A call to prayer
Friends,
How I thank God for each of you!
So many of you pray faithfully for each other and for this movement. I can’t tell you how grateful and thankful I am for you and your prayers.
We are a Jesus-centred, Spirit-led and hope-revealed movement. We don’t shy away from this in any way. In the language of Catherine and William Booth, the co-founders of our holiness movement, we are a “blood and fire Army” that believes Jesus will transform the world.
We remember that in his death and resurrection, Jesus shared with the disciples his promise of the Holy Spirit. He asked them to go to the upper room and pray … so they did. It was when they obeyed the voice of God and waited on God’s power that the Holy Spirit came upon them! They were then propelled into the streets with the power to start the church and see the world transformed. Same Jesus, same Holy Spirit.
A call to prayer
Will you join me in focused prayer? Please spend some of your time praying with us on these specific points.
Listen to God, and please let me know what you hear God say. God’s word says, “Give ear and come to me; listen, that you may live” (Isaiah 55:3).
Be confident because we know God speaks! We say, “I will listen to what God the Lord says; he promises peace to his people, his faithful servants – but let them not turn to folly” (Psalms 85:8).
Test what you have heard with godly people. I am very happy for you to feed this back to me. We are aware of so many problems, but we are listening to how God is sharing solutions so we can walk in God’s way towards the future. In these days, “We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you” (2 Chronicles 20:12).
First and foremost, we need to be ‘an Army on our knees’ and then rise and move forward into a world that desperately needs Jesus.
So, this is what I am calling you to pray about:
1. Pray that we would be, first and foremost, a Jesus-centred, Spirit-led missional movement, if we are to see God’s hope revealed. We know we are building on some great mission already happening and ask God for discernment on how to take back the ground that we have lost by our own negligence or the forces of the enemy.
• What might that mean personally and as a movement? What is the Spirit saying to us?
2. Uplift our finances. “He owns the cattle of a thousand hills” (Psalm 50:10). The resource will be there for what God is asking. If we asked God to let things fall away that are not of him, and keep the things that are, what might that look like? That is a brave, bold prayer. We don’t have the resources we once did, and we do need to advance spiritually and missionally. God may ask us to change our footprint and the spaces and places in which we minister.
• Will we be a faith-filled Army that seeks God first?
• Will we do whatever God asks?
• What might that look like? What is the Spirit saying?
3. Uplift the next generations. Pray for our Millennials, Gen Z and Alpha (Gen Beta will be the children born from 2025 onwards). For the ones who are here in our movement, we thank God for you. We love you! We want waves of these generations coming to know the Lord and raised up as disciples. How might we be part of that? We also know how many of our beautiful young people, young adults and young families have left The Salvation Army. Some have gone to other churches (and we thank God they have found their place in the Body of Christ). Some have left the faith altogether. What part have we played in this? (To be honest, this one breaks my heart). I believe they have The Salvation Army DNA – many love the Word and want to be engaged in something bigger than them.
• Perhaps God is challenging some of us to be part of this, even in a new way, and there might be a calling for some to start new ministries that are needed. Maybe that is you?
• What is the Spirit saying?
4. We uplift spiritual warfare with spiritual wisdom. I ask that you pray about how we learn again that “we are not fighting against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers of this dark age” (Ephesians 6:12). We are engaged in a spiritual war, and we must battle the right things. We need to stand together, lifting up holy hands, clean and pure.
• What is the Spirit saying?
I am grateful to people of prayer who pray every day, prayer warriors who hear God so clearly and share and encourage, and prophets who share what the Lord is saying.
I am so grateful for all of you because I believe you want this Jesus-centred, Spirit-filled movement to become all God wants it to be.
So, I call you to focused prayer, invite you to engage and ask you to seek the Lord and share what he is saying.
Are you ready? These are urgent and exciting days. Hope will be revealed!
Bless you, friends.
Commissioner Miriam Gluyas
Territorial Commander
