Our times of prayer with the youth here in North East, Maryland, were very powerful. In fact so powerful that we could not let it stay in the church. So we took prayer to the streets.
We had prayer journeys. We actually went and prayed for each Jr. High and Sr. High school in our county. It was an awesome time not only for our youth to get together and spend time together. But the time spent was definitely quality time!
We prayed for the students to overcome drugs and alcohol addictions. We prayed that they would overcome depressions and other mental problems that tend to plague our youth. We also prayed for the staff and teachers at each school. We prayed for peace at school and that they could have a good learning environment.
This was at a time when we were having a lot of school incidents across our country but we never had any shootings or bomb threats while others were having a lot of troubles in this area.
We went to one school during our Wednesday Night Youth Service and we all got out (about 30) and scattered around the building to pray. After a few minutes a Vice Principal walked out and he asked me what was happening. I explained that our young people were praying for all the school students and teachers in the county and he thanked me and asked me to come as often as we liked to pray!
One particular Saturday we gathered at church to do a prayer journey to pray for all the Middle and Sr. High schools in our county. By this time we had acclimated our youth and staff about how to pray and what to pray etc… After about the third school out of eight or more that we prayed for that day Gods’ Spirit began to move.
I will never forget going to Oxford High School and there was a game out in the field and a crowd was at the game but the school area was empty. Our youth got out and spread out and began to pray!! I remember they were lying on their faces at the doors weeping and crying out to God for the souls of the students and staff! Then came a time of spontaneous rejoicing and we had a great time! We also had a hard time getting them to load up they were just caught away in the spirit of God!
Just a few days later one of the girls that was at the prayer journey she was asked to pray at the “Meet Me at the Flag Pole”. Her picture and a copy of her prayer were printed on the front page of the news paper.
Next time we write about prayer, we will write about taking our prayer to other communities!