Feb. 24 2002 Concert of Prayer

It was great to see the house overflowing as over 350 Christians packed Bethel Baptist Church. The Spring Hills Band worship team led the Body of Christ into the Spirit halfway through the first song. Pastor Dave Parsons of Bethel Baptist opened the celebration with the Pastors Prayer Fellowship motto "One Church Many Congregations" Focusing on the theme found in;

Luke 11: "One Day Jesus was praying a certain place when He ceased that one of His disciples said to Him Lord teach us to pray as John also taught his disciples" So He said to them, "When you pray say;

Our Father in heaven,
Hallow be your name
Your kingdom come,
Your will be done,
On earth as it is in heaven,
Give us day by day our daily bread,
And forgive us our sins,
For we also forgive everyone who is indebted to us.
And do not lead us into temptation,"

Pastor Dave "One of the few times that they said Lord teach us something it was teach us how to pray. He left them a pattern prayer and we notice that in this pattern prayer there are certain themes, there is
Priority, Petition, Pardon, and Protection."

"Tonight several Pastors in the community will lead us on each of these certain themes. We are expecting a wonderful time. But before we get started would please just turn around and greet the persons around you. You will be praying with them in a few minutes. God Bless" Pastor Dave hands off to Pastor Marshall.

"I think some time we should have a concert of fellowship instead of a concert of prayer. Amen! My name is Steve Marshall Pastor of Santa Rosa Christian Church and I want to ask as we begin together in our focus of the Lords Prayer we remember that as Jesus was instructing his disciples regarding prayer He began by saying before you make as request petition that we are to give thanks to Him Our Father in Heaven, Hallowed be Your Name".

 

Priority
by Don Norris
Lifeline Christian Ministries

"Your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven" Matthew 6:11

"Hi I am Don Norris from Lifeline Christian Church in Santa Rosa CA. I think it goes with say that Jesus focus in most of the sermons he preached. In most of the things He had to say to those who were following Him which were His disciples. Was that the Kingdom of God should be first! Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these other things shall be added unto us".

"What do people think about the church in Sonoma County? Are we those church people? Those religious people? Are we those people who don't do bad things? And go around telling people they should be doing good things? What do they say about those who are outside Christianity? What to they say about us?"

"Paul the apostle identified the Kingdom of God as righteousness and joy in the Holy Spirit. I think we should want to be identified as the people of righteousness, of peace and of joy. It's our joy they want to see. It's the joy of the Lord that brings people to Christ!"

"Money won't fix a marriage! But righteousness, peace and joy will fix a marriage. A good job, a good career and doing all the right things may not fix your family! But I'll tell you what! Righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost will fix your family. I better watch out or I am going to start preaching and I am not suppose too." Cheers from the crowd could be heard. "It's my nature… What we going to do folks is break into groups of about four or five. That may be uncomfortable for some of you but Praise God. The kingdom of God can be uncomfortable but there follows righteousness, peace and joy!" So were going to break into groups and what we want you to do is share with your group a priority that you have for this year. A priority in family, a priority in your personal life, a priority in church in your community. Something that you want to see the Kingdom of God and God's will come into. Something that you want to SEE THE KINGDOM ARISE IN YOUR LIFE IN. We want you to get into your groups and start praying you've got about 10 minutes to do this in".

 

Petition
by Billy Andre
Spring Hills Community Church

Give us today our daily bread. Matthew 6:11

"Wow! How do I follow that?" referring to Pastor Don Norris. "Give us today our daily bread, and as I was thinking about that today. Today after church I went jogging with a parent of one of our youths in our group. He is a runner and I am not necessarily a runner he took me up into the hills and we got done I was lagging. I just staggered into the car. I was tired I was weak and I was hungry. There was only one thing that would satisfy me at that time, and that was a turkey sandwich on one of those Dutch crunch rolls. You know what I mean! I was thinking about what was I going to say tonight and the thought came to me. Bread satisfies. It satisfies it gives you that strength that you need. Some of you today are feeling weak. Some of you are feeling tired and just totally worn out. And maybe some you have not been in Gods word all that much. In fact being kind young and in the ministry I could spend a lot time in Gods word and yet not really spending time with him. I could be preparing lessons and doing all this stuff, but actually spending time with just God and that is the only thing that will satisfy our souls. Give us today our daily bread. Its interest here that it's in plurals "Give Us" today "Our" "Daily Bread" were not just individuals here, but we are part of this community of faith. With that why don't we rejoin our group and talk about some of those issues and needs in your life, physical needs, spiritual needs, and share with those people and take the next 10 minutes and pray for each other. OK let's do it!"

Pardon
by Rod Bowman
Santa Rosa First Christian Church

Hi I am Rod Bowman Pastor at First Christian Church. Forgive us our trespasses or is it debts? How many are for trespasses? (Laughter) How many for debts? (Laughter) I like how one little kid put it forgive us our trash baskets as we forgive those who put thrash in our basket. (Laughter) (Laughter) I think that is quite appropriate he may not have the language down but he certainly understands.

Jesus said forgive us our debts as we forgive and you notice that He does not speak of forgiveness in terms of ability. You know. He does give us the excuse to say; well that's just something I can't do, they is a point in which I just can't do that. He doesn't allow that out for us. He is a reconciling God who calls His people to be reconcilers. So He is very insistent on us being forgiving. Read something sometime ago by Corry Tin Boom, she was being interviewed there in the Netherlands and often the in the distance there was a church bell ringing. The interviewer asked how could you be so forgiving? After all the things that you have gone through, they were both thinking of Ravens Brook. She went through some horrible things there including the loss of her sister who was treated cruelty. Forgiveness does not come easy. Jesus dose say that. Corry picked up on the church bell ringing in the background. She said do you hear that bell ringing? Well somebody is pulling on a rope to get that bell to ring. Eventually they are going to let go of that rope but the momentum that has begun in that bell is going to cause it to still ring. But because nobody is tugging on the rope it's going to eventually die down and she spoke of that in terms of forgiveness. You know when things happen to us when we are hurt deeply the memory of that is sometimes really fresh. We think we never forgive it! Or never forget it! But she says you got to learn to quite tugging on the rope. Because that what we do…. We tug on the rope. We keep that memory fresh. We keep rehearsing it. We keep all of that stuff, because we've been hurt so badly. We got to learn to quite tugging on the rope.

You know I know some people who for some 20, 30, 40 years keep an offense. You get them worked up and they can dredge up stuff where there memories are just as fresh as if the offenses happened just last night. Sometime the people who had offend them have been dead 10 or more years (Laughter) And you know churches can be that way with one another they have rope to tug too. So were going to spend a few minutes talking confidentially to the Lord about ropes that we might be hanging on to. It there a rope your tugging on someone right now? Or some people or something? Our God is reconciling God! For a then next few moments I want you to visualize the face of Jesus in His passion, and in His suffering, as he hung there on Calvary.

You know some of the Bible scholars tell us that Jesus might have been say Father forgive them for know not what they do and saying more than once. But repeatedly as He looked about those saying Father forgive them for they know not what they do. So you see God can do it and thinking about the horrible thing we have done to him. You know what they are in your own life. ( A long silence) We need to do it, we need to quite tugging on the rope.

Let us read the scripture on the screen Psalm 32

Blessed is he whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered.

Please go to prayer for the next few minutes.

So Father help us to be instruments of your reconciliation Help us to be as forgiving as we have been forgiven and this is our prayer in Jesus name Amen.

 

Protection
J.R. Young
Santa Rosa Christian Church
and Dr. Sam Tillery
Foothills Community Church

"Hi my name is J.R. Young of Santa Rosa Christian Church" "And Hi my name is Dr. Sam Tillery, Pastor of the Foothills Community Church and its our privilege to lead us into the final movement tonight which is:

"And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one."

J.R. Young: "We just want to lead you in the kind of a pray to Protect us. Protect us God from the evil one. Would you pray with us? Father we that your word is clear to us Lord that we war not against flesh and blood but against powers and principalities and it say spiritual forces of evil in heavenly places and Lord I confess that we don't understand that I don't understand all of that. We just asking tonight as your people gathered here in this place by your Spirit. Lord would just help to war against those forces and God we are asking for your protection tonight. Lord we are unable in and of ourselves and in our own power, Lord we need your strength. We need your power working in our lives Holy Spirit would you come now and empower us. And strength us. And help us. We confess Lord that we are feeble without you and God we need you and we ask for your protection over us tonight. Thank You God".

Dr. Sam Tillery: " You know the bible is clear when it say the devil is like a roar lion roaming about seeking whom he may devour. And who he's looking at is you and me. We are God agents of help and hope to the rest of the world and so we need to pray for Gods protection. But we wrestle not against flesh and blood, yet so often we do that. We wrestle against spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. And our prayer and humbleness before God brings about His Power in our lives. Think about this if we were like a big flock of sheep the Lord likeness like sheep doesn't He, yeah… and if there were some wolves surrounding us they would try to come into the middle of the pack and attack one of us because we pounce on them we would get them. They going to hang around the perimeter and seek to grab a hold of those who are lingering around the fringes. So we need to pray tonight that God would protect us and protect those in the Body of Christ who may be lingering on the outside edges and bring that before the Lord. Because he is seeking to devour us and he been pay close attention to us because for so many years we have been divided as the Body of Christ.

But now we are uniting and serving together (applause) and that breaks down and begins to destroy the work that the enemy has had against us and that is division! Now he is going to work even harder to keep us divided and some how find some kind of issue amongst us to cause us to get all tweaked out. You know what tweaked out looks like don't you? And that could easily happen if we take down our guard and that what we are going to do tonight as we close out using this pattern of prayer. We will pray for God protection against temptation and then from the evil one. So I am going to ask that very quickly that you and I speak out loud a word of protection over the church when I pray we not praying for one another as individuals but as the corporate Body of Christ That God would protect us from thing like pride and indifference so lets together very quickly speak it out loud one word of protection."

"So Father as we bring these words before You we are calling on You to protect us from these": (the volume of the audio did not allow the capture of the words but God heard them all)

"Father we confess that these things that we have mentioned we have been guilty of. Do you agree with that? Now the Bible says if we confess our sin, and you just agreed. He is faithful and He is just to forgive our sins and cleans us as His church from all unrighteousness. We thank you Lord we thank you.

"We now ask that the all Pastors and spiritual leaders in this house please come forward and stand right in front in the middle. Because you know what as Pastors and spiritual leaders we need you prayer for protection as we stand as shepherd's over the flock. So we are going to ask you to speak out our names, now some of you don't what they are but if your are in our churches just speak the name of God protection over these Pastors here tonight."

So the congregation spoke the names of the Pastors and spiritual leaders asking God for divine protection as our leaders start working in new way, which is for the unity of the Body of Christ. Some 27 Pastors representing 25 churches gratefully received the blessing.

Dr Sam Tillery "Father we accept you covering and your cleansing. We thank you that we are united in Christ Jesus. With your strength Your Power and Your authority we will stay united in Christ and focused not upon one another not upon our differences but upon Jesus Christ the Savoir and Lord of us all. We love You and give you thanks in Christ name! You guys agree with that?" Amen (very loud applause and cheers.)

"Hi my name is Pastor Jim Argue of the Genesis Fellowship. Hasn't this been a wonderful evening? (More loud applause and cheers) Our thanks to Pastor Dave and his staff and the congregation here of Bethel Baptist Church Lets thank them shall we! (More loud applause and cheers). This Concert is Prayer is one of four times a year where we can take an offering to support the Pastors Prayer Fellowship. I think the words getting out that things have really been happening. There been a major healing in our County between Petaluma and Santa Rosa and as a result we are branching out now. (More loud applause and cheers) Now that we gotten that healing taking place we are starting to move out to other towns. On the first Friday of March we be holding City Reach Prayer in the City of Sonoma there will be multiple churches and our prayer teams will be going in we hope that many of you will be there. The following month we will be going to a group of churches in Healdsburg. So it's Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria and we going to move out as God directs."! (More loud applause and cheers)

The Spring Hills Band closed out with:

WE WANT TO SEE JESUS LIFTED HIGH
as a banner that flies across this land!

Were gonna see
Jesus Lifted High!

Special Thanks to Officer David Childress of the Santa Rosa Police Dept for transcribing this event.