Prayer Arrows: Use Me

The Arrow Prayers are ©2000 Kay and Steve Morgan-Gurr. 

Art work is by Neil Crook

Use Me.

The Arrow that points around and out. 

God can use you, however old you are - whether you are a brand new Christian or an old and whiskery one... He can use you in many different ways at home, at school or at church.

You will need to ask the Holy Spirit to help you see where you can be used.

James 2:17b (TLB)

Faith that doesn’t show itself by good works is no faith at all—it is dead and useless.

When I do this prayer with children I 

talk through the different ways God can use them. Quite often it's just common sense - begin with doing what you should be doing. Tidying your room and doing your chores without complaining for a start!

Being used by God isn't just about being up front, leading hundreds to Jesus, or leading worship etc. It's also being faithful in other things - shopping for someone who can't get out, helping in the garden for some one who can't do it themselves. The list could go on and on.

Micah 6:8 tells us

The Lord has told you, human, what is good; he has told you what he wants from you: to do what is right to other people, love being kind to others, and live humbly, obeying your God.  (NCV)

That says it all really!

Other Prayer Arrows can be found here:

Praise

Thanks

Sorry

Listen

Walk

More to come!

Prayer Arrows: Listen

The Arrow Prayers are ©2000 Kay and Steve Morgan-Gurr. 

Art work is by Neil Crook

Listen.

Lots of Arrows that point in. 

Prayer isn't just about talking... It's listening too.
We should try to 'hear' what God is saying to us today, and give time for His word (The Bible) to sink in.

1 Samuel 3:8-9 (TLB)

So now the Lord called the third time, and once more Samuel jumped up and ran to Eli.
“Yes?” he asked. “What do you need?”
Then Eli realised it was the Lord who had spoken to the child. So he said to Samuel, “Go and lie down again, and if he calls again, say, ‘Yes, Lord, I’m listening.’”
So Samuel went back to bed.

What we are aiming to do with this arrow is create the habit of being still for a moment, to reflect and give the Holy Spirit a chance to do what He does rather than giving a breathless 'shopping list' and then running away. Stillness is rare in today's world - especially in prayer!

When I do this prayer with children I often joke that this is the bit of prayer that grown ups are not very good at!

It's a scary one to do with children, but you can do it with almost any prayer station, as many of them require the children to think - to meditate.

There is a fashion for emptying the mind and seeing what drops in - personally I think approaching 'listening to God' like this can be dangerous.

I prefer the listening bit of prayer to be in response to something we have learnt, read or heard. Some would say that if we guide we don't give the Holy Spirit room...... Well, I'm please to say that the Holy Spirit is bigger than that and works beyond what is in the human mind. I am convinced it is better and wiser to start with something of God in our minds than with nothing.

Some folk will find this scary - "What if God doesn't speak?"

Well - to start with, we need to be careful in how we explain this. How does God speak? It can be in many ways - it can be in an audible voice, but that is rare. Often it's something that stands out in our minds from what we have heard, and as we meditate on it, we can be comforted or challenged etc

We also need to be careful to teach the children about measuring what we 'hear' alongside the Bible and talking to trusted Christians.

When we do this as a specific activity I make it clear that not everyone will hear something at that moment, but that it's good to take the time to listen. We use music, a phrase from what we have learnt that day, a Bible verse or a specific aspect of God to reflect on. We have been amazed at the response from some of the children - it's worth a go!

How do you do the stillness and listening part of prayer? It's one I'm still trying to master - a fibro brain doesn't lend itself to stillness!

Other Prayer Arrows can be found here:

Praise

Thanks

Sorry

Use Me

Walk

(More coming over the next few days)

Prayer Arrows: Sorry

The Arrow Prayers are ©2000 Kay and Steve Morgan-Gurr. 

Art work is by Neil Crook

Sorry.

The Arrow that points around and in. 

Being truly sorry means:
I know I have done wrong, I will try not to do it again, I will ask for God's help when I am tempted, and I want to forgive others because God has forgiven me

The fantastic news is that because of Jesus - if we truly say sorry to God and mean it,
He will forgive us!

1 John 1:9 (TLB)

But if we confess our sins to him,[a] he can be depended on to forgive us and to cleanse us from every wrong. And it is perfectly proper for God to do this for us because Christ died to wash away our sins.

Psalm 103:11-13 (TLB)

11) for his mercy toward those who fear and honour him is as great as the height of the heavens above the earth. 12) He has removed our sins as far away from us as the east is from the west. 13) He is like a father to us, tender and sympathetic to those who reverence him.

When I do this prayer with children I use different activities - it depends on the age and stage of the children.

Some times I do 'Fizzy Prayers' (Click the link to see what this is)

Sometimes I get the children to write or draw their sorry prayers and we put the prayers through the shredder.

Occasionally we will write them on flash paper, get the children to fold them, and put them in a bowl...... and then I set light to them. (Flash paper does what it says - it disappears in an instant flash when lit). You may need to do a risk assessment on this!

With some children we get them to pin their prayers on a wooden cross - with the promise we won't read them!

Other Prayer Arrows can be found here:

Praise

Thanks

Listen

Use Me

Walk

(More coming over the next few days)

Prayer Arrows: Thanks

The Arrow Prayers are ©2000 Kay and Steve Morgan-Gurr. 

Art work is by Neil Crook

Thanks.

The Arrow That Points Backwards. 

We are supposed to be thankful for everything. Even the things we may not like!
Remember to be especially thankful for Jesus and what He has done to make it possible for us to know God and have the Holy Spirit living inside us

1 Thessalonians 5:18 (TLB)

No matter what happens, always be thankful, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.

When I do this prayer with children, I ask them what they are thankful for. The answers usually range from parents to sweets. Sometimes we get named pets or a favourite sport (Usually football)

I then start saying things that may not be on their list of things to be thankful for:  Brussel sprouts, the dentist, little brothers etc.
We then talk through the fact that these can be good things - we can be thankful that sprouts and the dentist are good for us. Sometimes we even look for the nice things about having a little brother!

Sometimes this will lead to a more in depth discussions about bad things that happen where it doesn't feel right to be thankful. Great sensitivity is needed during these time and I often agree with what they are saying - it would be cruel to tell them that they need to be thankful for awful things that may be happening to them, but encourage them to find something within those circumstances to be thankful for. It may just be "Thankyou that there are people who can help me". It can be a huge help to a child to see that they are not alone in the situations they face. (You may want to read a blog I wrote called "God's Will")

I like to use "Sweet wrapper prayers" to re-enforce this:

• Have some bright, flexible but strong paper you can use as sweet wrappers, plus some small square bits of paper.
• Get the child to write/draw what they want to say thankyou for on the square bit of paper
• Scrunch the “prayer” into a ball and wrap it in the bright paper like a sweet

Drop the sweet into a glass/clear plastic bowl and pray/say amen

Other Prayer Arrows can be found here:
Praise
Sorry
Listen
Use Me

Walk
(More coming over the next few days)

Prayer Arrows: Praise

The Arrow Prayers are ©2000 Kay and Steve Morgan-Gurr. 

Art work is by Neil Crook

Praise.

The Arrow that points up. 

Think about who God is, and what He is like

.......and tell Him.

Psalm 8:2 (TLB)

You have taught the little children to praise you perfectly. May their example shame and silence your enemies!

When I do this prayer with children, I do 'Shouting Prayers'.

I ask them to think of a word that describes God and say what it is.

It could be a real word: Big, Awesome, Wonderful, Loving.......

It could be a made up word: Humunginormous, Fandabiedozie, Wonderbig......

We then turn those words into a prayer.

I start with "Dear God, we think you are..." Then all the children shout their word out - lots of different words shouted at the same time. We then close with a "Wind Up" Amen (Something quite difficult to explain here..... but it's fun!)

There's loads of songs out there that can back this up too!

Other Prayer Arrows can be found here:

Thanks

Sorry

Listen

Use Me

Walk

More to come!

Praying With A Foggy Brain - There's An App For That.

(Check out the preceding posts to this: "What Was I Praying?" and "Is Prayer A Duty Or A Joy?")

I’ve been looking for ages for a journal app I can use for prayer, notes and thoughts. 

I needed one that enables me to use larger fonts on a clear and uncluttered background. 

None of those from Christian app writers cater for people with vision problems, so that shrunk the possibilities a lot!  

I also wanted one I could use across all devices - not easy when your computer/tablet is Apple and your phone is Android! 

But then I found and iPad/iphone app called ‘Awesome Note’ . (Christian app writers could learn a lot from looking at this very accessible app!)

This app is completely customisable - even down to what folders you want, what you want them to look like and how you want to use them. You can arrange the folders in any order and name them too. 

It also syncs with Evernote - my chosen note taking app, so I can look up stuff when I haven’t got my iPad. It's the best £2.99 I’ve ever spent on an app!

So why did I need an App?

It’s because of the tools I have found useful for my prayer life - with this app I can put them all in one place, and make notes as I use them. With a brain like mine I can easily forget.

These things are:

• A Prayer Book - I love old prayers - they have ancient and beautifully crafted words, and much thought has gone into what is in them. My favourite is the  ‘Prayers of the Reformers’ book. I bought a similar kindle prayer book and often ‘screen shot’ prayers and drop them into Awesome Note to use more frequently - especially if one mirrors how I feel I should be praying for a specific person or circumstance.

• Written Prayer - I have those moments where I start to pray for someone or something and then think “I don’t know what to pray”. (Yes I know about tongues - but not everyone has that gift….). I think it's helpful to write specific prayers and drop them into this app. I don’t think God minds us doing that. Somedays I'll read it as my prayer, but on other days it may be the catalyst for more. 

• Bible verses - There’s some great examples of praise in the psalms, there’s also some great examples of pleading with God. The Epistles give us some lovely examples of praying for others. I like to drop these into my journal too so I can pick them out to pray with. 

For example:

Ephesians 1:15-19(MSG)

“That’s why, when I heard of the solid trust you have in the Master Jesus and your outpouring of love to all the followers of Jesus, I couldn’t stop thanking God for you—every time I prayed, I’d think of you and give thanks. But I do more than thank. I ask—ask the God of our Master, Jesus Christ, the God of glory—to make you intelligent and discerning in knowing him personally, your eyes focused and clear, so that you can see exactly what it is he is calling you to do, grasp the immensity of this glorious way of life he has for his followers, oh, the utter extravagance of his work in us who trust him—endless energy, boundless strength!

• Music - I sometimes find it a distraction, but sometimes it’s something that draws me to prayer. If I come to prayer agitated I find it often ‘resets my soul’. I can't drop the actual music into the app, but I can write in a part of my journal if a song has helped.

• Devotions - More often than not, my daily reading will set a conversation going with God - so I have my journal in Awesome Note too. A good place to look back when I need reminding of what God is saying to me

Using all these things is a help, but I am also aware that change is crucial. This app is useful for this too - I can have lots of ways to pray in there. If I'm having a bad day I can use a more guided/prescriptive approach (Written prayers and Bible verses). On my better days I can be freer - rewriting prayers as circumstances change or the Holy Spirit reveals more.

Using something completely different to pray on some days is good - I sometimes use my prayer arrows book to focus on the different aspects of prayer. (That’s another blog!) I've dropped all the pictures from this book into Awesome Note so I can recall them, because on my bad days I won't remember all of them (If any!)

Others use the Lord’s Prayer as a guide, or an acronym such as A.C.T.S (“Adoration, Confession. Thanks and Supplication” Lots of big words there, which is why we wrote the prayer arrows). If you go for this approach to quiet times - you may want to use these and drop them into a journaling app..... or even a hand written journal if you prefer!

I hope this is helpful.

Be blessed in your praying.

What was I Praying?

Let’s be honest - we all find prayer difficult at some point in our lives, and for many different reasons.

If you were like me, you were brought up in a church where great value was placed on how long you prayed for in a morning - to rise early and spend at  least 30 minutes with God. (Subtext to that - “but an hour makes you a better Christian”)

Prayer meetings all had a similar flavour, where ancient worthies would pray for over 10 minutes using beautiful language - but some of which I couldn’t understand. I couldn’t listen/concentrate for that long and I couldn’t live up to this expectation.

I did pray out loud once as a teenager: A bunch of us who played badminton on a friday night with our church youth group would take ourselves off for half an hour to pray for our “non Christian friends”. I prayed for a guy I’d met through my Saturday job - apparently my prayer didn’t quite hit the mark. It took a very long time to pluck up the courage to pray out loud again! No one seemed to place any worth on the fact I valued prayer enough to actually be there rather than stay and play an extra game of badminton!

Whilst we’re being honest, we probably need to say that some of us just don’t have the concentration to cope with praying long public prayers or trying to pray for 30 minutes at a time (especially in the morning). And it’s not just those with Attention Deficit Disorder!

There are some who can do all this - but I suspect that this is often more down to personality than it is to being an uber-amazing Christian. It’s at this point I usually get shouts of ‘Heretic - burn her’! (Or the modern-day evangelical equivalent)

I totally agree that without prayer and without time to study God’s word our faith would just sink. It is vital to our survival.

But if you have one of many chronic illnesses, it can be quite hard to do what well meaning Christian teachers tell us we should do.

There are many conditions that make first thing in the morning the worst time to pray and read, there are conditions that make concentration hard  too.

For example, one of the conditions I have has an associated problem that can affect concentration, memory, the ability to put sentences together and being able to remember exactly what you were saying by halfway through that sentence. You can blank out very quickly too!

I’ve chatted to others with similar issues who not only struggle with quiet times/prayer, but also the guilt laid on them because they can’t ‘do prayer like they’re supposed to’. They are adults, teenagers and children. And it is for them I’m putting together a series of blogs on praying when you can’t concentrate for long. I hope that some of the info will also be useful for Children’s leaders who want to do more praying with their groups.

The truth is, over many years the 'church' has added to the rules of praying. We've put these rules on to new Christians for all the best intentions - we want to make sure the habit of prayer is formed early. 

It's a great aspiration!

But we forget the God has made us all with different personalities, and not all of us can follow this prescribed way of praying.

I was really helped by a comment by a friend in my home group. He said "Prayer is about my relationship with God, not what I ask for". If we pray, and our relationship with God grows, does it really matter how we get there?

For me, I am so thankful to now have people around me who just ‘get’ how I have to function. They appreciate my ‘constant conversation’ approach to prayer. Plus I’m grateful for those who work with me and never judge me if I don’t pray during those necessary early morning prayer meetings at camps and conferences - just because my speech jumbles in the early morning. 

I love those early morning prayer meetings…. I’d just rather not try to pray out loud!

Blessed are the Merciful - Talking Mercy

“Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.”

(Matthew 5 verse 7)

A popular children's song says: "Mercy is when God does NOT give us what we deserve"

God has shown us mercy. (Not going to explain that in this blog - if you're using this in your own children's work, I'm sure you can do that bit!)

In response to God's mercy, we too show mercy.

This can be forgiving people and not getting our own back. Some people also think this is being 'merciful' in what we do - that is, doing kind things for people who need help (Food banks, Raising money to get clean water into villages in Africa, raising awareness about the slave trade and lots more)

Showing mercy often starts by saying something, so we'll be using post it notes in the shape of speech bubbles to write or draw our prayers on. 

You may want to say thankyou for God's mercy. You may want to say "I forgive the person who upset me" or "help me to forgive".

Do one speech bubble about showing mercy to people in need - it could be anything, may be something you've seen on the news. 

I'll be praying about girls who live in countries where they not allowed to go to school - I want them to be able to learn.

POST SUMMER UPDATE: How did it go?

Again - I wasn’t sure of the impact this would have on the children, but reading all the prayers afterwards - I was amazed at the insight in them. 

At the conference, we encouraged them to ask God if there was someone they should forgive or people they should show more mercy to. We also said not to name people!

One girl didn’t want us to see her prayer and threw it out of the window. We encouraged her to go and get it and put it in her bible, and re-assured her that we didn’t mind if she kept it between her and God.

For another child who was struggling with faith, it was a glimpse of a heart cry to God.

Some of the prayers from camp were far too personal to put here, but here are three of the ones we can show:

Blessed Are the Meek - An Explosive Prayer

Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth 

(Matt 5 v 5)

Meek sounds like weak doesn't it?

But it isn't! It's all about having the power and the strength to hurt or destroy, but choosing not to. 

You've seen how some people always get angry or constantly grumbling about things haven't you? Or seen people always trying to 'get even'?  This is the opposite of meek

Part of being meek is being content in what ever situation we find ourselves in - especially when we can't change that situation, but instead relying on God for what we need. 

(There are some situations that we can and should change - especially if we are being hurt by someone. If this is the case, we should ask someone we trust for help. This isn't getting your own back, it's keeping ourselves and others safe.)

This is not about being a 'doormat'. It's about responding to people and situations in a way that makes God happy.

We're using Fun Snaps to pray about meekness!

These are amazing - if only the explosive part of them were in the packaging, it would be really dangerous and could hurt. But those who make them have put other things in them to make them safer - they are still effective (They go bang!) but they don't hurt you.

With God in our lives, we can be really effective - but we can choose not to hurt people. If everybody followed this beatitude - the results would be explosive!

Let pray about that - and then throw your fun snap on the floor.

POST SUMMER UPDATE: How did it go?

The whole teaching for this went really well (What is written above is only a very small snapshot of the teaching) - mainly because the children on the camp had given me so many wonderful examples of the opposite to meek that I could use!!

You would think this prayer activity would cause a riot wouldn’t you?!

It had an enthusiastic response with both groups, and the children got what we were trying to do.

It was a military operation to get the 64 children on camp to throw them at the same time, but the majority did go off at the same time!

The only down side for the children at the conference was the strength needed to throw the snap hard enough - all of our 5 and 6 year olds had to try twice. (Plus one child with the ‘naggers’ who wanted to make a point by throwing it a few seconds after everyone else - but his bid for independence in this was over shadowed by the younger ones doing it twice!)

I gave the chemical compound for fun snaps as part of the teaching, (as given on a website), but having repeated the teaching at church on Sunday - I was corrected by someone who knows about these things. So, if you see a website that says Silver nitrate - it’s wrong, it’s actually silver fulminate (Thanks to Ray Smith for correcting me on this)

Blessed Are Those Who Mourn - Fizzy Prayers

Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

(Matthew 5 verse 4)

This Beatitude is talking about being really sad for the wrong things we do. Along side that, it also means being really sad about the bad stuff in the world.

Use the dissolvable vitamin tablets to help you pray about the wrong stuff. 

Use the first tablet to say sorry for the wrong things you have done, watch it dissolve as you pray. The tablet will disappear - this represents the forgiveness God promises when we say sorry and mean it.

Use the other tablet to pray about something that is bad in the world (That might be slavery, hunger, bullying - anything that you are passionate about stopping). As the tablet dissolves, pray that the bad stuff you are talking to God about would end. But remember - you may be part of the answer to that prayer!

POST SUMMER UPDATE: How did it go?

This worked to a point, but the novelty factor took over a little. On the camp, trying to make it work for 64 kids was a challenge. Using 6 stations helped, and they certainly got what we were doing. One of our boys who had ASD pointed  out the left over scum on the top of the water, saying that although God forgets when He forgives, there is always something left over (The consequences). Quite profound! I think he ‘got it’.

For the other group, I had used a different brand of vitamin tablet that had no scum, but a very strong orange smell. A great sensory experience for most, but a little too much for one child who backed away quite quickly. (In the process of being tested for ASD - so not a surprise)

For those doing this - The Wilkinson’s brand leaves scum, but not such a strong smell. The Superdrug brand is the one with a very strong smell.

NOTE: I came across this idea when working with the amazing Orison and Prayer Spaces In Schools. I just added the "pray for the bad stuff in the world" bit. 

Do check them out!

Blessed Are The Poor In Spirit - Zip Prayers

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Matthew 5 v 3

Being poor in spirit is all about knowing you need God - the opposite is being arrogant, ‘full of yourself’, and thinking you can do things on your own and in your own way.

In this prayer activity, the zip represents where we are with God.

Zips pull things close together, so a completely closed zip means we are close to Him and fully reliant on Him. (Remember the ‘Frog’ bracelets!)

If the Zip is completely open - then that means are fully reliant on ourselves and God doesn’t get a look in.

Using the zip, think about how you rely on God.

There are lots of degrees of this - you may believe in God but still live as though you can do life without Him - so your zip could be at any point in between.

POST SUMMER UPDATE: How did it go?

Because this was a bit of a tenuous link I was doubtful that all would get it, but they seemed to. Whilst I was talking about it on camp and summarising the talk with the zip, something occurred to me. Zips on jeans have a ‘lock’ mechanism - if the tab is pushed all the way down, it locks the zip at the top. So I used this to talk about staying close to God and recognising how much we need to stay close to God. 

How do you lock your “Spiritual” zip? Keep talking to Him and reading the Bible are just two things you can do!

I took great care in explaining this activity - and all, with a couple of exceptions, seemed to get it. 

The couple of exceptions were children who were over tired and grumpy. The first night on camps and conferences are always bad for children! But even they got it by the middle of the week.

On camp, there was an added bonus……

We had a some children who were bordering on ADHD. Having told the campers to keep the zip in their Bibles, I noticed that for the rest of the week they would sit and fiddle with it during the ‘talky’ bits in the meetings thus helping them to listen. I also noticed a few leaders doing the same during the day - it appeared to be a good stress reliever too!

For the conference, I was worried if our 5 and 6 year olds would get it, but on chatting to parents it seems the children managed to explain it to them word for word!

There is always the problem of zips left behind - but I hope that getting dressed in the morning and ready for bed at night will bring this teaching to mind.

This had the unusual novelty factor of using a trouser fly zip to teach about God!

(Do Check out the other prayer activities, and the introductory blog to this series)

Beatitude Prayer Activities

Those who follow me on Twitter or Facebook will have seen my comments on purchasing strange things for creative prayer activities.

When we teach, we like to do a creative prayer that causes the children to stop and think about what they have heard and pray about how they can apply the teaching in their own lives.

We like these activities to be memorable, either using things the children will come across regularly or are so outrageous - they'll just recall them in those quiet moments when their minds wander.

I'm going to put some of them on here - just to spark a few ideas with folk who are (like me) keen to encourage both prayer and the application of Bible truth.

On camp this year we'll be looking at the Beatitudes. 

It's been tough preparing as I believe we often dumb down what these verses mean - turning them into a very light weight idea with wishy washy terminology. It's been tough because I want the children to have to full picture - not the 'pretty' version I was given as a child.

In our desire to make them understandable to children we have been guilty in watering them down by using words that culturally mean different things today - we've made them 'nice' rather than revolutionary.

The fact is - these words are hard hitting, active words that tell us how to live a Godly life. They are counter cultural and when applied will cause a revolution. There is nothing weak about them - they show strength in every area of our lives.

I'm up for starting a God revolution...... what about you? Care to join me?

Note: I won't be sharing them in order - I'm writing them up in the order the props arrive in the post!

Enjoy :o)