afghanistan, or missions work in different parts of Asia, or even the nation of Israel.  As well there are lots of prayer teaching, inspirational articles, and a daily devotional.

Check out Prayer Central for more information.

Gracious Window – Peter Tigchelaar

by Richard Long,

There is a new CD that I want to highly recommend to you.  It’s the long-awaited album from our good friend Peter Tigchelaar titled – “Gracious Window”.  It’ s not only a highly musical CD, but you will be inspired by the lyrics that come from his poetic heart.  Terry and I often refer to our dear friend as the “Minstrel of Hamilton.”  We want to share him with the rest of you!

Here’s the lyrics from the title song below.  I love that it is a song about prayer.

“But I can see more from on my knees”

You can go to his website and hear 3 sample songs which I am sure will convince you to buy some CD’s for people on your Christmas list.

Go to www.petertigchelaar.com  You can even watch him live on video doing his classical minstrel stuff.

Gracious Window

 

It’s another gracious window

opening out of a broken down day

and here’s yet another faithful stairway

bringing down songs to light the way

 

I don’t know how long it’s going to be open

and I can’t see the end of the galaxies

pouring through this gracious window

but I can see more from on my knees.

 

It’s a big house with many mansions

it’s such a big house, ‘cause it’s the universe

Such risky grace taking so many chances

to rescue each one from the ancient curse

 

I don’t know how long it’s going to be open

so now is your chance,  this is the day

to climb on in this gracious window

come on in – it’s the universe!

 

I don’t know how long it’s going to be open

I can’t see the end of the galaxies

pouring through this gracious window          

cascading down this faithful stairway

but I can see more from on my knees.

 

 words & music by Peter Tigchelaar

 Listen to Gracious Window here.

Emotionally Healthy Spirituality

by Richard Long,

  Terry and I had the wonderful opportunity to join over a hundred other pastoral couples and singles over the last day and a half to participate in an Emotionally Healthy Spirituality seminar here in Ottawa.

  We already had a copy of the book by Pete and Geri Scazzaro, but seeing them in action was a whole other level of training.  It was really challenging and helpful stuff.

   An extra bonus was the material they shared about Contemplative Spirituality in the afternoon session.  I hadn’t realized how deep they had gone in this direction.  They have really sought to implement the Daily Office into the lives of their congregation, including writing A Rule of Life for their staff and their elders.  Since we are really interested in any attempt to work out monasticism in an urban setting, it was wonderful to hear how they are doing that in Queens, New York.

You can learn much more about it at their great website at EmotionallyHealthy.org

 

 

The Christian Institute – UK

by Richard Long,

If you are interested in trends and prayer issues for the United Kingdom, we find that “The Christian Institute” is very informative.  A free email subscription to their newsletter brings in a weekly update of the hot issues “across the pond.”

One reason we subscribe is to see what is coming down the pipe here in Canada.  A lot of the issues that are being faced by the Church in the UK are similar to ours or maybe even a few steps further down the road.  Often what happens there, will eventually happen in our Parliament.

Check out The Christian Institute website here.