USA: God's up to something big! - 13 Dec 2004

Non-stop prayer combined with preaching bodybuilders breaking bricks with their heads made an impact on 250 people who gave their lives to Jesus during a 24-7 week in the US city of Salem, Oregon. Meanwhile in the same church, Salem City, a middle aged business men said drawing some prayer-room art with crayons was the most spiritual thing he'd done in months!

Brian Watson writes from Oregon's state capital : "The week was awesome!  We have run a couple "bootleg" prayer rooms at the YWAM campus out in the Oregon countryside, but my mind has been conspiring for months about praying 24-7 in the city.  

I talked with my pastor and he gave us the green light to pray in the basement of our church right in the middle of downtown Salem.  I love the fact that 24-7 is Christ centered, Mission Minded prayer, so it only makes sense to put your self in a postion to engage those you're praying for!  So, we decided to pray 24-7 in conjunction with an outreach we were doing as a church.  

It was a silly outreach with muscle men breaking bricks with their heads and running through big chuncks of ice but the gospel was preached.  Entire families responded to the message and surrendered their lives.  One kid that our youth group had been praying for  months and months decided to make Jesus Lord of his life.

All the while, we were praying non-stop!  It was obvious that God was up to something big at the very beginning of the week when we kicked off the prayer room.  There was so much enthusiasm and a sense that many have been waiting for something like this and just didn't realize it until now!  So we began!

The next couple of days I was bombarded with the usual complaint of  "one hour with God isn't enough".  They loved the freedom of being able to express their hearts to God in new and creative ways.  

One middle aged, business man in our church said, "yeah, picking up those crayons and drawing was probably the most spiritual thing I've done in months".  There is one guy in particular who came alive this week while being with God in the 24-7 prayer room!  He admitted, "God taught me how to pray this week".

He's already helping spear head the next stint of 24-7!  48 people spent an hour or more in the prayer room throughout the week from a number of different churches in the city.

As the week progressed it was obvious by the artwork hanging from the clothes line and graffitti on the walls that God was opening our eyes to the fact that His heart is for the people of Salem and beyond!  

We prayed like never before for the harvest and God heard our prayers.  We have over 250 new friends in the community that handed their lives over to Jesus last week and all we did was simply pray and put our own feet to those prayers, God is sooo amazing!  We really feel so honored to have played a small part in bringing pleasure to His heart this week... and it's just the beginning!

Yeah, so we're already planning round two of 24-7 for the end of January. Thanks for your support and inviting us to be a part of this crazy, organic, non-stop prayer movement."