Prayer Ministry

Our prayer group meets to pray for the church, its members, and their concerns.  You are invited to join us as we explore the wonders of our conversations with God. Email your prayer request to Rev Cramer or use our Contact Us Form.

Early in 2012 we began a ministry of healing prayer, similar to the prayer shawl ministry. If you are interested in joining us in this effort, please let us know. This group meets the 2nd Wednesday of each month at 6:30 PM. All are invited to attend.

 Some Thoughts on Prayer

Prayer changes our relationship to ourselves, each other, and to God.  Without it we lose our living connection to God. We can talk about God, but if we do not talk to God in prayer our conversation becomes meaningless.  Since our fundamental needs can only be satisfied by God, God wants us to pray.  Our prayers, both individual and communal, unite us in Christ.

These prayers, our dialogue with God, can take many different forms some of which are petition, intercession, lament, confession, praise, and thanksgiving.  Our first prayers are almost always centered in our own desires. In essence, it is a form of self-discovery that usually precedes all others as we learn to conform our wills to God’s will.  The Lord’s Prayer provides the perfect format for our petitionary prayers.

Petitionary prayers for healing center us in God’s healing power and immerse us in God’s peace. Illnesses, whether they are physical, mental or spiritual, block our ability live whole and healthy lives. When we pray for healing we need to be open to all the ways God can heal us because it is not always in ways that we want or think we need because God heals us first on the inside, addressing the needs of our souls so that other forms of healing can take place. Sometimes we will be made well or led to those who God uses to achieve the cure to our physical or mental challenges.  Other times what we really require is the strength to live within our limitations.

The wonder of intercessory prayer is its binding power as Christians lift each other up in prayer.  Praying with those in need is at the heart of the Christian life.  Thus all pastoral care must begin and end in prayer.  Yet the power of intercessory prayer extends beyond the immediate community, opening it to others in need.  Rather than creating a community that closes in on itself, the experience should produce people who are engaged with the world and concerned with social justice.  These prayers are integral to the human relationships.

Prayers of lament are too often ignored in a world where only a few stories belong to the whole community. Tragedies such as 9/11 and Katrina demonstrate the illusion of our self-sufficiency.  For people of faith, lament is the alternative to despair.  Prayers of lament represent the cries of those who have the courage to hope in God.  Suffering shared by a community provides consolation when the future looks bleakest. The resurrection, God’s response to the cross of Jesus Christ and thus the suffering of humankind, affirms the goodness of God.

Prayers of confession represent our response to the human condition as an honest self-examination and sacrifice of our sin to God, yet some churches no longer use prayers of confession during worship.  Since sin breaks our relationship with God, we are left spiritually empty and unable to wrestle with the seriousness of sin.  Confession prepares the way for our reconciliation allowing God to cleanse and renew our souls.

A community that is able to follow Paul’s directive to rejoice always and to pray constantly is only possible with all of the aforementioned prayer techniques in common use.  God’s steadfast love endures forever, but the church must be reminded of this frequently.  God is always there to listen to our prayers, no matter what form they take and for that we must be forever thankful, praising God always, and counting our blessings.