An invitation is going out across Europe for a unique gathering of 3,000 young people from all 51 nations of the continent, taking place in July 2019.  United Prayer Rising (UPRising) Europe will draw together believers for 72 hours of united worship and prayer with a mandate to contend for a youth awakening across Europe.

JJ Waters, Director of UPRising Europe said, “Following God’s lead, we are incredibly excited to gather together people from every nation in Europe to contend for a youth awakening. This is such a critical time for Europe – much is being shaken whilst at the same time God is moving powerfully in many nations. We believe He is doing something beautiful in the hearts of young people, in what is now one of the most unreached continents on earth. Now is the time to come together from different nations, across denominations, honouring fathers and mothers, and to worship and pray for a mighty move of God in Europe.”

We want to invite young people and anyone with a heart for Europe, to save the dates – 8^th to 11^th July 2019 and to plan to be part of this event.

The backbone of UPRising Europe will be 72 hours of non-stop worship and prayer led by worship teams of young people from all over Europe. We want to see young people from each of their nations bringing their own unique flavour, style of music and worship songs in their own language alongside English songs. These are the grassroots, passionate worship and prayer leaders who are faithful to where God has placed them and willing to contend for Europe.

Out of this will flow prayer and intercession for Europe, with occasional inspiration from speakers in our main sessions and seminars. There will also be prayer for these young people to be sent with a lasting fire to see their cities and nations changed by Jesus.

UPRising Europe is part of the global UPRising movement that was birthed out of the World Prayer Assembly in 2012 in Indonesia.  The first UPRising event was in Seoul, South Korea in July 2016. Since then, there have been UPRising events in the Philippines, South Africa, Mongolia, Bolivia, Malaysia, Canada, Chile, Mexico and California.

UPRising Europe will take place at Ashburnham Place, Battle, East Sussex – a Christian retreat and conference centre set in beautiful grounds with three lakes, gardens and an abundance of nature.  Delegates will be able to stay in Ashburnham place itself or camp in the spacious grounds.

We want to bring together young people from every nation in Europe and to make this event accessible to all. In order to do this, we intend to make ticket prices reasonable for those from all parts of Europe. If anyone or any church wishes to help subsidise these costs, please contact us via the website.

Anyone interested in finding out more and pre-registering for UPRising Europe can do so at the website:

www.uprisingeurope.org  Also, follow us on social media.  Pricing and tickets will be released shortly.

We would like to extend a warm invitation to the South East Asia Prayer Council Conference 2019 which takes place from 8th to 11th October 2019 at the Changi Village Hotel in Singapore.

We are grateful to Senior Pastor DjohanHandoyo from Bethany Church Singapore who is our Host this year.  Pastor Handoyo along with Reverend Edmund Smith, founder and Director of Real Love Ministry (RLM) Melaka, Malaysia, will be speaking on the theme: 'From Glory to Glory' - How we experience His Glory!

We look forward to welcoming delegates from the 11 nations of South East Asia as well as international visitors and IPC friends from around the world.

Full details of the event along with links to Register and Book accommodation are on the conference website at www.seaprayer2019singapore.org/

In His service,

Pastor Veronica Lorenzana | Pastor Ann Low

South East Asia Prayer Council

"One New Man" Alignment Roundtable with Messianic Jewish Leaders, March 11-14, Jerusalem

Please pray for this crucial international event that will involve both Jewish and Gentile leaders coming together to sit at the feet of Messiah together. Tikkun Global, a Messianic Jewish organization headquartered in Israel is organizing it and describes its objectives in this way:

"The sense is that these gatherings hold significant prophetic and relational importance in the timeline of the Kingdom of God and for the continuing restoration of Israel and the Church as One New Man. We believe that we are nearing a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit in Israel and the world.

It is now more important than ever for the body of believers to come into alignment and to bring purity and humility to apostolic renewal in our days.

The purpose of the convocation will be:

1. To seek God in worship and prayer for wisdom and prophetic direction.
2. To develop personal relationships and unity as the global family of believers from every nation.
3. Continue discussions regarding the concept of alignment and possible implications for Israel and the Church, for the Messianic Jewish body and the wider family of believers around the world.
4. Prayerfully explore what God might be calling us to do together - to move beyond relational unity and into some sort of strategic alliance for the future.

"Heaven must receive [Yeshua], until the time of the restoration of all the things that God spoke about long ago through the mouth of His holy prophets." - Acts 3:21

Please pray for an anointed, Spirit-led time that will bring forth good things for the entire Body of Christ, Jewish and Gentile, and for our world.

A significant number of major outreaches are planned simultaneously in every country possible within Africa with many international ministries involved such as Christ for All Nations, Luis Palau, Heidi Baker, Joyce Meyer, African Enterprises, Global Outreach Day (G.O.D) and TBN Africa on 31st May 2020 (provisional date).

During the last weekend of May they have planned to have an outreach in every country of Africa where it’s possible.

Together with many international ministries, churches and African denominations who have already committed to "adopt" a country.

During May, many churches will be mobilized to go out and witness and with about 5,000 evangelists to be trained they will cast a Gospel net, including live TV.

There will be broadcasts and live streaming over the whole continent of Africa.

The project has been initiated by Evangelist Jennifer Wilde (CA) and CEO Rev. Siegfried Tomazsewski.

Event Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Website link: www.1gda.org

The World Prayer Assembly, in 2012, was held in Jakarta, Indonesia at the Sentul International Convention Centre. It was what we called a “once in a generation” gathering.

The IPC spent 3 years helping to facilitate the event, which brought together over 9,000 leaders from over 86 nations and ended with one of the most amazing prayer gatherings in history - with over 100,000 people in a tri-generational four hour prayer gathering in the national stadium with links by satellite to 374 other citywide gatherings viewed an estimated 3.5 million people.

It was an inspirational time as new connections were formed, hearts changed and people were called deeper into Prayer and Mission.

Watch this video for the full story!

The Amazon is the mightiest river in world. It covers 40% of South America, 2.7 million square miles, discharging 209,000 cubic meters per second. It is composed of over 1100 tributaries. It is a powerful metaphor of what God wants the prayer and mission movement to be like-- flowing together in the same way to become an unstoppable force for breakthrough after breakthrough, for the evangelization and transformation of the nations. If Go 2020 is to succeed in mobilizing 100 million believers to pray and reach out to one billion unreached, hundreds if not thousands of prayer and mission networks and ministries must flow together, giving up some of our independence and identity for the greater good in order to become the Lord’s unstoppable force for the fulfillment of His Great Commission in our time.

Another helpful image about flowing together comes from the Gladiator movie when Maximus, the Roman general still incognito orders his rag tag group of individualistic fighters to “Stand together”. As they coordinated and fought together, they overcame a much stronger barbarian horde with all its superior weaponry, including chariots. In the same way, we are battling principalities and powers, facing massive spiritual and human opposition to the cause of Christ. There is no excuse for going our own way and doing our own thing when our General, the Lord Jesus Christ is telling us to “stand together”!

In assessing the tragic failure of his generation to evangelize the world by 1900, A.T. Pierson attributed this most of all to the lack of prevailing prayer.

"Every time the church has set herself to praying there have been stupendous movements in the mission world. If we should but transfer the stress of our dependence and emphasis from appeals to men to appeals to God-from trust in organization to trust in supplication-from confidence in methods to importunate prayer for the power of the Holy Spirit, we should see results more astounding than have yet been wrought."

The biggest shortcoming and danger of global campaigns like Go 2020 is that we will underestimate our need for united ongoing prayer. We can so easily begin to rely on human-conceived programs, plans and organization rather than following the early church’s example of starting with the Lord before mission activity. Acts 1:14 describes their culture of prayer that carried through the whole book of Acts and resulted in breakthrough after breakthrough in evangelism and cross-cultural mission. God wants and deserves to be the Senior Partner. We need to prayerfully submit to His guidance from start to finish and let Him open the way before us as Head of the Body, the General of a worldwide army of brothers and sisters, men, women and children that He wants to call and use to reach the unreached. Prayer and surrender is always prior to mission strategy and deployment.

The New Testament urges us to always start with intimacy with the Lord (John 15 “abide in me and I in you” so that we can go and “bear fruit that remains”.) Spiritual fruit along with divine strategy and guidance comes out of that dependent, intimate relationship. We are not wasting time seeking God in prayer.  Jesus clearly commanded the early disciples in Acts 2 that they were first to “stay in Jerusalem and receive power from on high” before putting any plans or programs into operation. More than 30 times in the subsequent pages of Acts, as the early missionaries and evangelists sought God through united prayer, they experienced the intervention of His almighty Spirit, often in spectacular ways.

Missions and evangelism are supernatural endeavors and need supernatural partnership with the Holy Spirit. He will go before us to open doors, provide what we lack and above all arrange divine encounters with people whom He has prepared to come to Christ. They in turn will become His specially ordained instruments in their own cultural and language spheres. 

Let’s therefore recover this dynamic of the early church. Start with God and those around us in prayer, then sharing the Gospel as He leads us. Cultivate the “ministry of availability”, both for people closest to us and those at ends of earth, the 4700 least reached people groups that are still largely cut off from hearing the Good News. As well as evangelizing our own neighborhoods and cities, let’s join many others in adopting each of these people groups for prayer, and help make sure they do not remain lost but get at least one opportunity to hear about the Lord of life! May the result be like the awesome Amazon, an unstoppable force for seeking and hearing from God, then carrying out evangelism, discipling, church planting, and other vital ministries for reaching all the remaining unreached peoples.

For more information and resources on prayer and mission to the unreached, please see www.joshuaproject.net.

Do watch, and share the links to these excellent new videos entitled ‘Reaching the Unreached – Prayer that Empowers Missions’ - that focus us on the need to pray for the 4,700 unreached peoples' groups.  They were produced by the acclaimed Videographer / Director, Michael Lienau, a friend of IPC: 

3 minute version:  https://vimeo.com/311331983

9 minute version: https://vimeo.com/311342648

Prayer Triplets are a wonderful way of doing corporate prayer in an ongoing way focusing on those around us who need to come to Christ as well as for an unreached people group across the world. It is difficult by ourselves to maintain such a prayer focus but “a three-fold cord is not easily broken” as the Bible tells us.

Find two others who want to connect with the Lord for the harvest and begin to pray and then make yourselves available to share His Good News with others!

Pray in Triplets

1. That we can all abide in the Vine (Christ), going deeper in intimacy, surrendering all that we are and want to do to Him and His purposes (John 15:4, 16)
   
   
2. That we may have the “ministry of availability” to those around us now, not only those at the ends of the earth that are in our plans and strategies. (Jesus with individuals like Bartimaeus, Nicodemus, the woman with the flow of blood, the thief on the cross, etc.; Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch. Paul and Lydia.)
   
   
3. That together we and others in the missions community can recover the early church’s dynamic culture of united prayer that led them into supernatural breakthroughs of God’s mighty working with great numbers coming to the Lord and Christianity, spreading eventually throughout the whole then known world. (Acts 1:4-5, 8; 4:31,33; 5:12, 16; 6:7)
   
   
4. That all the 4700 least reached people groups (less than one believer per thousand among them) will be adopted by praying churches, organizations and individuals and rapidly reached with the Gospel.
   
   
5. That the Lord will use Go 2020 as an effective rallying cry to the global Church that call 100 million believers into a lifestyle of focused prayer and outreach for the unreached around them and at the ends of the earth.

John Robb

IPC Chairman

Dr. Jason Hubbard has just been installed during the IPC planning retreat in Jakarta and will be taking over the executive responsibilities from John Robb. John will remain chairman but take a long-anticipated writing sabbatical.

The IPC leadership team rejoices at Jason’s willingness to serve us and the international prayer movement.

Please pray for him and his family that they will be anointed, guided and protected being blessed to full measure as Jason works with our team to facilitate the work of the IPC as a “network of networks” connecting God’s people to pray for the transformation of our world.

Introducing Dr. Jason Hubbard

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF LIGHT OF THE WORLD PRAYER CENTER, BELLINGHAM, WASHINGTON, USA

By the grace of God, my desire is be an extravagant worshipper of  Jesus, an anointed deliverer of men and a godly husband and father.  I have been married for 26 years to Kristie, and have 3 beautiful kids, Jasmine (22), recently married to Tyler Hanon (25), Gracelyn (17) and Joshua (13). 

Previously I worked as the Associate Pastor of Prayer and Bible at Christ the King Church (3500 members) in Bellingham, WA for 10 years.  I completed my Doctorate in Discipleship in 2013 at Talbot Seminary.

For the last 10 years I have been working as the executive director of Light of the World Prayer Center (www.lowpc.org).  I also serve as a board member on 4 prayer ministries: America Prays (www.americaprays.org), the National Prayer Committee (www.nationalprayercommittee.com),  Greater Commission Coalition (www.greatcommissioncoalition.com) and the International Prayer Council (www.ipcprayer.org/ipc-home).

Our mission statement at Light of the World Prayer Center is to “Exalt Jesus, through united, day and night, prayer, praise and worship for Global Harvest.”  Our primary objective is to see Whatcom County transformed to the Glory of God, that the Lamb may receive the due reward of his sufferings.  We have 40 Spirit-led, worship-fed, Scripture-based weekly prayer meetings (80hrs per week) at our city-wide house of prayer. 

We also have 45 local churches that each take a day of prayer once a month every month, asking God for a massive Christ awakening to erupt in this region and bring about societal transformation!  

We have established 9 strategic teams in 9 different spheres in society (family, business, education, government, media, health-care, social services, global missions and church) that help us pray strategically!  

We have seen noticeable church growth in many of our local churches, several new church plants, and 60-90 pastors meeting together for prayer on a regular basis! 

You can hear about some of the amazing testimonies of transformation in a short 13-minute video documentary called, “The Whatcom Story 2” www.lowpc.org/whatcomstory

Favorite scriptures: Colossians 1:15-18, John 17 & Luke 18:1-8

Current Goals for Go 2020 (by the end of May 2020)

• Mobilize 100 million Christians to share the Gospel during May 2020.
• Reach 1 billion people with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
• 1 million new churches, faith communities and small groups.
• Disciple 20 million new believers and integrate them into existing and new churches.

The daughter of one of the founders of the Islamic republic has warned that, while still strong, the system her late father helped establish some 40 years ago is weakened and could someday collapse.

Faezeh Hashemi, the daughter of former Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, said in an interview with a Tehran daily published on December 27 that "intimidation" and "fear" were the main things propping up the Islamic establishment.

"In my view, a breakdown [of principles] has already happened, there hasn't been a physical collapse, but I see that as very likely," Hashemi told the independent Mostaghel newspaper.

Hashemi, 56, a former pro-reform lawmaker who was jailed for six months in 2012 after being convicted of antiregime propaganda, said one doesn't see the open and physical crackdowns on dissent like those seen in the antigovernment protests of 2009, but a lot of repressive measures are taking place behind the scenes.

"In every segment of society, groups of activists are in jail, from workers to teachers, truck drivers, women's rights activists, environmentalists, students..., [those involved in economic activities], and citizens who are either in jail or have been sentenced to jail," she said.

A collapse isn't imminent, she noted, "but there's been a breakdown. Everywhere you look there's inefficiency, there's a lack of leadership and reason, everything is abandoned, there's no attempt to find solutions to the problems or if there is then things only get worse, there are no signs of improvement."

'Trampling Everything'

Hashemi has previously come under pressure from hard-line conservatives attempting to smear the legacy of her father, who died in 2017, and also due to her own stances and support for reforms. They denounced her and called for her punishment in 2016 for meeting a leader of the persecuted Baha'i faith with whom she used to share a cell in Tehran's Evin prison.

In March 2017, the hard-line judiciary sentenced her to six months in jail for charges that included "antistate propaganda, spreading lies against the judiciary, and the Revolutionary Guards Corps," the opposition website Kalame reported. She was also briefly detained in the 2009 crackdown.

Hashemi appeared to place much of the blame for the country's current problems on the hard-liners, accusing them of interpreting religion to serve their own interests and "trampling on everything" to remain in power.

But she also criticized President Hassan Rohani, who is in his second term and is seen as a relative moderate.

"The president says things as if he's not the president, he talks in a way as if he were [a member of] the opposition," she said. "I know that the government is not in charge of major issues, there are significant barriers, but there are problems even in those segments under the control of the government."

Hashemi said Iran needed to seriously review and update laws and practices that have gone wrong.

Her comments come amid heightened U.S. pressure on Iran and the reimposition of tough economic sanctions, including penalties targeting the country's oil exports that contributed to a collapse of the national currency earlier this year. The rial has strengthened in recent weeks, but the cost of living remains significantly high.

Protests over economic problems and corruption spread to more than 80 cities and towns last December and in early January. Since then there have been sporadic protests during which protesters have chanted slogans against the establishment.

In a June interview with the Financial Times, Hashemi said that the survival of the Iranian establishment depended on reforms and also negotiations with the United States under President Donald Trump, who has taken a hard line on the Islamic republic.

See the full article on Radio Free Europe - Radio Liberty: https://www.rferl.org/a/revolutionary-s-daughter-says-islamic-republic-weakened-could-collapse/29681911.html?ltflags=mailer

Let’s pray for the government and nation of Iran to experience full reformation and deliverance from the oppression of radical Islam.
Pray also for what is perhaps the fastest growing Christian movement in the world, that the Gospel will spread to every sector and person of the nation.

Every January First, the leader of North Korea gives a New Year's speech that sets the tone for the year.  Everyone is expected to memorize the speech and discuss it at special meetings. 

There is a lot of anticipation as to what Kim Jong Un will have to say on Tuesday.  Following a very eventful year which he rounded out with a letter to South Korean President Moon Jae-in, Kim is expected to lay out his own plan for diplomacy on the Korean peninsula for 2019. 

The world awaits. North Korea is also using the year-end to vaunt its nuclear program with a celebration of the first anniversary of developing nuclear weapons.

In the meantime, people still try to leave the North but it is increasingly difficult.  New video cameras have been installed along the border in full view to discourage defectors.  Ministry of State Security (MSS) agents have also been luring people to defect in order arrest them and increase their own "scores." MSS Bureau 12, tasked with monitoring cell phone use has been re-named to Bureau 15 and has broader powers.  The bureau functions as the mobile-

phone anti-espionage bureau tasked with preventing communications into and out of the country as well as a front line to prevent defections.  There have been a number of defectors who have returned to North Korea--some voluntarily, some under duress.  They are being exploited to discourage others from defecting.

Kim Jong Un's zeal for new construction continues with mass mobilization for the Wonsan-Kalma Coastal Tourist Zone project even as other needed renovation projects languish for lack of man-power and materials.  Along with construction projects, the leadership extolled farm workers with a special rally in December even as the farmers themselves are anxious about being able to make it through the winter.  Sanctions continue to have an impact as shown by these photos from the Rason Economic Zone but the "Singapore" shops in Pyongyang continue with business as usual.

Meanwhile both North and South Korea are moving forward on the inter-Korea railway project celebrated in a special ceremony on December 26th with a ribbon-cutting ceremony on the northern side of the border following assurance from the UN Security Council that the sanctions would not be applied to the project.

We all know that the authorities are working to stamp out the viewing of South Korean media in the North but it seems that they are also heavily involved in spreading it around. A couple final notes:  New Kim Il Sung-Kim Jong Il high prestige badges are being distributed.  Here is a new searchable detailed digital atlas of North Korea.  Take a look around...

Remembering Our Brothers in Prison We continue to pray for six South Koreans held in the North as well as Daily NK journalist, Choi Song Min (alias). Here's information on the pastors and others who have been detained and released.  Please remember them in your prayers.

Ben Torrey - Director

The Fourth River Project, Inc.

www.thefourthriver.org

Pray for the upcoming second Trump-Kim summit planned for the end of next month.
Pray for the denuclarization of the Korean peninsula.
Pray for the closing down of the prison camps and freedom for North Korea as a result.