Classic Movement, New Rhythm: A Report from Salvation Army USARyan Milner - 3 Aug 2007
What might God do in 8760 hours? What might He do with 300 communities seeking His face? What might He do with thousands of faithful, with innumerable tears, with an army on its knees?
From June to June, from 2006 to 2007, for twelve months, for 52 unbroken weeks, for 8760 hours, the eastern territory of the United States’ Salvation Army had the faith and strength and hope to ask these same questions. Across the territory, nearly 300 units, from churches to community centers to summer camps to administrative headquarters, passed the baton every Friday at 7:00 PM, engaging together in a year of unbroken 24-7 prayer. One of the most classic and radical movements in modern Christianity was finding a new rhythm. And it’s still moving.
Janet Munn, the eastern territory’s Ambassador of Prayer and Spiritual Formation, had prayer on her heart since she accepted the position in August, 2005.
“As I sought the Lord, prayed, listened, meditated, the 24-7 prayer movement was brought to my attention partly because of friends in Vancouver, Canada who had been praying nonstop for several years,” Munn said, reflecting on her inspiration for spearheading the year of unbroken prayer. “I was also aware of some other Salvationists involved in nonstop prayer in Australia and the UK. I visited IHOP [The International House of Prayer] in Kansas City in November 2005. All these things converged in my heart and it seemed right for us to press together in nonstop prayer.”
Once the call was clear, the logistical challenge of organizing nonstop prayer across one fourth of the United States was aided by the website armyonitsknees.org, a Salvation Army site dedicated solely to organizing, encouraging, and reporting on 24-7 prayer. For an entire year, units across the eastern territory used the site to sign up for a slot from Friday at 7:00 PM to Friday at 7:00 PM. From there, individuals within the unit would volunteer for hour increments during the week. As word spread, the movement soon involved more than even Munn was aware of.
“It is difficult to get an exact count,” she said, trying to gage the exact number who prayed across those 8760 hours. “I know the ones who signed up on the website but I keep finding more who participated that I was not aware of.”
The eastern territory’s one-year anniversary passed on June 8 (celebrated by an 8,000 person event from June 7-10 in Hershey, PA), but according to Munn, they have no intention of slowing down now.
“We passed our one year anniversary,” she said, “but we continue in nonstop prayer as a territory. Once again, the Salvation Army summer camps are praying nonstop and other groups continue to sign up for nonstop prayer. Only the Lord knows where this will lead.”
The affect of the new rhythm, according to Munn, is already apparent.
“Nonstop prayer has begun to change our territory,” she said. “Every time we gather as a people, there is a heightened sense of the Lord’s presence, of holy expectancy for God to show up in our midst and do God things. The sense of hunger for God, His word, His presence, His will- are all heightened and I know it is in relation to the prayer effort in which we’ve been engaged.”
Munn has loved everything the year of prayer has brought- increased interdependence with her fellow Salvationists, the smallest of peeks at what God might do when we seek Him, even an increased understanding of how little the enemy wants believers to band together in prayer. All are testimonies that the Salvation Army East is doing something right.
And now they’re not alone. The Salvation Army southern territory began their own year of prayer on June 11 (with the territory’s headquarters already deeply impacted after their inaugural week of unbroken prayer), and the western territory begins its own year of prayer in September. If the last year in the eastern territory is any indication, it will be even more exciting to see what God might do with two more territories (three-fourths of the Salvationist nation) engaging in their own stretches of 8760 hours of unbroken prayer.
To Munn, this new rhythm, beautifully supplementing a classic movement, is just what the Salvation Army has been needing.
“I long for the Salvation Army to become a house of prayer again,” she said. “That we would really be restored in this priority- pervasively, deeply, utterly. We are not there yet but we are closer than before and continue to head in the right direction.”
But Munn’s deepest desire is that prayer will aid the Salvation Army’s heart for humanitarian service.
“I ache to see believers in my context, including myself, minister out of the overflow of the prayer room or prayer closet,” she said. “When this happens, the lost, the broken, the poor who come to us by the thousands every day, will experience the Isaiah 61 promise, becoming transformed into oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor. They’ll go on to rebuild the ancient ruins, the places long devastated. This is our birthright, mandate, destiny.”
