Session 5: "Prayer of Thanksgiving & For God's Direction"

Owned by David Hina
Last updated: Mar 07, 2017
2 min read
  1. PURPOSE:  In 1 Tim 1:12, Paul said, "I thank him who has given me strength, Christ Jesus our Lord, because he judged me faithful, appointing me to his service."  We need to thank God.  He has appointed us to his service, and given us all that we need in our service to Him.  Let's take this time to thank Him for calling us out of darkness to Himself and into service before Him, and for equipping us for our service to Him.  Then take some time to pray for wisdom and direction as we seek more and more to be a church of disciples, making disciples for Jesus Christ.
  2. PROCESS:
    1. We'll break up into two groups, with each group spending time in Thanksgiving and then praying for God's direction.
    2. As prayer targets, use those that we produced at the end of each session, as well as the ones listed below.
    3. Plan to finish by about 2:15pm.
  3. ADDITIONAL PRAYER TARGETS:
    1. Women leadership:  Ask God to raise up a woman or women, who are submitted to Him and to His purposes, and who would have a heart for discipling the women of the church, desiring to see them develop as mature disciples of Christ.
    2. Young adult leadership:  Pray that we would be able to engage the young adults (Nathan, Josh (Lauren?), Mary, Sarah, Becca, Jessie (Tony?)) in God's Word, answering their questions, and giving them spiritual direction.  This may mean establishing a S.S. class, weekly one-on-one mentoring/discipleship, or some other type of group with a leader, or....
    3. Ministry of the Word:  Ask the Lord to use the ministry of preaching and teaching at Providence as the foundation for building up the body, "for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that [the members of Providence] may be complete, equipped for every good work. 
    4. Baptizing:  Pray that through these discipleship initiatives and changes to our culture, that the Lord would bear fruit amongst us in terms of conversion and new members through baptism.
    5. Discipleship Process:  Pray that we would rightly understand the key elements of any discipleship process - what must be in place to produce mature, equipped followers of Jesus Christ?  Then pray, based upon a right understanding of those key elements, that God would help us to develop a very specific disciple-making process that is suitable for Providence (taking into account our size, setting, community make-up, gifts of the body, etc.).

Session #5 Output:

Prayer Targets (from the first 4 sessions):

  1. Lord, show me where I am as a disciple of Jesus Christ.
  2. Lord, convict me of those around me who NEED discipling.
  3. Help us Lord, from a right heart, to properly assess how you desire your church (Providence) to look and function, from your Word.
  4. Help us to truly & accurately capture the needs for discipleship, and through the Spirit to implement plans for growth in maturity.
  5. Lord, place the NEED on our hearts that gives us YOUR Vision for our church, and make us UP TO that Vision.