Noche de Oracion (prayer night)

A few months ago on of the men in the congregation encouraged the church to fast for 24 hours. It's always exciting to me when the good ideas come from the church and not the gringos :)! Though the objective was to spend the 24 hours praying and fasting, we wanted to encourage everyone in the church to take a specific half an hour of the 24 hours to pray alone. Together, the whole congregation would ALL be part of the prayer time. The "wee" hours of the morning always seem to be the hardest, but the youth stepped up to the task. The youth committee felt like it might be too much to not eat and stay up all night, so we encouraged the youth to fast all day Friday and break the fast together Saturday morning.

Everyone arrived at the building around midnight. We started with a time of praise and Ben gave us some good thoughts on fasting, praying and their purpose. Then we divided into groups and studied Luke 11:1-4 for a time. Around 1 a.m. we filled them up with Caffiene and snacks and then split them up individually to write out their sin and confess it before God. Following this time, we talked a little about being honest before God and starting the night off right with Him. We placed everyone's "sin list" in the trash can and burned them and talked a little about God's forgiveness. We then seperated into groups again and each group (3) took a floor in the church building. The church's building is divided into 4 floors and on each level there are one, some times two class rooms. Each group prayed for each student and teacher by name. This went on until around 3:45 a.m.

The youth committee figured midnight to 3 wouldn't be too hard, but we were all pretty sure we would "hit a wall" around 3ish in the morning. We decided that we would do activities that would keep us all awake. A little before 4 we had a quick coffee break and then did some Bible "win, lose or draw". We also had some group "Bible charades" during this time. While this was going on, the AIMers and Bill broke off from the group to fix everyone breakfast.

About 5:30 a.m. we all ate eggs, bacon and pancakes. The night was a get way to break the fast together and spend time developing their walk with God. No one complained, no one slept and everyone prayed and grew! There was a concern from someone that not many youth would come to an all night prayer time. I'm super proud of the youth and never doubted that at least half or more would be there...in all there were around 30 of us!! God is GOOD!!!

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