The Week of Prayer is a time to pay special attention to our prayer lives, together as a church. Something like a ‘prayer MOT’. Prayer is a great gift from God — that we can be in relationship with him through his grace and Jesus’s work on the cross, that we can call him Father, and that he cares deeply for us and wants to hear our prayers.

But do you treat prayer like that is true? I know I don’t.

Prayer can too often become something that gets swept out by busyness and the demands of our chaotic schedules. The purpose of the Week of Prayer is to stop; to make us aware of how we pray and encourage us to look towards God in our day to day lives and to be praying more.

There will be prayer meetings in the mornings and evenings at 7:30, some in person in different locations across London, and some on Zoom. We will have our Central prayer meeting on Wednesday, our dedicated time when we pray together as a church family once a month, and on Saturday evening we will have a time for praise and worship.

Something I have found particularly helpful about the Week of Prayer in the past is the morning emails. These include devotionals written by members of Globe, a song for the day, and some specific things to be praying for. As someone who can find it easy to be overwhelmed by all the things there are to bring to God, it is great to have some valuable pointers on what to devote my time in prayer to, which helps my easily distracted mind to stay focused. I also love hearing the thoughts of different members of our church. This year we will be focusing on some verses from Ephesians 3 throughout the week.

Quite a lot going on, right? But don’t feel overwhelmed! This is primarily a time for us to think more closely about how we pray, and how we can be praying more both individually and as a church. Here are a few ideas that might help us to get the most out of the week:

1. Don’t try to go to everything.

Don’t fill your schedule with every prayer meeting and event and end up exhausted. Pick out one or two things to come along to, maybe joining up with your Focus group, and use the rest of the week to pray and meditate on what you are learning.

2. Use the daily emails to inform your prayer.

Take inspiration from the thoughts of the devotional writers, use the prayer points in the emails, use the songs of the day for your worship. As the emails come out first thing in the morning, we can use them to direct our prayer throughout the day.

3. Enjoy each other’s company.

Learn from how other people pray in prayer meetings. Talk with your church family about the ways they like to pray and try new things out to see if you enjoy them. Pray through the verses together, knowing that you are brothers and sisters in Christ.

I am praying that as a church family we will have a week of finding great joy in prayer, and that we would grow together in our knowledge of God’s incredible love for us.