Look at some of what God is doing through prayer boxes!
Prayer Box Dream
Hello, I am Len Parsons, a Pastor from Murfreesboro, TN. We have been led of the Lord to start a new ministry in a town about 20 miles from us. We have rented a building to have services in, as He said, but we lacked the vision of ministry for the new church. So we have been praying for the Lord to reveal His plan for it . I really felt He would make Himself known to us, simply and clearly. Sometimes God uses dreams to share the vision of what He sees, so we can go and be faithful to do it .
On Monday morning (August 6, 2007) about 6:25 I had this dream: In the dream we were to reach this city by having a ""city wide prayer event ."" I could see the sign, and that's what it said. I felt resistance to the idea in the dream .. like Moses ... "I can't speak ... I don't know how to do this".
Then the dream revealed three ways it was to be done:
1) By prayer walking .. asking people, "Can we pray for you?"
2) I saw God encounters .. divine appointments .. of people already ready to receive, and
3) We were to go to businesses and get them to let us put a box in their businesses for people to put prayer requests in. I saw the prayer box in my dream, it said "Can we pray for you?" I thought, "My English teacher in school would have said, "May we pray for you?'" But God said again, "Can we pray for you?".
I woke up and knew this was the vision for the church, so that people all over town would be covered with a covering of prayer. I typed it in an email and sent it to myself so I would not forget the words God had spoken ,
When my wife, Nelda, woke up I told her the best I could about what a prayer box was or looked like in my dream. .. I was working and thinking, "How can I make these boxes? ... I know I can't make anything close to what I saw in the dream so .. I'll just have to do something less than what God said ... some little rough gift boxes or something."
Then later in the day my wife ran outside with our lap top to show me what she had found. There was the prayer box (On your website) just like in the dream! Same color, same words, same heart, same vison, already made to look just like God said!
It is such an encouragement to know He knows all things and that He knows the end from the beginning, and if the last of the dream was that exact, then the rest is as well .
May God Bless & Keep You Always
Love Pastor Len & Nelda Parsons
Divine Appointment in an Asian Grocery Store
-Molly Saunders
I take care of my mother with Alzheimer's disease in addition to working with the Free Prayer Box Ministry. On Wednesdays, sometimes I get a chance to get away on a motorcycle ride. Early in June, 2007, I rode to Columbus, Ohio and ended up at a small Asian grocery store. I went there (I thought ) out of curiosity. While I was there, my cell phone rang. It was a lady named Janet from Jacksonville, Florida, calling about the Free Prayer Box Ministry. I talked to her about what the Lord has done, and prayed with her over the phone that the Lord would give her direction as she presented the idea to her pastor. I ended the prayer, "In Jesus' name, Amen." In a moment, a woman who worked there,came quietly over to me and touched my arm. She whispered, "Are you a Christian?" I whispered back, "Yes, I am." In a trembling, fearful voice she said, "I was born into a Muslim family. A friend gave me a Bible and I am learning about Jesus... Please pray for me." I could feel tears welling up as I was about to pray for her. All of a sudden she turned away and I heard a man's voice behind me, " May I help you?"
I turned to him and said, "What a great store you have here!" The Holy Spirit gave me the words to turn the attention from what the woman and I had been talking about to the store owners interest. The woman hurried away and I bought a pack of crackers that were made in Pakistan. As I paid the woman for the crackers, I mouthed the words," I will be praying for you." She smiled and said, "Thank you."
The Lord sent me into that store and had Janet call me right then, so that this lady could hear my prayer. I don't know her name, but please pray with me for this brave woman.
Prayer Boxes Being Made in Myanmar
In April, 2005, we received a letter from Reverend Van Cung Tum, Principal of Evangelical Bible School in Yangon, Myanmar. He wanted information about the Prayer Box Ministry. He had no money to send , but our Tuesday prayer meeting group paid to have the introductory pack sent to him. In August, we received the following letter:
Dear in Christ, Christian Greetings from Myanmar, in the name of our Lord. Many thanks for the 2 free prayer boxes and the instruction materials have arrived safely. So good and blessed for us. Praise be the Lord. We are praying for you and have made boxes (in the Burmese language) to spread the Free Prayer Box ministry in Myanmar. We ask God to spread the ministry into the world.
In Christ, Van Cung Tum, Principal
From Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Pastor Rohan Anderson of the Family worship Center in Toronto was visiting a church in the USA. He went to a shopping mall, spotted a prayer box, went home and looked up the website. After calling Molly Saunders he ordered an introductory pack. After reading the materials and praying, he came to Mansfield, Ohio to meet the Prayer Box Ministry team! He left with 100 boxes!
God Uses an Airline Attendant
Mari Matson is an airline attendant and lives in Boston, MA. When she has a layover in a city, she doesn't just stay in her motel. She has made it her mission to find a group of Christians and join them in praying for that city. She found the Free prayer Box Ministry website and ordered 5 boxes to take to each prayer group she attends. A month later she ordered another 5 boxes, and took them to a convention of the Fellowship of Christian Airline Personnel in Atlanta, GA!
Christians in Honduras Reach out with Prayer Boxes
Pastor Rod Buchanan took a carton of Spanish prayer boxes on a missions trip to Honduras. He would be working with Missionaries Larry and Angie Overholt and the congregation of Evangelica Mundial in Choluteca. When Pastor Rod explained the prayer box concept and presented them with the prayer boxes, they were moved to tears. "You made the prayer boxes in our language???!!!"
Later they visited a hardware store and obtained permission to place a prayer box. After doing so, they spent about 15 minutes looking around the store. When leaving, they saw a man putting a prayer request in the prayer box. They waited till he left and went to retrieve the prayer request. They were surprised to see that in 15 minutes, 5 people had already written prayer requests!
From West Virginia
I have had a prayer box in a bar in Kanawha City at Charleston, WV, for about a year.
One day while checking the prayer requests for that box, a man at the bar approached me and said, "Hey, are you that preacher?" I acknowledged I was and he proceeded to introduce himself and his fiancé and to say that they wanted to be married. Then he explained they wanted to be married there in the bar!
The Lord quickly spoke to my heart that this was the right thing to do. I explained the need for premarital counseling to which they agreed. A week or so later, he called to say they had set a date for the wedding.
I had gotten to know the owner of the bar very well, so when I arrived for the wedding, he had stopped the sale of alcohol for a few hours so we could go through the ceremony!
The ceremony went very well and was well attended, even by the bride's daughter who was not overly thrilled by the idea, but saw the greater good in her mother's happiness.
Sometime after the ceremony, the owner came to me to actually ask my permission to begin selling drinks. Clearly a level of respect has developed and God has opened a wonderful door for opportunities to spread the Gospel.
My Church and I are very excited about what God is doing through the ' Free Prayer Box Ministry'. At this time we have several boxes placed throughout our community. We gather each week to pray for each request. To add to our excitement, one of the bar tenders and her fiancé were in Church Easter morning.
God bless you as the ministry continues growing.
Pastor Ollie Parsons
Southeast Church of the Nazarene
Charleston, WV
From England
Dear Molly, I am from the UK. God has spoken to us here in Brixham, a small fishing village in Devon, England. We now have prayer boxes in pubs, libraries, supermarkets, and also doctors surgeries in our town . People have been very open to this idea and we believe we will see God do some incredible things because of this . I just want to encourage you and say you are doing a good thing . May god richly bless you and your ministry.
Regards,
Karen James
England
Bible Studies in Bars?
God used one man's prayers and a prayer box to get a Bible study started in a bar in Charleston, West Virginia. Christians in Mount Vernon, Ohio heard about it and after much prayer, God opened the heart of the owner of Flapper's bar, and began a Bible study there! (You can see this story on our video )
Prayer Boxes Go Door to Door!
In Natchez, Mississippi, Christians were led to take prayer boxes beyond the walls of businesses. They are taking the prayer boxes door to door! Because they are so professionally made and not marked from any one denomination, they are getting a great response of people welcoming their prayers.
Pray they will be sick of their sin!
During one of our weekly noon prayer meetings at Mulberry Street Methodist Church here in Mount Vernon, Ohio, one of our Pastors prayed that God would make people see the futility of their sin- to make them sick of sin and hungry for God. That same week I got a prayer request for the health of Paul and Cathy. They didn't have a phone number, just an address. When I went to visit them I heard an amazing answer to that pastor's prayer. Paul and Cathy and all of their friends had a long history of drug and alcohol abuse. Paul had recently been released from jail, where he had truly met Jesus through a jail ministry! When he got out, his desire was for God, instead of the drugs and alcohol. One night when Cathy and their friends were sitting there doing drugs and drinking, Cathy said to her friends, "Paul's right! This is really stupid, and I'm tired of living this way." The friends agreed and Paul was able to lead all of them to Christ! By the time I met them, most of their friends had found a Church and were growing in Christ!
- Molly Saunders
Proof that God is Changing Hearts!
Often we get word of how God answered our prayers: A restored marriage, an illness healed, a loved one coming to Christ. But as we have continued to be faithful in prayer, we have seen God changing hearts by the change in prayer requests from temporary things to eternal things:
"Pray that God will wash away my sins."
"My girlfriend and I went too far and now I regret it every day."
"Help me to cast away my sinful ways."
"Pray for my husband and I, that we would both obey God."
Proof of Answered Prayer!
A prayer request from a Joe Smith* said, "Pray that God will save my soul. I'm going to hell and I don't want to." Four months later, there was a prayer request in that same box from someone else that said, "Pray that Joe Smith will stop pushing his Christian beliefs on everyone." This prayer request showed us that God had answered our prayers for the salvation of Joe Smith!
God Gave Me Courage
I told Molly I would place a prayer box in a business, and afterward I felt that I couldn't do it. I didn't want to do it because I didn't know where I would put one, and I was really afraid they would say, "No!" to the prayer box idea. But I had told Molly I would, so I felt I had to. I asked all my friends to pray for me and then I took one to the YMCA here in Mt. Vernon, Ohio. They said 'Yes!' right away. Thank God! And what a blessing I have felt to be used by God this way! My prayer requests are mostly from children with serious requests for their friends and family. God has expanded my territory and I now have three prayer boxes out in three different businesses! If He gave me the courage, He can give you the courage as well, and you will be very blessed!
- Mary Bland
And God said, "My presence will go with you and I will give you rest." Exodus 33:14
Send us stories of what God is doing through prayer boxes and your prayers in your town! Email us and let us know!