40 Days

My hubby as you all know is a pastor. A larger group of pastors meet on occasion, but he attends a smaller local monthly meeting. Last month there were six different churches represented in the meeting. After a time of worship, what evolved in the next fourteen minutes was a miracle. These men thought it would be a good idea to start the new year with forty days of prayer and fasting. That all six churches would meet weekly during this time period and pray as a corporate body for our city. Here’s the cool part of this story, other churches heard about it and wanted to participate. There are twenty four churches that are committed to fast for the next forty days. They were inspired by this scripture verse:

2 Chronicles 7:14 “If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”

The only agenda is to ask God for more of His manifest presence in our area.

Fasting for me is a time of giving something up that I enjoy and in its place (when I crave it) spurs me to pray. It’s a time of drawing nearer to God. Some of the people in our church are fasting various things such as; television, sugar, coffee, meats, etc. There is no wrong way to fast. It is something that is between you and God. I decided I should fast snacks. What I’ve discovered is you don’t realize how much you do something until you stop doing it. Let’s just put it this way, I pray a lot lately.

Last night was the first of six weekly prayer meetings. Different churches will host the meetings and the pastors will take turns leading them. Last night two different pastors and various members from their worship team worked together to facilitate the meeting. There were about five hundred people who showed up to pray together. The place was packed out. You can feel the excitement in the air. It was wonderful. I can only imagine this number growing.

I’m very excited and encouraged by this. Unity among God’s people is very pleasing to Him. A lot can happen in forty days. I can’t wait to see what next week brings.

© Nadine Z. 2008