For 25 years, Steve Hawthorne has written and published the Seek God for the City prayer guide. Many of you have told us that you would like to read and pray through other prayers Steve has written. WayMakers has produced several other prayer guides authored by Steve. The “Ways to Pray” series of six, 16-page pocket-sized prayer guides will encourage you in on-going, sustained praying. Each of the different booklets has its own unique theme:

  • • Blessings: Ways to Pray in Hope. Learn how to pray blessings by using your own words to express the goodness in God’s heart for others. Seven biblical themes with sample prayers of blessing help you pray for the fulfillment of God’s purpose for next-door neighbors and in distant nations.
  • • Light from my House: Ways to Pray for God’s Light to Shine. Fight the battle of light overcoming darkness in the lives of neighbors and people in your community. Focused prayers ignite biblical passages about the light of Christ.
  • • The Lord is Their Shepherd: Ways to Pray for Goodness and Mercy. Follow the 23rd Psalm as a guideline to pray for others. Pray your way into the story of what God is doing in the lives of people who are close to you, but still far from God. Pray them all the way home.
  • • Open My City: Ways to Pray for Neighbors. Seven biblical themes of openness. Pray open the eyes, ear and lives of those who seem closed to Christ. Pray open the homes and hearts of Christians to welcome them.
  • • Prompts for Prayerwalkers: Ways to Pray from God’s Word for your World. This booklet helps prayerwalkers to get started and veterans to keep going. Select scriptures and “street-tested” prayers equip you to pray on-site with insight. Biblical ideas help you enjoy praying with persistence.
  • • What Would Jesus Pray? Ways to Pray like Jesus. Prayers Jesus actually prayed, organized around seven parts of the “Lord’s Prayer.” Pray with the same clear purpose Jesus used when He prayed for others.

The booklets are reasonably priced at $2.00 each. Significant discounts for bulk orders of 20 or more are available. You can also order mixed quantities of two or more of these booklets. Check out two sample pages of each of them and place your order today.

These days both challenge and yet strengthen our desire to spend time before God in prayer. Let’s ask God to stir our hearts and unite our faith as we seek His face and ask for His will to be done, here on earth as it is in heaven.

For His glory,

Barb Hawthorne

Stephanie Tucker

More Info and Order at:https://waymakers.org/pray/ways-to-pray/

An estimated two million people filled Hong Kong streets in protests against the government, which had been pursuing an extradition agreement that could have sent activists, advocates and even foreign nationals to mainland China for legal proceedings. But even after the bill was pulled, the protests not only continued: they have grown, and through the ongoing protest, an unlikely song has rapidly become the unofficial anthem by tens and hundreds of thousands. The uniting song is ‘Sing Hallelujah to the Lord’. A quarter of the entire population sang the anthem. Praise the Lord, Hong Kong! Praise the Lord, indeed!

John Earnest walked into a California synagogue carrying a semiautomatic rifle. Rabbi Goldstein was preparing for the day’s prayer and heard gunshots. He found himself staring down the barrel of a gun. Earnest had just shot someone in the foyer. ‘I have a fraction of a second to decide what to do’, he recounted. ‘Do I hide? The gun is pointing at me. Do I think about others?’ His mind raced. When he turned to herd the children to safety the gunman fired at him, blowing off his fingers. His granddaughter cried, ‘Grandpa, why are you bleeding?’ The gunman fired into a side room full of people but only two were slightly wounded. As the rabbi turned back, the gunman’s rifle jammed. Two congregation members chased him out of the building. A short time later, he inexplicably phoned 911 and reported the shooting.

‘According to Proverbs 14:34, we agree that righteousness exalts a nation, so we speak righteousness into every aspect of government. We decree and declare that Kingdom values (well-being, health, safety and prosperity) will be established over all other values in the UK. We thank You, Lord, for the expectation that people are treated justly - economically, educationally and socially - irrespective of class or ethnicity. We thank You for those who are concerned over housing, healthcare and the environment, and for the roots of social justice and concern that lie within Your Kingdom. In this season of the impossible becoming possible, we agree with God’s promise, “You shall declare a thing and it shall be established” (Job 22:28). We declare that the words of God’s people in this nation will release hope and peace, and build Kingdom purposes in our land. We speak mercy, truth, righteousness and Godly wisdom into all spheres of government.’

Farming facts

27 Jun 2019

Certain occupations can be more dangerous than others due to the nature of work that is carried out. The Health and Safety Executive reported that agriculture, forestry and fishing are the riskiest industry sector. One that consistently tops the list of hazardous industries is farming. Although no figures are yet available for 2019, 33 people died in the 12 months up to March 2018. Farming is more than five times more risky than the second such industry. Farmers had the most fatal injuries, and 48% of those killed were over 65. Almost twice as many self-employed farmers were killed as employees.

The Bishop of St Albans said arms sales to Saudi Arabia should be suspended, after a court of appeal ruled that the Government failed to assess adequately the risk of arms being used in violation of international law. He said, ‘We need reassurance that the Government has adopted appropriate safeguards to protect civilians in future. Aid is still needed in Yemen, and I hope international partners will work with the Government to deliver this.’ Campaign Against Arms Trade said the Government didn’t enforce its own rules, which state that military export licences should not be granted if there is a clear risk that arms might be used in violation of international humanitarian law. Christian Aid said that the Saudi-UAE-led coalition was being propped up by UK government military advisers, arms exports, and ongoing political and technical support. The Government plans to appeal against the court’s ruling.

Dr Richard Scott runs the Bethesda Medical Centre, caring for almost 20,000 patients. At the end of the standard Western medicine procedure he asks his patients for their permission to introduce elements of faith into his consultation. He maintains that his behaviour is vindicated by the WHO, which includes spiritual alongside physical and mental wellbeing and has ‘involved a spiritual angle’ for patients with depression, anxiety or addiction. Now he faces disciplinary action by the General Medical Council and could lose his job, following complaints to the National Secular Society by an acquaintance that a ‘highly vulnerable’ patient felt ‘discomfort at the use of prayer’. Christian Concern said that Dr Scott always asks his patients if they're open to discussion. Sometimes they're not, and he respects that.

Journalist Mobeen Azhar went to Huddersfield to investigate gun crime. His enquiry, lasting almost two years, found links between Huddersfield and national and international drugs trading, mainly by British Pakistanis. Each incident he saw on videotape seemed to follow the same pattern - streets cordoned off, gunshots, blood, and masked men speeding off. Witnesses were afraid to talk for fear of retribution. The words ‘young Pakistani’ kept coming up, with suggestions of a drug turf war. ‘It’s getting out of control - you can’t pop down to the shop without a bulletproof vest’, one woman said. In 20 months, 95+ incidents involving firearms related to the drugs trade occurred in one Huddersfield district alone. People justified selling drugs because ‘the customers aren’t Muslim, so you don’t have to respect them’. One in every 100 people in Yorkshire and Humber has used crack cocaine and other opiates.