Prayer Initiative Releases Praying Church Handbook
The Praying Church Handbook, Volume II is now available as a resource for churches and their prayer ministry teams. This is the second of four planned volumes. Volume I was released last year and featured the contributions of Dr. Raymond Culpepper, Dr. French Arrington, Dr. James Beaty and others, with a special section that extracted prayer moments at the first twenty Church of God General Assemblies. Throughout both volumes are short prayer stories, vignettes into the personal lives of men and women in our history.
Volume II focuses on personal and family prayer. Contributors include Dr. Mark Williams, Dr. Edgar Lee (Dean of the Assemblies of God Theological Seminary), Dr. Bill Bright, Dr. Herbert Seals, Author Debbie Salter Goodwin, Hollywood actor Susan Isaacs, Kathy Hamon, Author Ron Auch, Pastor Mark Hisle, Carletta Douglas, Ester Calderon and Joann Garzarella. The volume is comprised of two sections, the first focused on personal prayer, and the second on the family and prayer. It contains a brief history of the family altar. Chapter titles include, “Prayer – the Key to Intimacy,” “Effective Personal Prayer,” “Prayer as Presence,” “The Bible as a Prayer Book,” “Prayer and Transformation,” “Creating a Personal Prayer Room,” “Prayer and Fasting,” “When God Doesn’t Answer,” “If it is the Will of God – Why Ask?” Chapter titles in the family prayer section include, “The Missional Family,” “Praying for the Salvation of your Children,” “Making Prayer a Life Skill,” and “The Power of Prayer in your Family”.
Doug Small, who is the Prayer Coordinator for the denomination and a contributor to the series says, “The multi-volume set is an attempt to move our prayer discussions to a deeper level, to get beyond the ‘three steps to this-or-that,’ and consider the theology of prayer, its deeper moorings.” Small says the first two volumes, both 650-700 pages, are not books you merely read through, but tools for pastors and prayer leaders wanting to go deeper than superficial praying.
The books are available from Church of God Prayer Ministries. Volume III is to be released in late spring or early summer and will focus on Pastors and Prayer, and the Church as a House of Prayer. Volume IV will focus on Intercession, and Prayer Evangelism. All four volumes can be acquired for a pre-publication price of $99.99 plus shipping by calling the denominational prayer office or from the website, www.alivepublications.org.
