Welcome!
I love that you are here. Really.
This challenge is nothing more than a desire born out of one mama’s heart and shared with others who wish to do the same – to pray faithfully and boldly as we enter the upcoming school year. And it all began with this post. I’ve been overwhelmed by your response to join me in getting serious about praying for our people. You are serious about this and that inspires me!
I cannot think of a better way to kick off the school year than to armor up and cover our kids in prayer. Honestly, I wish I had been more intentional about this in years past with my children, and maybe you are feeling the same, but instead of focusing on that, we are going to be thankful we are here. We are going to own the opportunity right in front of us. We are claiming ground for this year. We are praying brave for this year. We are rising up boldly as women of faith who know our birthright, our purpose and exactly how big our God is.
Can you tell I’m a little fired up about this?
The challenge has 4 purposes.
- Be Faithful – We are called to pray without ceasing (1 Thessalonians 5:17). I haven’t mastered that yet, but I’m going to keep trying. For the next 30 days we are committing to faithfully pray for our children. Everyday, praying. You can do this!
- Be Intentional – Becoming a prayer warrior does not happen without effort. Faithfulness does not happen without effort. We are going to be intentional and focused about prayer.
- Be Purposeful – For one month we commit to being purposeful in prayer. We are going to dig deeper and lay it all out before God. We are going to pray for specific areas of our children’s’ lives as we petition God on their behalf.
- Form a Habit – Research shows it takes 21 days to form a habit. We’ll do 30 days just to be sure. 🙂 I desire for prayer to be my habit, my default. I want to develop an ongoing and consistent conversation with God about my children. And this is where it starts.
So how will this work?
I’ll send you an e-mail each tomorrow morning with the prayer prompts for the next week, specific things we will be praying for our people, each day. I’ll also send out an occasional e-mail with a prayer or verse of encouragement along the way, but I have no intention of flooding your inbox daily.
Your job? Pray. Fight awkward and pray. Fight discouragement and pray. Fight tired or boredom or busy and distracted and make a conscious effort to pray for your people every single day. Pray for two minutes or pray for ten; that’s between you and God. The challenge is simply to make the effort and make it happen.
How can you make this work for YOU?
There is all kinds of freedom here, friends. Prayer is a personal conversation with God and you know your people best so adjust as you see fit. Just keep praying.
There is no failure here. If you miss a few days, you are not behind, just jump back in and continue praying.
Find an accountability partner. Tell a friend you are doing this. Be brave enough to check in with each other, learn from each other and grow together. We do this for weight loss or a fitness challenge, why not hold each other accountable for prayer?
Grab a journal. I’m terrible at this, friends. I write, but I don’t journal. Ever. But for this 30 days I’m going to try my best to write at least one sentence each day about what I prayed for. Why? Because as we go through the school year and I see God’s faithfulness and provision in the lives of my children, I want to be able to look back on these prayers. This is what connecting the dots looks like. What a cool way to see growth. What a cool thing to show your children as well. Grab a cheap notebook, friends. You don’t want to miss out on the blessing of this.
Okay, I think that is everything you need to know about the challenge. But one last thing, I am praying for you. I’m honored that you would join me in prayer and humbled that I get to do this with all of you. And, even more I’m anxious to see how God uses our faithful prayer. If you have stories along the way please e-mail them to me ([email protected]). Community is a gift.
May you be blessed on this journey.
Bravely,
Katie
