Restless Ones - Pueblo Incense House of Prayer
A production of the Pueblo Incense House of Prayer. Our mission is to help normal believers sustain a life of worship and prayer by exploring what the scriptures say about the urgency of the hour we live in as well as how to grow in intimacy with God.
Restless Ones - Pueblo Incense House of Prayer
Conversation: The Power of Relational Prayer
In this engaging discussion episode, Zac and Brennan unpack the powerful concept of "relational intercession"—a term they admit to making up, but one deeply rooted in Scripture. Moving beyond the formal teaching, they process together what it looks like when prayer flows from authentic friendship rather than religious duty.
Key conversation topics:
- What is relational intercession? Exploring how Paul's letters reveal prayer partnerships built on genuine relationship, not just spiritual assignments
- The role of emotions in prayer: Wrestling with how love, care, and burden-bearing shape our intercession—and when emotional investment becomes too much
- Prayer as real work: Challenging the hierarchy that elevates some ministry roles over others and recognizing prayer as equal partnership in kingdom advancement
- The economy of God: A profound discussion on how those enriched in prayer and those enriched in finances can work together in a beautiful cycle of generosity and thanksgiving
- Practical steps forward: Simple, actionable ways to start praying relationally—meeting monthly, praying weekly with others, interceding daily
- The shift from inward to outward: How prayer communities can stop building their own platforms and start serving the visions God has given others
This conversation gets refreshingly honest about the challenges of prayer ministry, the pitfalls of self-ambition, and the breakthrough that comes when we learn to "join in helping" one another through prayer and generosity. Zac shares vulnerably about PyHop's journey from isolation to collaboration, while Brennan offers theological insights on partnership that will challenge how you view both prayer and giving.
Perfect for anyone exploring what it means to pray beyond the prayer room walls and partner with what God is doing in their city through authentic, relational intercession.
So I want to start off with a bit of a caveat today.
SPEAKER_01:Okay.
SPEAKER_02:So as you're listening to these teachings and discussions, we will give you the teaching, and the teaching's meant to be very biblically based, very theologically accurate, like all of that good stuff. We've done a ton of research and things behind it, hopefully. And then we give that teaching online, right? And you're going to see all of those labeled as the teachings. What we do here, what you're listening to right now, is the discussions, right? It's a conversation. And so I think last week I walked away thinking, man, we should probably explain that what we say here isn't pre-planned. We were just talking about that right before we started. We don't have any idea really what we're about to say. And so this may be more or less biblical, a lot of what we say. So just want to give that caveat of when you're listening to these discussions, think of it just like that. You're listening to a discussion, not necessarily a teaching where we're going to give you the line by line of the Bible, but a discussion where we're going to process together. And so take whatever we're saying with a grain of salt, take it back to the word and go, okay, is where is this in the Bible? What does the Bible say? Just want to give that caveat before we jump in.
SPEAKER_00:I can appreciate that caveat.
SPEAKER_02:Gives us a little more breathing room, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:We were just talking. We're both so used to really studying, having notes in front of us, and kind of using that as a script. So the fact that we genuinely do not have a script for this conversation. Just never know what you're gonna get.
SPEAKER_02:It's kind of terrifying, honestly. All right. Well, welcome back to the Restless Ones podcast. We want to equip you with the tools to build and sustain a life of prayer here. Today we are talking about. Ooh, actually, I completely forgot to read the title. What does it say? Partnering in prayer and ministry. Yeah, partnering in prayer and ministry. So we're gonna jump in today. If you haven't listened to the teaching yet, please pause this, go back and do that. A lot of what we say here probably won't make a lot of sense if you don't do that. So go back. Zach's teaching was great on this. Listen to that first, but yeah, great, Zach. And you shouted me out in the middle of it. That's right.
SPEAKER_00:It's mutual.
SPEAKER_02:Got a passage. It's a partnership. Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. One hand washes the other. So let's jump in. The first passage you pulled out, 2 Corinthians 3 through 11. You started talking about this idea of relational intercession. I love that word. Um, well, words, I guess, phrase. Haven't really heard that before. And not gonna lie, I looked it up on Google. Like, is this a thing? Relational intercession? No. Just about no one's ever said it. So I think we could totally take and run the thing. Let's go make it our own thing. So give just like the 30-second, one-minute version of what exactly is relational intercession? What are we saying when we say that?
SPEAKER_00:Totally. I think based on the scripture that I shared there, relational intercession, which is our made-up term, is essentially having friends and praying for them. Intention, intentional relationships where prayer is the center of that, having prayer-based relationships. And so in that scripture, Paul is, I'm not going to read it because it's really long, but in the scripture, Paul is essentially updating his friends in Corinth, saying, This is what we're kind of going through, this is what we've gone through. Pray for me. I need I need your prayers to give me favor and breakthrough in this. And they did. And so I think that relational intercession, though Google may not think it's a thing, I think biblically I've found that reality um more than I even realized that it was there. And then I think even just practically, we've stepped into a sort of season of relational intercession with a whole bunch of new friends.
SPEAKER_02:So yeah, it's so true. And as I was thinking about this, the idea of relational intercession, I started thinking through like I um different people in the Bible and characters, and one that really stuck out to me was Daniel when he prays in Daniel 9 for the people of Israel, right? Talking about relational intercession, right? We're praying for people that we know, people that we care about. And I just see that so much in his prayer when he's talking about like talk asking God for forgiveness for Israel, confessing the sins of Israel, and he uses so much like we language and us, and just see him really have that heart of intercession, but it's not just for like random people that I don't know. He's praying for his nation and being a leader, he knew so many of them, he knew the people that he was praying for specifically. And I think that's part of why that prayer probably had a lot of weight in heaven. It's written down in the scripture because it was so relationally grounded. I think there's there's something to be said about that that I haven't really heard before. It again, relational intercession is not a term that anyone uses, yeah, and so it's it's fascinating to me because you hear so much talk about like burden bearing. I've heard that all the time in intercession, but it's never really in the context of friendship. It's always just like God just spontaneously places a burden on you for something or someone and you pray into it. And I'm all for that. But as I'm thinking about this like relational peace, praying for friends, it's like, well, we all already have burdens for them. Yeah, because they're our friends, we already care about them, we already have that burden of I want to pray for them, I want to see the best for them. And so I think it just makes sense that intercession would flow from that place for our friends.
SPEAKER_00:Even as I was studying for this teaching and putting together the notes, it just felt like it was everywhere in the New Testament, everywhere that Paul went, every letter that he wrote, it felt like it was just in there. And I was mind-blown, like, Lord, how could I have not seen this relational intercession thing this clearly before? It stuck out so much. And then I really started thinking about it in the 21st century. You know, we are in churches and we're in the West and we're in America, and we're so good at systems and we're so good at process and the mechanics. You do A, B, and C and you get the result that you're looking for. And I think that we have even in the prayer world, maybe I'm just speaking for me, maybe I'm speaking for more of us who are listening to this podcast, but for me, I I get really good at the system, and in the process of doing the right systems, it can be easy to neglect the people part of it. And so as I dove back into the teaching, I was like, oh Lord, prayer was rooted in their friendship. And you think about the the relational nature of the kingdom, which we've been talking about um several sessions in a row, God's kingdom is relational, the the the way that he works is is built upon the foundation of relationships. And I think maybe we've gotten away from that in our context of prayer and intercession, and we've just tried to figure out what is the system, what's the right verse to pray, what's the right word to pray, and we've neglected the relational part of it.
SPEAKER_02:That's a good point. And as I'm thinking about it, like I almost wonder if this is more of a quote unquote new idea for the prayer movement specifically. Because I think of like, you know, the prayer meetings in a local church, pretty often they're more relationally based than like a prayer room context, right? Because I having been in both a lot of my life, I've seen the prayer room context, which I do still love, it's a more of a broad thing, which isn't bad, right? It allows everyone to engage with the same topic and new people and all of that stuff. But then you go to like a local church, and very often the prayers are like, hey, you know, you know, Aunt Susie's got cancer or had this diagnosis, let's let's pray into that, right? And so it's it's far more relationally based. So I wonder if a lot of our mindsets are coming from the prayer movement, and that's why we're like, wait a minute, this is like this is crazy. It's kind of all throughout the scripture that we would do a more relationally based prayer. But I think yeah, I think there's something to that of bearing the burden of one another of being willing to go to that place in intercession.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. And I think the Lord honors um the way that we genuinely love and care for people, and when we bring that love and care to the place of prayer. I think, again, we didn't we didn't study this out, but I think that that's a real dynamic to why we've seen some pretty cool answers as we've prayed for friends in our prayer room, is because we're cultivating a relationship that is rooted in love. We're loving them, we're caring for them, and we're wanting to uh carry the burden alongside of them, and that actually causes something on the inside of us to pray more intensely, to pray harder, to pray with more emotion behind it, to pray where the stakes feel like they're a little higher. And I think that that does something to God. I think it does something to his heart, and I think we've seen breakthrough because of that piece, whatever we call that.
SPEAKER_02:Sure. I think that's huge, the thing of uh 1 Corinthians 13, right? Where if we're praying but our prayers are devoid of love, I would argue those prayers are probably pointless, right? If it if it says, you know, you can speak in tongues, you can have the gift of prophecy, knowledge, you can move mountains, but if you don't have love, it's pointless. Wow, then our prayers are probably pointless if they don't have love in them.
SPEAKER_01:Wow.
SPEAKER_02:So I think that's it's actually a huge point that our prayers that we pray for people or to God, like they need to be filled with love. Yeah, there needs to be that that relational peace. Because I don't know if you necessarily get love apart from relationship. I mean, I guess you you could technically, but more often than not, it comes through relationship.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Amen. Praise God for the Bible, not full of love. And I think it's worth noting too that genuine and authentic relationships take some time. Paul isn't just writing to a bunch of people who don't know him. These are his, I mean, people who he has deep affection for, people that he cares about, they care about him, and it actually took some time to cultivate relationship. And I think the more that that relationship was cultivated, the deeper the groans were in prayer. And I've I've seen that, and I think I mentioned it on the teaching. I pray for my family, unlike I pray for strangers. I I love strangers, I want them to know Jesus, but when I'm contending for my son or daughter who might be sick with a cold, I I I care about them, I love them, and so I'm willing to contend for them even when I wake up at 4 a.m. because they're sniffling or whatever it is. Like I'm willing to go in for them.
SPEAKER_02:So are we talking about the place of like emotions in prayer? Is that what we're talking about? Or are we talking about something slightly different? Because in my mind, like I'm just trying to figure that out of like when we say we want to pray from that place of caring, bearing their burdens, loving them. Like, is that an emotional state that we want to be in, like a heart posture that we want to be in, or is that something else? Is it more of like a mindset or something? Like, can we pe unpack that a little bit? Of what do you what is it supposed to look like or feel like when you're in that rhythm?
SPEAKER_00:I think it's probably both. I think it involves the emotions, it involves the mindset, it involves our our approach, it it involves involves diligence to like actually care and to write down somebody's prayer requests and to remember what they're doing. I think it involves a lot of those dynamics. So I don't know if I would say that it's emotional alone. Like we just need to be more emotional in prayer, and then it works.
SPEAKER_03:Right.
SPEAKER_00:I don't know if that's quite how it is, but I think it counts for something. Um, in the same way with how we approach it when we come to a prayer room or when we are praying in our own homes for people. I think it it matters how we have invested in the relationship. Whatever, I think it's just relational. We've invested in relationship, and that relationship exists. It's authentic, it's real. And so when we shift our focus to the Lord, what comes with that? Emotions come with that, um uh belief and faith come with that.
SPEAKER_02:Um I do agree. I think it's probably both. I mean, I think of like the different examples in the Bible where people cried out to Jesus for healing, right? And it the prayer is very often both a mental, like your Lord, the faith, the whole all of that. But then there's also typically a very strong emotion related to it, right? That drives the people to Jesus, or that I would think stirs his heart. It moves his compassion when he sees that emotion. And so I think it's part of it. I think, I mean, if it's a relationship, it's gonna be both, right? There's gonna be emotions in it, there's gonna be mind in it, it's gonna be all of the above.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And every part of it.
SPEAKER_00:I'm intrigued with the idea of how much is too much. How how much emotional investment do we sometimes have in those prayer requests? Because sometimes we can spread our own emotional health, our own mental health too thin in the place of prayer. Then instead of prayer becoming a place where we're recharged and refreshed and we meet the presence of God, it's a place where we've only poured out, and I think that that can have a toll on our physical body. I think of the stories of intercessors of old, like Daniel Nash is always one that comes to mind for me. And that that dude carried prayer so heavily. I called Daniel Nash a dude. Wow. Um he carried respect. Yeah. Carried prayer so intensely and so heavily. I think it took a legitimate toll on his body, which led to him dying before he was he he should have lived another 20, 30 years.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. No, 100%. It's a great question. I think of all the revivalists too throughout history that just wore themselves then. It's like sure they saw a lot of God move, but is that what God wanted? Like, is that healthy biblically? And I do wonder as we even as we start engaging more with relational intercession here at PyHop. Like, I wonder where's the point where we're gonna find that and be like, okay, we're we're doing this a little too much. Like we need to figure out a different outlet. I think it it's helpful though that we do the first 30 minutes of our prayer meeting in a door, right? Just in worship, because that allows you to you know receive from the Lord to just worship him. Then we go into the align, then we go into intercession, and then we go back into a door if we have a second prayer meeting after it. Yeah. So I think that rhythm is probably helpful, but yeah, I'm curious. I guess we'll find out as we go how much is too much. Yeah, man.
SPEAKER_00:People go through real stuff and heavy stuff, and I'm I'm nervous to think about when all of that happens all at once. It's one thing for that to happen in your own life, but when you have committed as a friend to intercede and to carry that with them, imagine if that happens with every friend kingdom connection we have all at once. Oh boy.
SPEAKER_02:That that would be wild.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So I think it's worth mentioning because there's there's definitely boundaries and wisdom that the Lord has for us as intercessors too.
SPEAKER_01:Come on.
SPEAKER_00:It's it's one thing to go make a whole bunch of friends and become everybody's best friend and pray for them, but it's also another thing to really learn boundaries and I think depth of relationship and how much you can carry um in those in the different depths of relationship.
SPEAKER_02:Come on. So good. Let's move on to that second portion where you talk about how this relational prayer kind of advances the kingdom, how it pushes forward the work of God.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Um, I think the key text you're using is 2 Corinthians 1 11. Out of that, I'll read it. It says, Well, my version's actually a little bit different, which is interesting.
SPEAKER_00:Uh you have the NIV?
SPEAKER_02:Naga C S B.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, cool. Read that one.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Uh it says he well, verse 10, he has delivered us from such a terrible death, and he will deliver us. We have put our hope in him that he will deliver us again while you join in helping us by your prayers. Then many will give thanks on our behalf for the gift that came to us through the prayers of many. Nice. And I I like use NASB, right? In there. I like the way N S B A B put it. N A S B. Woo. Um, the way it put it, it was the strongest of the translations that I read. Um, because it used the word if, and that hit me in your teaching. I was like, whoa, wait, what? If? Yeah, that's crazy, right? Because it's like we have put our hope in God that God will deliver us again if you join in helping us in our prayers. Yeah. And like, that's an intense statement for Paul the apostle to say, hey, we just went through some really rough stuff, and we believe God's gonna deliver us again, but only if you pray for us. Like he's effectively saying, if you don't pray for us, God's not gonna deliver us. Yeah. That's a strong statement. So I had to go back through all the other translations, and some say it more or less strong. Um, and SB's the strongest on that one, but it's all that similar idea of like the prayers are key in God delivering them, which is crazy, right? Because I mean, we think about it, this is the apostle Paul. Like, why don't you pray for yourself? That's what blows my mind. Yeah, right? Because like he could just pray for himself and he'd be fine, but there's something in him that knows I need your prayers for this to actually work. Yeah, why is that the case?
SPEAKER_00:Because of relational intercession.
SPEAKER_02:That's right.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I I love that too. If you pray, well, I think that Paul understood prayer and he understood partnership in prayer better than any of us do. He I in the table in the study notes, I just put all of these different examples of Paul asking people for prayer when he could have just done it himself, but he realized that it took the prayer of a couple more people along with his faith. Surely Paul wasn't saying, you guys pray so that I don't have to. Like I can just do the work and then you guys can be the prayer people, I'll be the do the work people. I think Paul was probably crying out for his life in many of these scenarios, yeah. And then asking, pray for me as well. So I think that he understood that when two or three are even joined together, not even in the physical location, but when they're together in agreement that God's presence can show up and do stuff, which is a is awesome. And I think we see that principle. I mean, I've heard so many stories of missionaries in this nation or that nation, and they send the text message, pray for us, we're about to be arrested. And they pray, and somehow they're miraculously delivered. Those types of things happen all of the time because I think that there's agreement there that flows out of genuine care, genuine relationship. So really, I think Paul realized that agreement matters in prayer. Agreement gets stuff done. When you attach your faith to mine, things happen.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, it's literally that verse like uh that John prays all the time. If two or more of you agree on as touching anything in this earth, it will be done for you by my father in heaven. Right. I think so. It's it's a very biblical thing that the power of agreement will affect change in the earth. Um, when I was reading this verse while I was looking through the different translations, I was like, I wonder what words are used there. Um the word if or while or as um isn't actually a word in the Hebrew or the Greek rather. And so that's why all the translations are a little bit different on what like word goes there specifically. But the next word, technically the first word in verse 11, uh is typically translated join and helping. And it's one word, and it's a really long Greek word that I'm not even gonna try to pronounce. But it basically means like to help together, right? So that this idea is the this is the only place it's used in the whole Bible, actually, which is fascinating. But it's this idea of helping, but helping something or someone together.
SPEAKER_01:Wow.
SPEAKER_02:And so I thought of uh just this last week, I was like at a summit conference, and there was like this big banner that we had outside, kept blowing over. And so someone asked me, they're like, Hey Brennan, can you help like bring the banner inside? I was like, Great, yeah, I can totally do that. But it's also way too big for me to just carry by myself, and so I was like, Hey, will you come out and help me carry the banner? And so I grabbed someone else, we both went out, we brought it back inside. And I think that's the picture that he's painting here, right? Is there's some goal, someone or something needs help. But we're not just gonna go there alone, right? This join in helping us is uh, hey, come together and let's both do this together, which is profound to me that he's saying that through prayers. Yes, right, because Paul is physically there, he's in the trenches doing it with his hands, with his feet, he's talking to people, he's doing this stuff, but he's saying, not just will you back me with your prayers, but will you do it together with me in your prayers, right? Just like I couldn't carry that banner in myself, yeah. He can't do this without someone else holding the other end. And it's not a that one is greater or lesser than the other. Both are meant to work in partnership and do it together through their prayers.
SPEAKER_00:So good. In the teaching I just talked about, how it's prayer is the real work. Prayer isn't, you know, Lord forgive us for all of the different categories that we've set up. These people are serving in their their business, these people are serving in their ministry, these people are serving in the home and the family, whatever it might be, and we think that it's all disconnected when really I think in God's mind, it's all together. Yeah. And prayer matters as much as preaching the gospel. And sometimes we elevate these things on the ladder of what's more important to God. Is it preaching the gospel? Is it discipling people? Yeah, is it um the mom at home? Is it the prayer people? And we we have a ranking system, all of us. We probably have a ranking system in our own minds. But I think what Paul is demonstrating is guys, prayer is important, and here I am trying to spread the gospel all over the world. I can't do this, I can't do that mission that God has assigned me, called me to do, unless you join in if you help me through prayer, if you join in the actual work that I'm doing through prayer. So prayer is important.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. And I think just to flip it the other way, though, as well, you can say the join in together or join in helping. It works both ways. We can't say that going and being the missionary is better than being the one praying for the missionary. But the same way, we can't say that one praying is better than the one doing the actual work, right? I think growing up in the House of Prayer culture, that's often been my mindset is the ones praying are doing the more important work, while those out there doing the actual stuff, you know, it's good, but it's not as important. Yeah, and that's just been my mindset. But that's that's goes against what this verse is saying because this verse is like, no, they're they're moving together, they're working together in this. Neither one's more important, neither one's more necessary. Both are needed. Yeah, I think you could do either one on its own. I mean, you could be a missionary without praying or anyone praying for you. You could pray without praying for anyone actually doing the work, but it just doesn't work as well.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:As when you have both together in partnership.
SPEAKER_00:I think it's God's strategy and God's design to put um, you know, specific assignments on the hearts of people. I'm gonna call you to serve in a prayer room for whatever amount of years. I'm gonna call you to the mission field for 10 days, for two years, for 50 years. And rather than looking at those as, oh, I could have done the other thing, I think it it's valuable for us to look at one another and say, what does God put in your heart? Because the dream that's in your heart was a dream that was first in his heart. There's a chorus Chelsea was singing over one of our kingdom connections this week. You'll provide for the dreams of your heart, God. If it was birthed in your heart, you'll provide for it. So I think we've got to look at one another and the assignments that we're on, not as um, that's the real work, that's like the the next tier work, or in in baseball they have the the triple-A teams, the farm teams. They haven't quite made it there yet. It's not really the real thing. It's you're the youth pastor, you're not the lead pastor. No, all of those assignments are dreams in God's heart that they they need to be interlinked and attached to all of the other parts of the body so that we can work together in one accord as the body of Christ. That's real unity, is when we can support one another in those missions. Instead of everybody trying to say, oh, you actually need to be uh the youth pastor, you actually need to be in the prayer room for 80,000 hours a week, or you actually need to be on the mission field, or you actually need to be um feeding the homeless. All of those things are dreams birthed in God's heart. How can we use what God is, what He's got burning in our heart to support that over there?
SPEAKER_02:What is he called you to is so key, but I think it there's two parts of this in my mind, right? Like the first is as an individual, you have to have that boundary lines and also the discernment to know what is God asked me to do. I'm not here to do everything because we can't. We are limited humans, we only have so much capacity, so much time, energy, money, all that stuff. And so, what is it that God is specifically asking me to do and go after that? Do that thing, don't be pulled aside by everyone else saying, hey, this is the most important, that's the most important, right? But I think too, um, of that one verse, couldn't tell you where it's at, um, but it talks about consider others as more important than yourselves. And yeah, this won't preach at all in the West, trust me. But what if our vision for advancing the kingdom was to consider others' people's visions as more important than ours? Yeah. Right? What if we say, all right, I'm gonna use the gifts that God's given me, the resources I have, what's your vision? Your vision is to go feed the homeless. How can I back your vision? What can I do to help your vision? Okay, what's your vision to pray, to build a prayer room? How can I back your vision? What can I do for your vision? Right. And I think if we get into that mindset and get out of the, I'm building my thing, I'm doing what God told me to do, and go a little bit more into the what has God told you to do, and how can I come behind you and help you with that? Which is so anti-everything our culture tells us to do, right? It grates against that so deeply. But but it's so biblical, right? I mean, it's part of relational intercession, it's part of the join and helping us in your prayers, right? They're not on the missions field with Paul. This isn't necessarily their thing. Yep. But Paul's like, hey, will you back me with my thing in your prayers? And let's do this thing together, right? So I think there's there's such a place for that of being willing to lay down our visions, our dreams, our plans in order to better the dreams, the visions, the plans of others.
SPEAKER_00:It's so good. That's such a good point. Um I I think of the verse, the James verse. I don't know how it ends, but it says where jealousy and selfish ambition exists, so does every sort of wicked thing or evil thing. Something like that. Go look it up. You guys, you guys know where that is in the book of James. Something like that. But I I think about how selfish ambition can really get us caught in our our own sort of world and not we don't look up. And in the teaching, I was getting a little vulnerable and saying, for a lot of years running a house of prayer, all I cared about was how do we get more prayer meetings? How do we get more hours? I felt, I felt my value in leading the ministry was how much I was doing, how many hours I was doing. And as we've sort of shifted some of the things over the past couple years, really, I've realized that partnering with God's heart and the dreams of his heart, even when they are not of a direct benefit to more hours in the prayer room, yeah, actually is advancing the overall mission. I always think of sports and team dynamics. It's football season, so we'll go with that.
SPEAKER_02:Come on.
SPEAKER_00:Nobody really wants to be the right tackle. They all want to be the quarterback. When we're in elementary school, everybody says, I get to be quarterback, and nobody's like signed up. I'll be the blocker. But that blocker is so important for the role of the quarterback. And together, if they both do their assignment in support, mutual support with one another, then the overall mission gets gets uh completed more effectively.
SPEAKER_02:Mm-hmm. Yeah. I mean, it's literally the body. Yeah. We keep coming back to that because it but it's such a biblical concept, and it's so what this looks like is I'm not the hand, right? I'm the elbow.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Right. But in order for the hand to properly function, the elbow's gotta be working together with the hand. It's gotta be supporting what the hand wants to do, where the hand needs to go. Yeah. Right. And so I think it's just so designed to be built like that, that all of the body, the different parts of Christ, the body of Christ in the world, it's meant to work together and not be the same, but love the differences. I think we we so often, when we try to do unity, we try to water down the differences and be like, let's come together and let's just not talk about all of these things that we disagree on and we do differently. Let's just talk about the things we do agree on.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Which is great. It's a good starting point. But I think real unity is when we come together and go, hey, you are very different than me. Let's talk about it. And I want to honor the way that you're different than me.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Because that's where the beauty is, is the fact that we are different, not the same, because we're different parts of the body.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Right now, obviously there are core things that are all the same because everybody's got the same DNA. Right. But the different specific roles and giftings and talents and time, energy, money, all that we have, like it's it's meant to work together in partnership, not just be an isolated thing.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Man, we need we need more of that. We've got to walk in that. Takes faith, takes self-denial, humility. It takes humility. I think truthfully, maybe some of those listening may not understand this, but if you have been to our prayer room and you've been to a prayer meeting that that we host, this might make sense. When we pray those prayers of alignment, I think that that's shifted something in our community. In the way, I mean, so many of the verses we pray are humility and love one another, and we pray those day in and day out. Yeah, I think that that's done something to the intercessors, a part of this community. That we've really stopped looking at our own desires or our own desire to just have a full prayer meeting, a big, big prayer community, and we've just started looking, Lord, we we want to deny ourselves and care about people in prayer right here and right now. I think it's done something praying those verses over our hearts day in and day out.
SPEAKER_02:I just wonder what it would look like if every praying community, and you know, I've we've been connected with those for a long time, so it's just where my mind goes. But like, what would it look like if every praying community, instead of just like you said, focusing on their vision, which it's not a bad thing, right? I I hear the vision of prayer communities, it's a good thing. The worth of Jesus, glorifying him, adoring him, advancing the kingdom of God through prayer. Yes, an amen to all of that. But it's not the most important thing, though, right? Like we're saying, like it's it's we have to join in helping together, right? It's not the most important thing, it's different parts of the body. But what would it look like if every prayer community reached out into the city and said, Hey, how can we back what other people are doing? Whether that's a church, a ministry, business leaders, marketplace leaders, politicians, whoever that might be, like what if the prayer communities, instead of becoming places where they're trying to pull people in, they're trying to push prayers out and be like, we're gonna become a place that's a resource, not just of teachings, but a resource of prayer to cover the different initiatives and people in our city, the people that we can actually have that relational connection with and then back them in prayer. Like I just wonder what would happen to the cities, but then also what would happen to the prayer communities. Like I've seen it start to transform ours.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:As we've started reaching out a little bit, and obviously we don't do it perfect, we're just figuring it out as we go. But but it's been beautiful seeing the prayer community go less inward because I feel like we get so focused on inside in ourselves, working ourselves out, and just we're constantly here, which isn't bad. There's contemplative prayer and all that's very good. Don't lose that. But the ability to go out and go, all right, let's let's do service, acts of service through prayer. Right. I think we we miss that so often in prayer rooms. We we get focused on just our connection with Jesus and we don't we forget the reaching out, the touching people in real and tangible ways. I just wonder, like, I dream about like what would happen if prayer communities could adopt their city in prayer in real and tangible ways, really praying for specific people's specific needs, like and not coming with an agenda of we want to do this to get more people in the prayer room to build our thing, but coming to go to like a local pastor and being like, Hey, how can we move your church forward? How can we cause your church to grow and get bigger and better? Like that's that would be beautiful. I feel like that could really change so many things if prayer communities, and obviously it's not just prayer communities, but that's just who I am. Sure. I've been a part of prayer communities for so long, so that's what comes to my mind. But I think it would be a beautiful thing.
SPEAKER_00:Is this is this not his strategy to build prayer rooms all over the place? To build praying people all over the place. We think of Malachi 111 and the glorious reality of him essentially saying, one day, it's not just gonna be about this temple in Jerusalem. It's gonna be people coming together and there's gonna be prayer and worship taking place everywhere. So wouldn't it make sense that God would strategically put people in cities, in regions, in communities, so that they could they could move the needle in that city, in that region, instead of all just going to one place and praying for one city, that it would expand and multiply all throughout the earth. I I have to believe that that's why God is doing it. Not so that we can all just do the same thing from afar and high five. Hey, you're worshiping Jesus. I mean, that's beautiful and it's glorious, but you're whoever's listening to this, wherever you're at, if you're in our city, come on, come to the prayer room. And if you're in a different city, you're in that city because God wants you to move the needle there through prayer, through preaching the gospel, through discipleship, through the local church, through all of it. He wants you to move the needle there in that place.
SPEAKER_02:All right, can I go money? Let's do it. Let's go there. So, because what you're talking about, right? We want to see prayer in every region, Malachi 111, every place across the earth. That's not happening right now, right? Maybe in like China and different places like that, where there's like an insanely large number of houses of prayer, they might have it covered. Yeah. Out here in the Western world, we're struggling, right? And what is the main issue for the vast majority of us? Yeah. Money.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:That's typically the biggest issue, right? We've talked about this so many times. The number of people we know that if we could look them in the eye and be like, hey, we'll pay you a full living wage to come and pray. How many people we know that would be like, absolutely, I am there. Because they're intercessors at heart. It's what they're called to do. They're meant to be the prayer arm of the body of Christ, but they can't do it because they don't have the money, right? And so I feel like money being the biggest block, what we're talking about here, there is a way to get around that. Yeah. Get around is a weird way to say it, but like to solve that, if you will. So we go to 2 Corinthians 9, uh, verse 10. Verse 10. Now the one who provides seed for the sower and bread for food will also provide and multiply your seed, increase the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way for all generosity, which produces thanksgiving to God through us. Right? So it talks about God's going to enrich you in every way for generosity. So he's going to give you things so you can give them away, which will produce thanksgiving to God. For the ministry of the service is not only supplying the needs of the saints, but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. So when we give, it results in the needs of the saints being met, but also thanksgiving to God. Because of the proof provided by this ministry, they will glorify God for the obedient confession of the gospel of Christ and for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone. And verse 14 ties into what we're saying. And as they pray on your behalf, they will have deep affection for you because of the surpassing grace of God in you. Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift. There's a cycle here that I think is meant to happen that we've we've missed in the body of Christ, and especially in the prayer movement, where we're meant to be ones praying into what others are doing. We're meant to pray into the missionary, we're meant to pray into the business leader, the marketplace leader, we're meant to pray into the ministry leader, the pastors, right? And that overflow that we have, God's enriched us with prayer, right? As praying communities, we are enriched in prayer. We know how to pray. We love prayer. We have time to pray, energy to pray, a space to pray. Not very many people have that. Yeah. I mean, I I've it was crazy awkward scenario. I was at a church and they were like, hey, everyone, gather around in small groups and pray for each other. And no one was really praying for each other in my group. So I just kind of went through and prayed for people because I'm like, someone needs to pray for these people. And they look at me and they're like, Brennan, you're like the LeBron James of praying. I was like, listen, that was not good prayers, trust me. But but it made me realize, like, wow, prayer is just not common in most of the body of Christ. So we are, as prayer communities, enriched in prayer. We have a wealth of it. And why do we have that, right? It says in verse 11, you're enriched in every way for all generosity. Yeah. So our we're given so much in prayer not to just keep it and hold on to it. I think that's why it's kind of rotting in us. We get bored of it, we get tired with prayer because we're just holding on to it. The point is we have a lot so we can give it. So we give away prayer, right? So we're meant to use that to give away our prayer, which it says, when you are enriched and you give away what you're enriched with, it produces thanksgiving to God. It produces glory, right? So I think of all the prayer communities in the US, let's say for now, if we are to take all the prayers that, you know, the enrichment that God gives us in the place of prayer and we give that away, then that's gonna result in all the people that we're praying for giving thanks to God. I'm stunned by how much it means to people that we look them in the eye and we say, Hey, we're praying for you.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And they know we're not just saying that, because so many people say it, but they're like, No, you're actually at prayer house. You actually do this stuff. Yeah, this is your job. And so they're so blessed by it. It means so much. And that results in them going, Oh my gosh, God, thank you for this team of intercessors, thank you for these people praying for me. And right, it results in that deep affection. They have deep affection for us, right? Because we're giving them out of the generosity of what we have, what God's given us. So it works that way, right? That's where it's kind of started with us is where you receive prayer and we're going, wait, we're not supposed to just be holding on to this, we're supposed to give it. Yeah. But then you flip it, because that's not necessarily the first way that this is meant to be interpreted. Totally. I'm taking a secondary application there. Primary application of this is the reverse.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Is God is enriching someone financially, right? And why does he enrich them financially? So that they don't just hold it, but they give it away, right? For generosity. They supply the needs of the saints. What happens? The people that receive the money give thanks to God, they give glory to God. And so if you can picture it, it's this beautiful cycle that occurs, right? Because we pray for them and we go, God, you know, bless them, back what they're doing, bless this marketing plan, the strategy, Lord. You know, give them this million dollars in sales that we're praying for Anne with We Love Creations, right? Where give them that, like, do it, God. And then they are blessed by that. They go, oh my gosh, there's intercessors praying. And so they go, Thank you, God. And God's name is glorified, right? That's incense arising. There's that prayer, that glory to God is happening in that location now. And so they give thanks. And then if they get the breakthrough, if they see it, that means they're enriched with money, right? Financially. And so they go, Okay, I'm enriched. I'm gonna give this back to the people that are praying because they don't have money. They have a lot of prayers, but they sure don't have money. Yeah, right. And so they they give us money because they don't have prayers, but they have money, right? So they give us money and we go, holy cow, praise God, because we need some money, right? In order to be able to do this prayer thing. And so it results in what? Thanksgiving to God again. Glory to God. We praise God, go, thank you. And so more incense happens from where we are.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And so if you if you continue that cycle, it's just gonna build a deeper and deeper bond, right? It talks about as they pray on your behalf, they'll have deep affection for you because of the surpassing grace of God in you. So, like when when they give money to us, we have deep affection for them. When we pray for them, they get deep affection for us, and it keeps building and growing, and it's just gonna go back and forth, and their business is gonna be advanced, and our prayer is gonna be advanced. Yeah, and if you build that, I could easily see every region in the US having prayer and having prayer that glorifies God. I could see it happening, I could see Malachi 111 practically happening because the barrier of money, finances, resources, it's no longer there. Yep. If we do this partnership thing where we're praying into it, they're blessing us financially, we're praying again, and it just goes back and forth. I just think that's I think that's God's strategy. Maybe I'm wrong, could be entirely wrong. But from what I'm seeing, it would make so much sense if God's strategy is for the prayer leaders and those with enriched in prayer, those enriched in money, work together to advance the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00:So good, man. I don't even know what I would add to that other than I think of David as a young man. He's a man after God's own heart. God sees him, anoints him king, enriches him with the wealth of a kingdom. Uh-huh. And David says, I'm going to use that wealth to fund night and day worship around my presence. And so with those resources, he does that. And then on top of that, he saves up for the for the glorious temple. He's in he's enriched and he fuels what was valuable when when that night and day worship was happening in their city, they were experiencing breakthrough. And then you see the pattern throughout um Israel's history. So I think that that's profound. I think um I always think about how when I started preaching, I was like 16 years old, and um my grandma had six other sisters, so I have a bunch of great aunts, and they all love Jesus and they're all so tender, and the moment you pray and the moment they get in God's presence, they're all crying, and it's the sweetest thing ever. But they would they would come listen to me preach when I s started, and I after I would get done preaching, I would give go give them all a hug, and they're all weeping, and then they're just giving me like$10 bills,$20 bills. I didn't ask for it, especially back then. I really didn't need it. But they were so thankful that they encountered God's presence. They were so happy that God was moving in me that it was a natural response for them to give a resource that they had.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And so I think I think being on the receiving end, I mean, the amount of times that we have seen people that looked at our mission who are not necessarily attached. They're not people that are in the prayer room with us day in and day out, but they see the mission and they say, I'm gonna give you some of my resource and bless your mission. That the amount of gratitude that comes into our hearts, yeah. I'll never forget. One time we got a really large gift out of nowhere, and we were like, it was the 11th hour. We didn't know how we were gonna afford to feed our family, we didn't know how we were gonna afford this space, and then we got a phone call and it changed everything. And me and Chelsea were so speechless and just wept because it was like, God, we're so grateful. You care about this. And that's the same sort of feeling that people get when we're willing to sew and invest into their mission with prayer. So I'm just I'm I still believe everything you said. It it's a cycle, it works together, and I think it advances both sides in a crazy way.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:I've always thought about night and day, 24-7 worship and prayer is this thing that we can reach for, and we just got to get people to love Jesus a whole bunch so that they'll all say yes to do it as long as they possibly can. That's part of it for sure. But I also think about where we're at legitimately in our little ministry with our little whatever 10, 12, however many hours a week we do. I think about how, oh, we've got all these friendships that we've built within our city and within our region. We need more prayer meetings to pray for them. We're running out of time. And then I think about how, oh no, we don't, you and I, me, you, Chelsea, and some of our intercessors, we don't have time. We're all working other jobs. We need, we need resources that can fund it and fuel it and grow the prayer movement. And as we do that, as we're able and able to do our assignment, then we can do that well and advance their mission, and it just works together in such a unique way. Like we are living in that right now. It's happening. What you just talked about is happening in in real time with us right now.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, it's crazy. And I feel like it's it's more than just prayer and financial resources. For sure. I think there's other areas. I think that's the one that we've landed on right now and gone, holy cow, this could work. Right. But I'm sure there's so many other resources in the body of Christ that we haven't even dreamed of yet, like serving, right? Like there, there's probably ways that money can impact serving, serving can impact money, prayer can impact serving, serving can impact prayer. That's good. And there's so many more ways you can connect the body of Christ. I think we're just highlighting one here that's like this, this is really powerful, and it it so like perfectly meets the needs of each other that like this this could really change so many things if we really got a hold of this. Yeah. And it's not been hard. Right. Like it's not hard to do absolutely because again, you're not operating out of lack, you're operating out of the abundance that God's given you. So good, right? And we we have abundance of prayer, so it's not hard to give a few of our prayer meetings to pray to these business leaders or missionaries or ministry leaders. In fact, it's really enjoyable once you get going. Yeah, some of the best prayer meetings we have are in that. Totally. Uh, and it's so, it's so beautiful. It's knit our hearts to people we we hardly know, right? Like I remember that one uh prayer meeting where uh we've been praying for uh good gracious mobile coffee, right? And we've been praying for them to like erase all the debt that they incurred to like start the business and start it up and all of that. We've been praying for that for months, right? And I remember we were in a prayer meeting, you know, I think there's four or five people in the room, and you like from the mic were like, hey, we just got word from Grace that she just erased all the debt, like it's gone. And we just rubbed it. We were like, heck yeah, yeah, it was such a moment of victory. Yeah, and it's like, have I met Grace? Yeah, once. Right, once in person, twice over Zoom. Yeah, and but we're so excited because it's like, nah, we we did that whole join together thing. That's not just Grace's mission anymore. Yeah, it's ours too. Yeah, because we're in that together, right? We're we're both carrying that banner because we want to see the vision, the mission that she has done with it. Like we want to see it advanced. Uh, it's so beautiful. Yeah, I I love, I love where we're at with this. I love where it's going.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. It's been so mind-blowing because I mean, even as we've prayed for marketplace leaders or ministry leaders or missionaries, sometimes we'll check the the account and see who's like donated. And it's some of those people that we've been praying for, and we didn't have like a conversation and say, hey, we need money. I mean, maybe they assume we we always need money, but we we didn't there was no there was no um you know direct conversation where hey, let's make this transaction. It's not a transactional thing, it's a relational thing entirely. Yeah, they felt the the thankfulness that's talked about there in chapter nine, and um they felt compelled to give what they had. And sometimes it, like you mentioned, it's financial. But I also think about for a season, uh, my barber who I've gone to for nine years now, he was just asking, hey, like what are you doing in life ministry? I just told him he's like, Oh, dude, I'll give you and your son free haircuts. And he just gave what he could. Like he he literally stepped back, looked at me, and said, I don't have money that I can give, like I don't have that to give to your to your mission, but I can give you guys a free haircut every month.
SPEAKER_01:Wow.
SPEAKER_00:And it was like, wow. I think about, oh, I know, I I don't want to open this can, but I think about the end times and when financial resources, and I think about how when you know the evil systems of the world start to take over and govern spheres of society, how though it may not be a financial resource, it may be a free haircut, it may be access to a well in your backyard, whatever it is. And I think about how if we were if we begin right here as prayer people, again, we bring this back to prayer people. That's probably who's listening to this. I don't know who else would listen to our as prayer people. If we begin to look at our commitment to prayer not only as a way to transform our hearts and align our hearts, but as a way to transform the city and the region around us, yeah, and build relationships, then I I believe that we will see God's economy flow the way he intends it to.
SPEAKER_02:Come on. And it's it's always out of abundance. Like I want to highlight that a lot, like because even you're you're talking about well, here, I'll just read the verse that I have in mind, right? 2 Corinthians 9, a little bit before the passage we just read, verse 6. This verse is used all the time talking about giving. The point is this the person who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, the person who sows generously will also reap generously. But then it's verse 7. Each person should do as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or out of compulsion, since God loves a cheerful giver.
SPEAKER_01:Wow, right?
SPEAKER_02:There it's never out of compulsion, it should never be out of this, hey, you really need to give to us or XYZ and you better do it. And there should be no twisting of arms. It should be an overflow of I have this in abundance, right? It's verse 11, you're enriched in every way for all generosity.
SPEAKER_01:Come on.
SPEAKER_02:Now I think of you know the guy giving you haircuts. What does he have an abundance of? Not really money, not really prayer. He has haircutting skills. Yeah, he has an abundance of that, he just does that for his job. Is that hard for him to be able to cut your hair? No, that's not a big deal for him. But for you, that's a huge deal because you don't know how to cut hair like that, right? You can't do that. You don't have the money to pay for that as much. And so it's such a blessing when he gives what he's enriched in. And so I think, yeah, that's just another example of so many ways where we give what we're enriched in to others to advance the mission, to advance the body of Christ. And it just results in that cycle of thanksgiving and glory to God all throughout.
SPEAKER_00:It's so good. I just have so much fresh faith right now because for going on 11 years now, we have kind of done the other model to sustain our ministry, Chelsea and our family's ministry. We have, I mean, tried to convince people that would you invest in this ministry? It's worth it. I promise. I promise. Prayer, prayer matters, worshiping Jesus night and day, it matters. And we've done that for 11 years. And God has been so good, so kind, so faithful for all of these 11 years, but I think he's revealed a better way, a way that's in alignment with the economy of his kingdom. And I'm living in the first fruits of it. I think we're living in the first fruits of it right now. But I'm dreaming so big with the Lord for our little city. I'm dreaming so big with the Lord for prayer communities throughout the earth. I think there's something to this, and um I'm excited for abundance.
SPEAKER_02:So someone's listening to this right now and they're like, this sounds great, but I have no idea how to do this. We said it was easy before. What does that look like? If someone's in a praying community or even not wants to start something like this, how do they do it? What's like a simple way to start this?
SPEAKER_00:This is what I would tell them. Find friends. Maybe they're business leaders, maybe they're ministry leaders, um, maybe they're a missionary. Find a friend who is who feels like they have a mission from God, an assignment from God.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Commit to meeting with them every month. If it's over Zoom, that's cool. If it's over coffee, even better. Meet with them every month and say, hey, how are things going in the business? What's what are like you celebrating right now? What are what are the roadblocks and how can I pray specifically for you? And then actually go to your prayer room, go to your prayer closet, and pray for them every single day. Every single day, 10 minutes. Doesn't take that much.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And then I would also say find a couple other people, two or three. If you're in a prayer meeting, they're probably there. Find two or three and commit to praying for them weekly together. Yeah, I would say do those three things. Meet with somebody monthly, commit to praying with other people for those people um weekly, and then pray every single day for them and see what the Lord does.
SPEAKER_02:Come on. Love it.
SPEAKER_00:Cool.
SPEAKER_02:All that's in there. God bless you.