today was the start of the “Five Days of Prayer” corporate prayer event at JBC for our missions ministry around the world. We pray from 5 to10 am and 5 to 10 pm each day this week, Monday through Friday. I prayed 8 of the 10 hours today not because I was expected to as the pastor but because our prayer times like this are some of the most spiritually renewing times for me.  I have a very strong sense of God’s presence during these times that very few other events in my life can equal. Sitting in my chair at home writing this after today I feel an incredible sense of peace and security in God’s love for me. Our prayer times are fairly bland in terms of energy and programming. Any where from 10 to 30 people are sitting in our prayer chapel together. Pastor Mike shares a bit about some missions ministry or missionaries that we support and then we pray one at a time as people feel comfortable and led for about 30 minutes and then we take a 15 minute break for snacks and coffee and chit chat, and then we do it again. People come and go through  out the entire 5 hours in the morning and evening as their schedules dictate. We have 20 plus churches that we have started in Sierra Leone, West Africa and that many schools as well plus a number of other ministries to help people in this poorest of countries. As you can imagine the Ebola sickness was a major focus of our praying as we interceded for this country asking God to work and bless. It is almost 11 pm and I will make it to bed about midnight and then up at 4:30 to make it down to the prayer chapel by 5 am. This will be a very exhausting week as I do my normal pastor stuff and fit in 40 hours of praying as well, but Friday evening when it is over I will feel sad that it is over and I will also have this very strong sense that we have moved the hand of almighty God, and lives around the world will be impacted in incredible ways that we probably won’t know about until we get to heaven and get to meet them. I am most blessed to be a part of this great work.