Jefferson Baptist Church has four, five-day prayer events each year. We pray for 50 hours during the five days, ten hours each day, five in the morning and five in the evening. We average about 40 people every hour with lots of coming and going. This particular five-day prayer time that is starting this Monday is focusing on our world wide missions effort and we will have a number of our missionaries with us sharing about their ministries and needs via Zoom.

Though we are praying for our missionaries and the millions of lost people that live all around our missionaries I personally am incredibly blessed by each of the prayer events, and when one is over I can hardly wait for the next one to start up.

Here are a few of the very real blessings I receive during each of our prayer events.

The most noticeable reward that I receive is a marked increase in energy. I am 74 years old and I have Parkinson’s and I am weary most of the time. Getting out of bed in the morning takes most of the energy that I saved up during the night sleeping. Just about everything makes me tired, including fishing, but praying energizes me. I pray for about 40 hours in the five days and it really seems like it is the volume of praying that fills up my gas tank so much. The extra energy and passion that I get Monday through Friday will make a difference in me right up until the next one.

Another super reward that I will experience next week is a significant renewing of my creative thinking. My brain picks up a lot of speed, sort of like I have shifted into a higher gear, and I imagine all kinds of scenes in heaven. I also get a ton of ideas about solutions for current problems I am dealing with. I get so many ideas for goals, projects, ministry ideas, and sermons that I can’t get them all written down.

The most important reward is the strong sense of God’s presence that I feel and the resolve that wells up inside of me to seek Him more, to serve Him, and to grow to be more and more like Him in character all the days of my life. The resolve to seek Him diligently results in a recommitment to reading His Word everyday, to spend time with Him in prayer every day, and to worship and praise Him all day long.

There are many more blessings and rewards but I will write about them another day.