Frontline Prayer

Since the fall of 2022, nearly every Wednesday a small group has gathered to pray for the health of our church and for God’s work among us. It is not an exaggeration to say that this commitment to pray has been foundation to the gospel renewal we’ve experienced together as a church. Throughout history, every significant movement of God has been marked by what Jonathan Edwards called “extraordinary prayer.” Prayer that is united, persistent, and kingdom-centered.

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Revelation 8:1-5 tells us that at the end of time the prayers of the saints will rise before God as a holy offering, revealed as the very means by which he accomplished his work through his people. Prayer is not a warm-up for ministry. I heard it said recently, “prayer is the work.”

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Frontline Prayer

Timothy Keller wrote in Center Church that “what is important is not the number of people praying, but the nature of the praying." Drawing on the work of C. John Miller, he distinguished between “maintenance” prayer and “frontline” prayer. Maintenance prayer is often focused on the physical needs inside the church, whereas frontline prayers focus on the priorities of our mission together.

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Our Wednesday prayer time follows this frontline pattern. Each week we focus on four requests:

1. That unity and love would be marks of our church family
2. That God would give us grace to confess sin and humble ourselves
3. That we would have compassion and zeal for the flourishing of the church and reaching of the lost
4. That we would have a yearning to know God, to see his face, to glimpse his glory

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Far from becoming stale, these requests spark fresh prayers each week and keep us centered on what matters most. While we also lift up physical needs, we keep those as the minor note, not the major theme, of our time together.

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Simple and Accessible opportunity to pray

We’ve worked to make this prayer rhythm easy for anyone to join:

• Wednesdays at noon - so you can join us on your lunch break
• 30 minutes - short and focused
• Virtual - join from wherever you are in the world
• Every week - consistent and dependable

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Whether you join often, occasionally, or not at all, we want you to know this rhythm exists and that God has honored it in powerful ways. If you do join, there is no pressure to pray out loud, you can simply participate silently and agree with the prayers offered. And if you cannot join, you can still join us in the Spirit by praying these four frontline requests for River City once a week.

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We’d love to see you on a Wednesday

We would love to see you for prayer sometime in the next few months. If you're interested in joining, check out our events page.

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_{[1] Timothy Keller, Center Church, (Zondervan, Grand Rapids, MI, 2010), p. 73.}