Please keep praying for the WPA! Your prayer support will be all-important to this event which is intended to be a "new paradigm" for an international congress-carried out Acts 13-style-incorporating listening to God, united prayer, and strategic implementation of world-impacting action that proceeds out of that encounter with the Lord and one another.
 
WPA Prayer Concerns
 
We are now less than two weeks from the World Prayer Assembly. Your prayers have been a sustaining and encouraging force for us. We know that without your support in this way, we could be dead meat in the spiritual battle that rages against us and this "once in a generation" gathering of praying people from around the world.
 
Here are some causes for thanksgiving to God and continuing key issues in prayer we hope you can focus on with us now and during the WPA:

1.    God has answered your prayers for people to hear His voice and come to the WPA. There are now about 6000 registered to take part! Much of this wave of registrations has flowed in to our Jakarta office in the last month.
2.    The Lord has been providing funding as it is needed. There is still about $400,000 needed to help hundreds of children, youth and adults with subsidies for their accommodations and ground transport and in some cases with partial travel help. Please pray that donors will respond now and provide the rest that is needed. A colleague is asking for 100 people to each give $4000. If the Lord moves your heart to help, please let us know.
3.    Pray for the many speakers, facilitators and worship teams that they will be anointed and prepared to play their part at the WPA. We want to follow a new/old paradigm of letting the Lord guide and speak as He did in Acts 13 to the five leaders at Antioch. Pray that we may have special wisdom and sensitivity to know how to do this effectively in both the plenary and track sessions.
4.    The Indonesian national committee needs our continuing prayer as they seek to bring together the very challenging and detailed logistics- hotels and other accommodations, ground transport involving many buses and program details. It is a huge undertaking- please pray for them regularly.
5.    The May 17 national stadium event will link the 100,000 participants live to 362 cities within Indonesia with an estimated audience of 5 million as well as many millions of others throughout the world through satellite TV and Internet streaming. Please pray for an anointed, powerful program that is being developed now, for excellent collaboration with Christian and secular media outlets, and that all the technical aspects will work flawlessly.
6.    Pray for unity, love and humility among the Indonesian committee and our international coordination team. Pray for excellent security, both spiritual and physical, to surround the venues, hotels and ground transport.   We all need His protection both physically and spiritually as we move into these last weeks and during the WPA as well. The evil one wants to hinder such a global prayer tsunami from happening, of course, and we must not underestimate his resolve to disrupt it.
7.    Of course, finally, pray that the WPA will be mightily and wonderfully used of God to fulfill His purposes and to be a vehicle for world revival and breakthrough in mission.PrayEphesians 3:20 and Habakkuk 2:14 for it!  
Thanks so much for standing with us for this "once in a generation" event.
 
Yours in Christ,
John Robb (on behalf of the WPA International Coordination Team)

With less than 100 days before the commencement of the 2012 London Olympics[1], the movement of prayer in the British Isles and Ireland wish to welcome the rest of the world to join us on the journey. We welcome prayer groups, praying communities, prayer movements, praying churches and praying individuals to join in with us to strengthen our hands in God during the coming months. Above all we are praying for the presence of God to be experienced in unprecedented ways in these island nations.

Key Dates:

Olympic Torch Relay: 19th May-27th July; Olympic Games 27th July-12th August;
Paralympic Torch Run 24th August-29th August; Paralympic Games 29th August-9th September

Background

As a result of a "download" from Heaven in 2005, we believed that it would take seven years of prayer and praise - particularly around the coasts of Scotland, England and Wales - to prepare this nation. So that, when the nations of the world arrive for the Games, we would be in a right place with God and with one another to welcome them and to pray for them to encounter God here. This "download" has been echoed in many ways through similar revelations. Only two weeks afterwards, a young man was the subject of a television interview for having completed a prayer walk of the entire coast of Great Britain. Since then, many others have walked and prayed along their part of the coast, and along rivers. A spiritual "coastguard" has been raised within the Lydia movement. Many prayer centers have been started around our coast also.

In addition, Scripture about the role of the gatekeepers as described in 1 Chronicles chapters 9-23 has been important for us. Gatekeepers were to stand guard at the gates of the temple - north, south, east and west - in order to maintain the temple as a place where people could encounter God. They were to be involved in praise and worship and in prophesying. They were to prepare for the ark of God's presence to be brought back. We have therefore been praying that when the nations come to the UK for the Games, they will come into a nation where they can encounter God - a nation where the presence of God can be experienced. We want to be a blessing to the people from the nations. We want them to be blessed by being here. We know that we actually deserve the judgment of God - but we have been praying repentantly for God to have mercy, forgive our sins and heal our land.

More Than Gold (the charity set up to co-ordinate the Christian response to the Games) has a Prayer Program team amongst the 22 program teams, and has welcomed the whole prayer strategy that has been emerging since 2005. The theme verses for 2012 are Isaiah 60:1-7 and the prayer strategy for 2012 is called 'A Time to Shine'. www.morethangold.org.uk

2012

Year of Prayer This year is being called 'a year of prayer' with many churches, organizations, and prayer ministries being called by the Holy Spirit to mobilize different seasons and initiatives. This is unprecedented here! Information on www.prayerforum.org. Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II. This will be celebrated throughout the year but especially from 2-4th June with many nationwide events. The Big Lunch will take place on Sun June 3rd where we are praying for 6 million people to be fed across the nation as the church provides lunch for its community. So in your prayers of blessing on this nation, we humbly ask for her and her family to be included. www.hopetogether.org.uk
The Olympic Torch Relay 19th May-27th July
Many know that the Olympic Torch is lit in Olympia, Greece - at a temple to Zeus. It will arrive in Land's End in Cornwall (the extreme South-West tip of England). It will then go to over 1,000 communities throughout all parts of the British Isles, stopping each night at 70 key towns and cities. Interestingly, about 70% of the overnight stopping points are coastal towns and cities. We believe God knew this before the route was formally planned, and has been preparing the ground through His people.

Favor of God. The first few months of this year has revealed an extraordinary level of favor that God has begun to give us. Here a few of the headlines.
•    More Than Gold has been equipping over 3000 churches throughout the country to make the most of this open door to do service, mission and hospitality in a variety of ways. All the main Christian denominations and over 80 organizations are working together.
•    The London Organizing Committee of the Olympic & Paralympic Games (LOCOG) have asked More Than Gold for 1,000 Games pastors - to welcome people as they arrive at ports, airports and stations & to help them locate venues or accommodation.
•    With the help of More Than Gold, LOCOG have found the Christian Chaplains who will be available to help with practical and spiritual needs of athletes in the athletes villages.
•    The Police have been looking to the church for help in a number of ways as they face huge policing challenges.
•    Hundreds of people involved in drama groups are expected from the nations. Various British-based drama teams have been writing and preparing special material.
•    Overseas mission teams are currently registering to come to partner with British Christians in faith sharing on the streets and in public squares.
•    LOCOG have asked More Than Gold to run the Athlete Family Homestay Program which provides living accommodation for athletes families from overseas.
•    The Salvation Army has been awarded the contract to provide water to the athletes in all events.   [William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army, began his work in the East End of London, not far from the main Olympic site.]
•    A 70-day cascade of praise and prayer will use the Olympic Torch Relay route to mobilize the movement for prayer and the church to pray blessing over communities. This involves a number of prayer initiatives including a praise bus and a prayer relay between 70 key towns and cities.
•    Churches in East London are running 30 days of non-stop prayer and worship 14th July to 12th August.
•    Many other churches, home groups, prayer groups, Houses of Prayer across the British Isles will be taking part in what we hope will become a continuous canopy of prayer & praise during both the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
Key Areas for Prayer:
1.    That we as the body of Christ across our nations will grasp the opportunities before us to Arise and Shine and share the good news of Jesus with residents, competitors, visitors, and a watching world. Isaiah 60:1-7
2.    That through the praise and prayers of God's people the Olympic Torch will be recalibrated to shine the light of Christ in every community across our nations during the 70-day cascade of prayer and praise.
3.    That through the prayer relay of blessing, ditches will indeed be dug in the spirit to prepare the way for the Lord to bless every person and every community. 2 Kings 3:6-20
4.    That Christians in the area of the main Olympic venues in the East London will be strengthened and equipped. They have been alert to the opportunities well before the 2012 Olympics were announced and through prayer and action are working hard as they focus on the legacy of the Games for future generations. However, this area is one of the poorest and most deprived in the capital, and the church is arguably the weakest numerically.  Yet they are full of enterprise and have been positioning themselves in the community "for such a time as this".
5.    Our nation is currently on a very high security alert. Every part of our armed forces and police are being mobilised. Annual leave has been cancelled for them all during this season. Pray for God's mercy and protection for us that the media will not create a culture of fear and that through a safe and peaceful Games, the:
•    presence of Jesus will be experienced
•    power of the gospel released to be shared
•    purposes of God will be fulfilled

Resources
If you would like to pray with us during this season, the More Than Gold website will be uploading daily. Prayer pointers from 14th May are linked to its Facebook and Twitter pages. www.morethangold.org.uk
Current prayer resources are on the prayer pages website.

Brian Mills & Jane Holloway on behalf of Prayer Forum of British Isles & Ireland
World Prayer Centre, Cornerstone House, 5 Ethel Street, Birmingham B2 4BG, UK
E: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
W: www.worldprayer.org.uk; www.prayerforum.org

April 24, 2012
________________________________________
[1] London 2012 was awarded to the United Kingdom and there are venues in Scotland, Wales, and in different parts of England as well as in London. The Olympic Torch run will also visit Isle of Man, the Channel Islands and the Republic of Ireland.

In January of last year, a colleague and I were invited to Yangon to help lead a special prayer initiative for Burma and for the raising up of children as intercessors. About 200 ministry leaders took part, and we had good unity and authoritative prayer for the nation. The participants developed plans to train and encourage prayer by children in various parts of the country.

My experience is that the united prayers of children can be especially powerful in bringing His transformation. We observed this while I was with World Vision in many of our development projects. What we are seeing now in Burma may well be the result of such intercession by kids and by adults who are uniting in prayer for the deliverance of the nation. Praise the Lord and thanks to all who have been besieging Heaven for breakthrough all these years and especially for the brave and compassionate efforts of David Eubank and the Free Burma Rangers who have stood in the gap and risked their lives to be instruments of His love and healing! Please read the recent report of the Free Burma Rangers. David Eubank, took part in the launch of the IPC in 2002, and we have prayed for him and his work through the years. His report is an exciting account of prayer and reconciliation from the front lines for which we can rejoice and give thanks even as we must continue to pray for God's full healing of the conflicted nation of Burma.
John Robb, IPC Chairman
FBR REPORT: Unplanned Meeting with Burma Delegation
Karen State, Burma, 2 April, 2012
Last year we wrote a letter to the Government of Burma (Myanmar) telling them that we pray for them, encouraging them to reconcile with all people in Burma and telling them that we were willing to be of help in any constructive way.
The Burma government let us know indirectly that they were interested in meeting. We discussed this among our teams and prayed about the right steps and timing. We did not know if and when a meeting would take place but unexpectedly we met the government delegation last week. I will make a full report on the events of this past week- meeting the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA - a breakaway faction of the Karen and a prior proxy of the Burma Army), a surprise for all meeting with the local Burma Army in the field in Burma, the Lay Ton Ku and Talako visit, IDP programs and how our friends, the Bluegrass band-Dogwood Cross - opened many hearts and how Eliya, opened a door into Burma thru the DKBA. We were able to meet, play for and pray for many people who are enemies there - Karen National Union (KNU), DKBA, Burma Army, the two factions of the Talakoe Karen - all this was God's gift. Then back to Mae Sot where we had the unexpected meeting with former Burma Army Generals Aung Min and Khin Gyi and others in Mae Sot in the middle of a KNU/Burma government prisoner release/negotiation - Aung Min is the chief negotiator for the government and ethnic groups in the ceasefire process. He is the one we had been praying about meeting after the Burma government expressed interest in meeting FBR. Now with no plan from us to do so, here and now, we have met.
This is what happened.
We had just returned from the Lay Ton Ku and Southern Karen State areas and the IDP programs and were in Mae Sot. We drove in on Friday night from the border and then had meetings with some in the KNU until midnight. Prior to this we had been asked to meet KNU leaders and others to offer to facilitate a possible multi ethnic unity meeting in the future. I prayed to God and said, "Lord, I want this to be of You; can you just do all the arraigning of meetings? That way it will be of You and not be me wasting time or going the wrong way. Thank you, Lord".
The meeting with some in the KNU unfolded as soon as we got back that night. Then, the next morning- Saturday - we were preparing to go to Mae La refugee camp when I noticed KNU, local authorities and others starting to come into where we were staying. I knew most of them, and we started to talk. They told me that very soon a delegation of the Burma government would arrive to release Mahn Ye Maung, a KNU leader who was being held prisoner. Mahn Ye Maung is an old personal friend of ours (Karen has especially been praying for him) and is known as the Karen 'Robinson Crusoe' for his escape from Coco island prison. While on work details, he secretly built a canoe he dug out from a tree and his multi week journey across the ocean to the Burma/Thai peninsula and eventual escape back to Karen lines many years ago is a story of brilliance, endurance, and daring. He had been captured again last year after a trip to coordinate with the Kachin. As he was going between China and Kachin State, northern Burma, the Chinese arrested him in Kunming and sent him on request from the Burma regime to Burma where he became prisoner again. He has been an issue in the ceasefire negation process. I prayed about what to do and decided that I would try talking with the KNU and other friends and see if this was an opportunity to meet. The Burma delegation approached and right away I was identified and called by name. They came over to me and said, "You are David Eubank, leader of the Free Burma Rangers". I said yes and that I was glad and surprised to meet. I shook hands with the 3 Burma government ministers that led the delegation (ex-Burma Army generals) and some of the delegation including the president of Egress - a business oriented peace-making group. (Egress later told me to give them a month, and they would arrange a meeting in Burma for us.) The meeting was warm, and I told them, "It is good we did not meet on the battle field, one of us or all of us would probably be dead!", and we all laughed. I gave them our FBR DVDs and FBR annual report and told them they may be angry when they look at all of these but that we reported what was true and tried to speak the truth in love. I acknowledged we were looking at things from one side and one perspective but were open to seeing the other side and all sides. They told me they would like to meet again and invited me to come to Burma. They then proceeded to the meeting hall where the official release of Mahn Ye Maung would take place.
Many of us FBR joined the meeting and stood in the back of the room. When the official handover of Mahn Ye Maung to the KNU was over the delegation moved back out, and we hugged and prayed with Mahn Ye Maung. On the way out Aung Min saw Baby Suu standing with me. He smiled and introduced himself, asking who she was - Suu shook his hand and introduced herself as Baby Bear and Suu. I took Aung Min's hand in mine and asked him if I could pray - he looked surprised but smiled and said yes, so I prayed - first in Burmese - "May God bless you" then in English-asking God to lead, help, and bless us as we try new ways that we do not know. Aung Min squeezed my hand as we prayed, and I felt God's love with us. After this we took a photo together. Then the Burma and Karen delegations ate lunch together at the next long table over from our FBR and Dogwood Cross group - very amazing positioning. After lunch, one of the Karen leaders asked me to stay on as the Karen and Burma group would continue meetings, and he wanted me to meet briefly after that. So the team took Dogwood Cross to Mae La refugee camp for the evening concert and Karen, the kids, and I stayed on where I worked while the kids played. Later that afternoon, the meeting finished, and now the delegation met our whole family and invited us to Burma for a meeting. There were real smiles as the kids, with both monkeys - Wesley and the Luthaw Kid - jumping about, introduced themselves and saluted as a team. We talked about the FBR mission, the multi-ethnic focus of our work, how we do this together as a family and how this is grounded in love and the desire for freedom for all. I told the kids in front of the delegation, "See these leaders, they were generals in the Burma army and now we are meeting in a friendly way together - we are all human beings, and we can be friends." The kids smiled, shook hands and looked intently at the delegation. They showed a lot of interest in the kids and wanted to talk to them. We were asked about the children's schooling while we are on missions, and they were all glad Karen was home/backpack schooling them. At the end they turned to me and said, "We do want you and your family to come to meet us in Burma. We want to start a new way. Please come." I told them we had been praying about it, and yes, we wanted to come at the right time and looked forward to that.
We said goodbye and they departed. ...Thank you for your prayers. We do not know what will come of the meetings with the Burma government and if there will be any more.
Thanks for everyone's prayers for this.
God bless you all,
Dave, family and teams
The Free Burma Rangers' (FBR) mission is to provide hope, help and love to internally displaced people inside Burma, regardless of ethnicity or religion. Using a network of indigenous field teams, FBR reports on human rights abuses, casualties and the humanitarian needs of people who are under the oppression of the Burma Army. FBR provides medical, spiritual and educational resources for IDP communities as they struggle to survive Burmese military attacks.

For more information, please visit www.freeburmarangers.org

Let's continue to pray for the full healing and reconciliation of Burma and all its peoples. Pray also for David Eubank and the Free Burma Rangers that the Lord will continue to use them effectively in this process.

"...the time is coming to gather all nations and tongues. And they shall come and shall see my glory." (Isaiah 66:18)

"Things always happen when we pray, especially when we pray in loving unity. (We) can hear God together and come to agreement. (We) can stand in the gap, ask forgiveness, bind and loose, and proclaim blessing." John Dawson

In the year 1612, the translation of the Gospel of Matthew in the Malay language was completed...it was published in 1629. ...Since 1964, there has been a flurry of various new translations both in Indonesian and Malay languages. But we are asked to pray for those efforts to News/International Prayer ConnectionsNews/International Prayer Connectionsmake the Scriptures available in the Malay language that would be 'acceptable' to the majority people…a project based on Shellabear's work but wrought with security issues and much debate over terminology.

•    PRAY for the Word of God to be widely available and read and for God to speak through His Word as only He can to all who would read it (Isaiah 55:11).

Prayer for the Majority People

While the stories cannot really be told or details shared publicly, we should know that all over Malaysia there are Malays hearing about Jesus and the love of God. Malays are being healed of sicknesses, and small groups of Malay believers are gathering to worship. Even in the absence of details, we are urged to pray for this growing movement, this continuing and scattered sowing of the seed.

Here are some instances that will help stimulate and fuel prayer:

•    Praise God for His faithfulness to His children in time of need - especially when under fire.
•    Praise God for the testimony of this sister as she shares it with fellow believers - that they also might be stirred and challenged to be more intentional.
•    PRAY that God will continue to give grace to this sister each time she is called on to share, that through her the gospel will be shared clearly with boldness as it should, and that others will come to faith in Jesus!

In another part of the country, a worker writes… 'We have new threats on our lives. We just got a report from several of our (Malay) families that some of their neighbors have made threatening plans against us the next time we come to their village.'

•    PRAY that those plans do not succeed.

Remember those Malay believers whose identities have been made public…the fellowship of believers who impacted by the August raid last year. There are threats on their lives, pressure from family and the authorities to revert to their former religion, and now tensions among them due to jealousy or suspicion.

Pray for a massive ingathering among the Malay.